I’m confused.  How does the Catholic Online report linked:

An announcement could be made soon after Easter this year. Pope Benedict XVI has taken a personal interest in the matter and has linked the issue to the year of St Paul…..We set forth our original story below believing that the sources reporting this exciting news and the history of the dialogue support its accuracy

Square with the report from the CDF spokesman in the National Catholic Register report?

A Vatican source has denied rumors that Rome has decided to create a personal prelature for members of the Traditional Anglican Communion…But Rome has not reached a decision to create a similar personal prelature for the Traditional Anglican Communion, according to an official at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith who spoke today with Register correspondent Edward Pentin.

Said the official, “It’s something that has appeared on the blogosphere and then been reiterated, but the truth is nothing’s been decided

Beats me.

Reports have abounded for awhile now. I’d go with the official at the congregation.

I’ll go with an official in-the-open Vatican announcement if and when it is made.  We appear to have dueling sources within or near to the CDF.

A personal prelature for TAC? I’ll believe it when I see it.

Time to calm the excitement, folks.  This is just so typical of blogosphere.  One site reports what another says, then another site reports the same thing and a feeding frenzy ensues with multiple reports all relying on the same original rumour.  Quite bluntly, there is no hard evidence of any kind, and for reasons I posted elsewhere on this site in relation to an earlier report, I think it is most unlikely to happen.

The story is dead. Rome has denied the rumor.

http://www.ncregister.com/daily/anglican_rumors_denied/

An unnamed source within the CDF does not constitute Rome denying the rumour. If anything the original ‘leaking’ of the story may have been a straw in the wind for a latter official declaration.

This strikes me as rumor and hearsay, but assuming for the moment it is true, I don’t quite understand this chain of event. I have a friend of mine who is a member the TAC, and I actually went with him one time to a church service. As I recall, about 3/4’s or more of the congregation were completely disgruntled, former clergy.

I’ve randomly attended one SSPX churches as well, though unknowningly until after mass when the priest started handing me a bunch of literature saying that Vatican II was an evil Protestant conspiracy. And then I discovered what it was. I assumed going it that it was a parish church of the Fraternity of St. Peter, the Tridentine rite order that is overseen by the Vatican and has a seminary in Nebraska.

Maybe that was just this one particular congregation, but from what I know of the TAC and the SSPX, I don’t understand why the Pope would go out of his way to cater to groups like this. SSPX is a Catholic break off group, so at least that’s “in the family” as it were. But, a Prelature to TAC as a group does not make any sense to me at all.

Archer,

My experience of SSPX (limited) is about like yours, but the good shepherd goes after the lost sheep, you know. From what I can see, there have already been good fruit borne by this ever-so-slight rapprochement.