A controversial group of ultra- traditional Catholics ordained three priests on Saturday, defying opposition from the Vatican.The Society of St Pius X (SSPX) made headlines last year when it emerged that a senior member, British Bishop Richard Williamson, had made remarks questioning the extent of the Holocaust.
The criticism also targeted the Vatican, where Pope Benedict XVI had ended the excommunication of Williamson and three other SSPX leaders weeks earlier.
On Saturday, the SSPX's superior general, Bishop Bernard Fellay, ordained three men from Italy, Sweden and the Czech Republic as priests.
The Vatican has previously denied the SSPX the right to ordain priests.
The head of the seminary, Father Stefan Frey, had rejected criticism in a previously published website entry.
"Such consecrations belong fundamentally to the life of a church community," Frey had written.
The brotherhood said around 2,500 followers came to witness the ordination at their seminary in Zaitzkofen, near the southern German town of Regensburg.
SSPX is made up of people who reject modern developments in Catholic practice, including those of the so-called Second Vatican Council reform process in the 1960s.
Earlier this year, Williamson was fined by a German court for his denial that the Nazis had systematically murdered millions of Jews.
SIC: ET