Catholic rebels say cannot rejoin Roman Church

By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Catholic traditionalists who broke with Rome two decades ago have said they could not rejoin the Church despite Pope Benedict's revival of the old Latin Mass because he still supported key reforms from the 1960s.

The Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), which pressured the Vatican for years to promote the Tridentine Latin rite rarely used since the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965), said over the weekend it still wanted Benedict to roll back other changes.

The SSPX rejects the opening to other faiths decided by the Council, especially the new positive approach to Judaism, and papal apologies for sins of Catholics against Jews in the past.

Benedict last year allowed wider use of the old Latin Mass in what was seen as a gesture to the SSPX to rejoin the Church that excommunicated its leaders when rebel Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre ordained four bishops against Rome's wishes in 1988.

During his current visit to the United States, Benedict visited a New York synagogue and quoted documents of the Council several times in speeches to Catholic audiences.

"The time for an agreement has not yet come," SSPX head Bishop Bernard Fellay wrote in a letter to his followers published on Saturday by the SSPX information service DICI.

The decree on the old Latin Mass was "not accompanied by logically co-related measures in the other areas of the life of the Church," he said in the French-language letter.

"Nothing has changed in Rome's determination to follow the council's orientation, despite 40 years of crisis, despite the deserted convents, abandoned rectories and empty churches."