Servants of the Holy Family (S.S.F. from Latin: Servi Sanctae Familiae) is a semi-contemplative, traditional Catholicreligious community of men located in Colorado Springs, Colorado (USA). Membership includes priests, seminarians and brothers. Servants of the Holy Family (SHF) was the first traditional Latin Mass religious community for men begun in the United States.[1] The introduction of the Mass of Paul VI was a catalyst for such foundations in the Church.[2] SHF's website states that it is faithful to the traditional Latin Mass and Catholic doctrine and morals[3] and claims to be endorsed by Catholic Bishops worldwide who support the traditional Latin Mass.[4]
SHF was founded in 1977 on the feast of the Holy Family and was placed under the patronage of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. The community has been located in Colorado since February 1977. The motherhouse with its chapel is situated on ten acres of land south of the Black Forest near the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado.[5] The church’s adherence to Catholic orthodoxy has drawn many devout Catholics looking for a more traditional service; many congregants moved to Black Forest, in part, to attend, former members said.[6]
Their stated purpose is "to aspire after and achieve by the grace of God the sanctification of its members and the salvation of souls through their prayers, sacrifices and apostolate". It intends to accomplish this chiefly by attachment to the Holy Sacrifice of the traditional Latin Mass and to the Roman Breviary. Other important devotions observed by all the members are Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, the frequent reception of the sacrament of Penance, keeping days of recollection on a regular basis, and praying the Holy Rosary with one of the approved litanies daily. Also, frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament as well as mental prayer and spiritual reading are considered most important for all of the members, who are to regard holiness of life as their primary objective. According to their website, their apostolate is the salvation of souls through the Mass, the Catholic Liturgy, the dispensing of the Sacraments, traditional Catholic sermons, morality, the spiritual life, and teaching of the Baltimore catechism.[7] They allow the public to attend many of their liturgical ceremonies.[8]
Apostolic Works
Traditional Latin Mass - The Elevation
According to their website, the liturgical life of Servants of the Holy Family is based on the traditional Latin Mass, which is offered exclusively at the SHF chapel.[9] SHF also offers Masses and Gregorian Masses, using the traditional Latin Mass, for the faithful who request them.[10]
Serving at the Altar
For the perpetuating of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and for serving at the Holy Altar, SHF has, since its inception, prepared men for the priesthood. The traditional program combines the minor seminary and major seminary curriculum and encompasses high school courses, philosophy and theology.[11]
The imparting of traditional Catholic doctrine and morals is accomplished mainly through sermons. SHF has a sermon program which began in the 1970s. Recordings of sermons were first distributed using cassette tapes and then compact discs, but are now available on their website since 2002. SHF makes additional sources of doctrine and morals available on their website, such as live stream of Masses and ceremonies in the chapel, daily saints' biographies, social media videos, seasonal sermons, unpublished sermons from their archives, spiritual booklets,[12] online classes, and links to saint's videos, through an annual membership. Their spiritual messages highlight features according to the liturgical days, and prayer intentions can also be sent.[13]
To further assist in explaining the truths of the Church, SHF has been active in catechetical work using the Internet to reach people domestically and internationally. SHF popularized the use of the Fr. Connell edition of the Baltimore Catechism #3 and created the Kindle version of it.[14] They have produced an online series of talks about the Catholic Faith which is based on the Baltimore Catechism.[15]
SHF publishes a Liturgical Calendar which gives the accurate daily schedule of the Church’s worship throughout the year and includes devotional art and a mini-catechism section with prayers.[16]
SHF recorded a compact disc of inspirational Gregorian chant and polyphonic music intended to enhance appreciation of the Sacred Liturgy in the Church.[17]
History
Besides its internal life as a religious community and its apostolic work, SHF has been involved with other Church issues.
In 1983, SHF was contacted by ArchbishopMarcel Lefebvre,[18] superior of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), and Father Clarence Kelly, who had recently been separated from the SSPX with eight other priests. Lefebvre was seeking help because of this division and other internal problems in the SSPX. Kelly was looking for mediation between his group and the SSPX. SHF assisted both during these negotiations.[19]
SHF met In 1989 at the Vatican with Augustin Cardinal Mayer, first president of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei. Subsequently, Cardinal Mayer appointed then-Archbishop (later Cardinal) J. Francis Stafford of Denver as his representative to visit SHF, have meetings with them and report back to the Commission. In 2008, Cardinal Darío Castrillón Hoyos, then president of the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei, appointed Bishop James D. Conley as the Commission's Special Delegate to SHF from the Vatican. [20]
Bishop and the confirmed after Confirmation ceremony
SHF received new priest members when its seminarians were ordained by a visiting Catholic bishop in 1995. In 2013, Bishop Michael John Sheridan, the Bishop of Colorado Springs where the community is based, issued a document declaring that the SHF community was, "...not in good standing with the diocesan or universal Catholic Church". In this declaration, Sheridan cited canon law to illustrate that the community could not validly or licitly celebrate certain sacraments.[21] In the following years, anonymous Catholic bishops who visited the community confirmed people who attended Mass at the SHF chapel. In 2018, another unnamed bishop gave tonsure and full minor orders, and in 2020, another unnamed bishop performed confirmations and ordination to the Holy Priesthood. In 2024, the founding Father, Anthony Ward was consecrated as a bishop by an anonymous retired archbishop. [22] Some people guess that Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano is the retired archbishop who consecrated Ward as a bishop.
