The Roman Catholic Church likes to describe herself as mater et magistra — mother and teacher — an institution whose scale and antiquity are supposed to make possible a patience no smaller body could afford. Whatever verdict history eventually renders on the theology of the Society of Saint Pius X, the documentary record of the eleven months preceding 1 July 2026 does not show that patience being exercised.

SSPX vs. Holy See: There is a word the English keep for a certain genre of marital combat: the domestic. It is the row the neighbours hear through the partition wall — the raised voices, the slammed door, and, at the climax, the unmistakable timpani of crockery making contact with plaster. Nobody calls the police. Everybody listens. And the next morning, over the fence, the verdict is delivered: Did you hear them last night?😁