The Vatican has again warned the Priestly Society of St. Pius X, known as the SSPX, against ordaining new bishops on July 1 without papal mandate. It said Pope Leo XIV wants them “to reconsider” their “extremely grave decision.”

The firm admonition came in a statement from Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, the prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith. It was issued in Italian by the Holy See’s Press Office on May 13. 

“With regard to the Priestly Fraternity of St. Pius X,” the cardinal said, “we reiterate what has already been communicated: that the episcopal ordinations announced by the Priestly Fraternity of St. Pius X do not have the corresponding papal mandate.”

He informed the SSPX that if it ordained bishops without the papal mandate, as the group announced in February that it plans to do on July 1 of this year, it would commit “a schismatic act” and said that such “a formal adhesion to schism would constitute a grave offense against God” and “entails excommunication.”

He said Pope Leo “continues in his prayers to ask the Holy Spirit to enlighten the leaders of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Pius X so that they may reconsider the extremely grave decision they have taken.”

On Feb. 2, 2026, the SSPX first announced its intention to ordain four bishops on July 1, after it failed to get a meeting with Pope Leo or a satisfactory answer to a letter it sent to the Vatican.

Ten days later, on Feb. 12, Cardinal Fernández received Father Davide Pagliarani, the superior of the SSPX, to discuss the situation and offered a way forward through “a specifically theological dialogue” to resolve the decades-long division between the Priestly Society of St. Pius X and the Holy See. 

[Podcast: The Vatican and SSPX controversy, explained]

Immediately after that meeting, the D.D.F. issued a statement, recalled in today’s communique, in which Cardinal Fernández reaffirmed the Holy See’s position that “the ordination of Bishops without the mandate of the Holy Father, who holds supreme ordinary power, which is full, universal, immediate and direct (cf. CDC, can. 331; Dogmatic Constitution ‘Pastor Aeternus,’ chapters I and III), would imply a decisive rupture of ecclesial communion (schism) with grave consequences for the Fraternity as a whole.”

Pope John Paul had also stated this in July 1988 at the time of the first illicit ordinations by the SSPX under Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. Indeed, since the archbishop founded the society in 1970, it has had problems accepting the full teachings of the Second Vatican Council, not only on liturgy but also on ecumenism, religious liberty, interreligious dialogue and aspects of the council’s ecclesiology.

A week after the Feb. 12 meeting, the SSPX issued a statement in which it reaffirmed its intention to move forward with the episcopal ordinations on July 1.

Today’s statement from Cardinal Fernández appears to be a last-ditch attempt to get the SSPX leadership to step back from a schismatic act that would have negative consequences for the whole society. According to its website, the SSPX has more than half a million members, including two bishops, over 700 priests and some 200 seminarians, in 60 countries. 

The schismatic act would also bring automatic excommunication to both the consecrating bishops and those who are illicitly ordained. Bishop Bernard Fellay and Bishop Alfonso de Galarreta—who were previously excommunicated under John Paul II in 1988 but whose excommunications were lifted by Pope Benedict in January 2009—are expected to ordain the new bishops. If they go ahead with the ordinations, they would be automatically excommunicated again. 

Gerard O’Connell is America’s senior Vatican correspondent and author of The Election of Pope Francis: An Inside Story of the Conclave That Changed History. He has been covering the Vatican since 1985.