A traditionalist Catholic bishop whose denial of the Holocaust created a scandal when Pope Benedict XVI rehabilitated him has died

Bishop Williamson’s public denial of the Jewish Holocaust became an additional roadblock to full communion with the Catholic Church as well as a source of deep tension within the SSPX.

Richard Williamson, a Catholic bishop known for his controversial denial of the Holocaust, has died at age 84. He was part of the Society of St. Pius X and was excommunicated in 1988, later rehabilitated by Pope Benedict XVI.

Ordained illicitly in 1988 by Archbishop Lefebvre, the auxiliary bishop of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X was expelled in 2012 after making Holocaust-denying statements. A free agent at the head of an ultra-traditionalist Catholic “resistance,