Question Corner: Why are SSPX confessions invalid?

Q: Why is it that when the SSPX says Mass, it’s only illicit, but now going to confession with them would be not only illicit but also invalid?

A: The short answer is because the sacrament of penance has a much stronger juridical or “legal” dimension than most of the other sacraments.

For reference, keep in mind that a sacrament is “valid” if it actually “works,” whereas it is “licit” if it is celebrated in a circumstance permitted by the Church.

Some sacraments still “work” even if they are administered in unlawful circumstances. For instance, normally a priest or deacon is the only licit minister of baptism. But since ultimately holy orders are not needed in order to confer baptism, anyone with the intention to baptize, whether ordained or not, can still impart a real baptism as long as he or she uses water and the correct prayer.

Similarly, a priest who is not in good standing might be officially forbidden from celebrating Mass, but the simple fact of his priesthood still leaves him capable of confecting the Eucharist.

However, other sacraments are of such a nature where their validity is directly dependent on their licit celebration. These sacraments require the proper “faculties,” a canonical term which refers to official permission from the proper apostolic authority, typically the local diocesan bishop.

The sacrament of penance requires faculties for its valid celebration, because in addition to being a sacrament of healing, it also pertains to justice. As we all know, while we can forgive those who have wronged us personally, we normally cannot offer forgiveness on behalf of a third party who was injured by another. Our sins are often an offense against our neighbor, but they are always and also an offense to God.

Christ, as God, could forgive sins. And in order to continue his saving mission beyond the time when he would personally walk the earth, he explicitly “delegated” this power to his apostles (see Jn 20:23). This original “faculty” from Jesus was handed down to the successors of the apostles — our modern-day bishops who are in communion with the pope as the successor to St. Peter. Today’s diocesan bishops can essentially “sub-delegate” this apostolic power to forgive sins to the priests who are their co-workers in ministry.

When the SSPX originally fractured their union with Rome when they first ordained bishops without the permission of the Holy Father in 1988, none of their priests were in a position to obtain the faculty to validly absolve sins in the context of a sacramental confession, that is, apart from situations involving immediate danger of death, where the Church’s universal law gives anyone who has ever been ordained a priest the power to absolve sins in that limited instance.

Or in other words, especially after 1988, none of the priests of the Society were “incardinated” or officially part of an actual diocese, nor were they members of a recognized religious order. Thus, none of their priests had the kind of relationship with a bishop or other ecclesiastical superior who could have given them the needed faculties to absolve sins, so they celebrated the sacrament of reconciliation invalidly.

As a special favor for the Year of Mercy in 2015 to 2016, Pope Francis granted the faculty to confer absolution to all the priests of the SSPX. In the hope of an eventual reconciliation with the SSPX, Pope Francis then extended this faculty indefinitely at the conclusion of that special jubilee year.

However, with the note that was published on July 2, 2026, it now appears that this faculty has been revoked as a logical consequence of the schismatic act of ordaining new bishops without a mandate.

While on a very technical level some canon lawyers question whether the faculty has been officially revoked at this point, what is not disputed is that the SSPX are no longer in any sort of communion with the Church and the faithful should not approach them for confession.

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