Vatican doctrine czar confirms negotiations with traditionalists dead, won't negotiate faith

VATICAN CITY – The Vatican's new doctrine czar says negotiations to bring back a breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics are dead and that no new talks are planned.

Reconciling with the Society of St. Pius X — thus ending the only formal schism created since the Second Vatican Council in 1962 — had been a priority of Pope Benedict XVI since his tenure heading the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

However, the office's new chief, Monsignor Gerhard Ludwig Mueller, told Germany's Norddeutscher Rundfunk broadcaster that "the talks are closed and I don't believe there are new ones."

The late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre founded the society in 1969, opposed to Vatican II's introduction of Mass in the vernacular and outreach to Jews. In 1988, the Vatican excommunicated Lefebvre and four bishops.