In letter, pope responds to criticisms over Lefebvrite decision

John Thavis at Catholic News Service:

Pope Benedict XVI has written a letter to the world's bishops defending his decision to lift the excommunications of four traditionalist bishops and expressing regret that it gave rise to misunderstandings and polemics, according to Italian newspapers.

The pope said the controversy over Bishop Richard Williamson's statements denying the extent of the Holocaust was "a misadventure that was for me unforeseeable" and acknowledged that the Vatican should have paid more attention to information easily available on the Internet, the reports said.

The pope said he was particularly saddened at the reaction of some Catholics who seemed willing to believe he was changing direction on Catholic-Jewish relations and were ready to "strike at me with hostility."

... As for the Society of St. Pius X, he said the church cannot ignore a community of believers that has 491 priests, 215 seminarians and thousands of faithful.

Rorate Caeli is on the story big time, including what they claim is a complete text in German.

update 2 - NLM has what appears to be the final full-version of the ENGLISH-LANGUAGE text (which includes four more paragraphs) {ph/t: Gregor}.