Return to Tradition says extraordinary ministers began “in defiance of the Vatican”. Rome itself created them in 1973

The instruction Immensae caritatis (29 January 1973) of the Sacred Congregation for the Discipline of the Sacraments states that “Pope Paul VI has decided it opportune to authorize special ministers” and gives local Ordinaries the faculty to appoint them, among other cases “whenever the number of faithful wishing to receive communion is so great that the celebration of Mass or the giving of communion outside Mass would take too long” (text). The norms were issued, it says, in response to requests from several bishops’ conferences.

Later Vatican documents stress that these ministers are extraordinary and are to be used only when there is real necessity, and they reprove their routine use (Redemptionis Sacramentum 151–158). Stine’s criticism of how widely they are used is a fair argument; the claim that they began against the Vatican’s will is not.

Asked whether the General Instruction requires celebration facing the people, the Congregation for Divine Worship answered in 2000 that “the word expedit does not constitute an obligation, but a suggestion” (response). Stine quotes this response accurately later in the episode.