Vatican City, Jan 26, 2009 / 09:01 am
In an editorial this Sunday, the L’Osservatore Romano underscored that the decision by Pope Benedict XVI to life the excommunications of four bishops ordained by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre is a “gesture of mercy” that should encourage the members of the Society of St. Pius X to embrace the Second Vatican Council, which “half a century after its announcement is sill alive in the Church.”
The editorial notes that “half a century ago, on January 25, 1959, the announcement of Vatican II by John XXIII was a great surprise which went beyond the confines of the Catholic Church. By the next day, the Archbishop of Milan—who in 1963 would become Paul VI—defined the future Council as an ‘historic event of enormous importance’, that is, ‘important today, tomorrow, important for the nations and for human hearts, important for all the Church and for all of humanity.”