(ZENIT News / Rome, 30.09.2024).- On Thursday, September 26, the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter (FSSP) issued a press release stating that it “was recently informed by the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life of the opening of an Apostolic Visit to the Fraternity.” It also assured that the Prefect himself of this Dicastery clarified to the Superior General and to his Assistants, during a meeting in Rome, that the Visit did not originate in any problem of the Fraternity but intended that the Dicastery learn who we are, how we are and how we live, in order to aid us in anything we might need.”
The Fraternity’s last ordinary Apostolic Visit, by the Ecclesia Dei Commission, took place in 2014. Given that the [Congregation] for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life was in charge of the FSSP and of other former Ecclesia Dei Institutes for three years, now it is the competence of this Dicastery to be in charge of the FSSP.
Four days later, the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life issued a press release about this. Stated in the press release was that “on September 12, 2024 an Apostolic Visit was made to the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter to deepen knowledge of this Society of Apostolic Life of Pontifical Right and to offer it more timely aid on the path of following Christ,” adding that “This Apostolic Visit is carried out in the context of the process of accompaniment of the Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life erected by the Ecclesia Dei Pontifical Commission that, with the Motu Proprio Traditionis Custodes of Pope Francis (July 16, 2021), have passed to the competence of this Dicastery.”
The Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter is a Society of Apostolic Life of Pontifical Right, namely, a Community of Priests, who do not take religious vows, but who work together for a common mission in the Catholic Church, under the authority of the Holy See. The Fraternity has a twofold mission: in the first lace, the formation and sanctification of priests and, in the second place, the care of souls and pastoral activity at the service of the Church. The Fraternity of Saint Peter fulfils this mission by using the Liturgical Books current in 1962, as specified in the Decree of its erection in 1988, confirmed by Pope Francis’ Decree on February 11, 2022.
The Fraternity was founded on July 18, 1988 in the Abbey of Hauterive, Switzerland by a dozen priests and some twenty seminarians. Shortly after the Fraternity’s foundation and at the request of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, Bishop Josef Stimpfle of Augsburg, Germany, granted the Fraternity headquarters in Wigratzbad, a Marian Shrine in Bavaria. It’s here where the Fraternity’s European Seminary is located and it is the Community’s Motherhouse; its General House is in Fribourg, Switzerland. At present, the Fraternity has some 368 priests and 201 seminarians.
