The Pius X bunch will find something wrong with what ever is said by ANY Pope, about ANYTHING. That is what they do. They will always be stuck in the 70s, and will always consider themselves victims. I hope that they find Peace and Salvation. They do not WANT to be part of the Catholic Church, and will always stand apart from it. They are what they are.

When a person talks to some of today's "Christians", it is hard to tell if they have even read the New testament. It seems as if they are stuck in the Old Testament and want everyone to think as they do. As society in general is changing, the Church too must adapt. The basics will always be there. The Ten Commandments, The Golden Rule, The Trinity, Salvation. What must be looked at are the rules and customs that have been passed down over the years. Many of these were made in response to a need at some time in the past. It is not up to us to pass judgment on these rules, but it is up to us (The Magisterium) to review them and make changes as needed. There are many who will fight any change to the death. That is their choice, but not changing some of the old rules will result in a dying Church. The Church is not here to perpetuate the Hierarchy, It is here to serve the needs of the people. What I just said is heresy to many, but it is the Truth, and must be discussed if the Church is to survive and fulfill the mission that Christ gave it.

What you were saying brought to mind this part of Acts 15;

I think what they're basically saying was converts didn't need to do all that extraneous stuff, that there's just a few things they needed to do. I think they recognized that if the faith didn't adapt, if they made it too difficult to become part of the new faith that Christ started then it wouldn't work out in the long run, that the faith wouldn't grow and spread without converts from outside of Judaism.

I think it's what some of the best Popes of the last 100 years saw - that the Catholic church was laying down to many heavy burdens that benefited no one and wasn't keeping up with the times. They saw that in order for the faith to survive it must adapt and dispense with the burdens that really didn't do anything good. Of course the conservative reactionaries have been trying to stop that from happening even before the Second Vatican Council. And now are throwing fits that there's a Pope in charge who at least wants to see some adaptation to modern times on the part of the church.

I hope the SSPX realizes that the Popes reached out to THEM and took a lot of flak for it from a lot of people all over the political spectrum. And if they want to slap that hand away it's all on them now.