Under article 3, the local bishop is tasked …
§5. to proceed suitably to verify that the parishes canonically erected for the benefit of these faithful are effective for their spiritual growth, and to determine whether or not to retain them;
This seems to strike a middle ground between benign neglect and assuming all is well. A few things to note:
- Growth in numbers is not mentioned, at least not the specifics of a community’s population.
- Specifics aren’t mentioned in the line of spiritual life, so it remains subject to the judgment of the bishop.
- How might a bishop make judgments? I suppose the first marker would be a community’s attention to his pastoral letters, or observance of diocesan initiatives. If a bishop declared a year for St Joseph or the Eucharist, for example. If a bishop organized a synod. Were these events embraced by a TLM community, or passed over?
The final judgment remains: will a TLM community remain as it has been? The local bishop decides.
The approved English translation is here.
