The head of the  the traditionalist Society of St Pius X has described Jewish people “enemies of the Church."

Bishop Bernard Fellay, the society’s superior general, said that Jewish leaders' support of the Second Vatican Council “shows that Vatican II is their thing, not the Church’s."

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The society's superior general claimed that those opposed to Rome granting canonical recognition to the SSPX have been “the enemies of the Church: the Jews, the Masons, the modernists."

He said these people, “who are outside of the Church, who over centuries have been enemies of the Church."

Bishop Felley made the comments during a talk at  at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Academy in New Hamburg, Ontario, Canada.

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The Society of St. Pius X was founded by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in 1970 in response to what he described as errors that had crept into the church after the second Vatican council. The organization's relations with Rome became strained in 1988 after Archbishop Lefebvre consecrated four bishops against the orders of Pope John Paul II.

Pope Benedict XVI has declared that the SSPX has no canonical status in the Catholic Church.