↑ Lefebvre, Marcel (28 April 1983). Conference at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary. p.4.4.
↑ Kelly, Clarence (June 1983). Kelly, Clarence (ed.). "Thoughts On My Ten Years As A Priest". The Bulletin. Oyster Bay, New York: Society of St. Pius V: 1–2.
↑ Paci, Stefano M. (June 1989). Moynihan, Ph.D., Robert (ed.). "Obstacle Course For His Eminence". 30 Days: 47.
↑ Our Bishops (Per this web page, "All of the bishops who have helped us throughout the years are listed in the Annuario Pontificio (Pontifical Annual) which is the official directory from the Holy See of Rome.")
Sedevacantism is a traditionalist Catholic movement which holds that since the death of Pius XII the occupiers of the Holy See are not valid popes due to their espousal of one or more heresies and that, for lack of a valid pope, the See of Rome is vacant. Sedevacantism owes its origins to the rejection of the theological and disciplinary changes implemented following the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965).
Mass is the main Eucharistic liturgical service in many forms of Western Christianity. The term Mass is commonly used in the Catholic Church, Western Rite Orthodoxy, Old Catholicism, and Independent Catholicism. The term is also used in some Lutheran churches, as well as in some Anglican churches, and on rare occasion by other Protestant churches.
Marcel François Marie Joseph Lefebvre was a French Catholic archbishop who influenced modern traditionalist Catholicism. In 1970, five years after the close of the Second Vatican Council, he founded the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), a community to train seminarians in the traditional manner, in the village of Écône, Switzerland. In 1988, Pope John Paul II declared that Archbishop Lefebvre had "incurred the grave penalty of excommunication envisaged by ecclesiastical law" for consecrating four bishops against the pope's express prohibition but, according to Lefebvre, in reliance on an "agreement given by the Holy See ... for the consecration of one bishop."
Traditionalist Catholicism is a movement that emphasizes beliefs, practices, customs, traditions, liturgical forms, devotions and presentations of teaching associated with the Catholic Church before the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). Traditionalist Catholics particularly emphasize the Tridentine Mass, the Roman Rite liturgy largely replaced in general use by the post-Second Vatican Council Mass of Paul VI.
The Society of Saint Pius X is a canonically irregular traditionalist Catholic fraternity of priests founded in 1970 by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. Lefebvre was a leading traditionalist at the Second Vatican Council with the Coetus Internationalis Patrum and Superior General of the Holy Ghost Fathers until 1968. The society was initially established as a pious union of the Catholic Church with the permission of François Charrière, the Bishop of Lausanne, Geneva and Fribourg in Switzerland.
The Society of Saint Pius V is a traditionalist Catholic society of priests, formed in 1983, and based in Oyster Bay Cove, New York, United States. The society broke away from the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) over liturgical issues.
Ecclesia Dei is the document Pope John Paul II issued on 2 July 1988 in reaction to the Ecône consecrations, in which four priests of the Society of Saint Pius X were ordained as bishops despite an express prohibition by the Holy See. The consecrating bishop and the four priests consecrated were excommunicated. John Paul called for unity and established the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei to foster a dialogue with those associated with the consecrations who hoped to maintain both loyalty to the papacy and their attachment to traditional liturgical forms.
The Roman Rite is the most common ritual family for performing the ecclesiastical services of the Latin Church, the largest of the sui iuris particular churches that comprise the Catholic Church. The Roman Rite governs rites such as the Roman Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours as well as the manner in which sacraments and blessings are performed.
Fernando Arêas Rifan is a bishop of the Roman Catholic Church from Campos, Brazil. Since December 2002 he has been the Apostolic Administrator of the Personal Apostolic Administration of Saint John Mary Vianney, also known as the Priestly Union of Saint Jean-Marie Vianney. For some years before 2001 he was allied with Priestly Union when it defied the Holy See by routinely using unauthorized liturgical forms and associated with the Society of St. Pius X. He helped negotiate the reconciliation of the Priestly Union with the Holy See in 2001.
Antônio de Castro Mayer was a Brazilian prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. A Traditionalist Catholic and ally of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, he was Bishop of Campos from 1949 until his resignation in 1981.
The Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei was a commission of the Catholic Church established by Pope John Paul II's motu proprioEcclesia Dei of 2 July 1988 for the care of those former followers of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre who broke with him as a result of his consecration of four priests of his Society of St. Pius X as bishops on 30 June 1988, an act that the Holy See deemed illicit and a schismatic act. It was also tasked with trying to return to full communion with the Holy See those traditionalist Catholics who are in a state of separation, of whom the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) is foremost, and of helping to satisfy just aspirations of people unconnected with these groups who want to keep alive the pre-1970 Roman Rite liturgy.
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