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Posted on 08/12/2024 4:59:01 PM PDT by ebb tide
(LifeSiteNews) — Our recent article, which defended Archbishop Viganò from the charge of schism, summarized a number of arguments which point towards Francis not being a true pope.
That article promised more detailed expositions of these arguments. This is the first of those more detailed explanations and deals with the argument that Francis is not the true pope because he is not a member of the Catholic Church, as a result of his departure from the public profession of the Catholic faith.
Who are the members of the Catholic Church?
The Catholic Church teaches that her members are those who:
As a consequence, the following can never, under any circumstances, be considered as members of the Catholic Church.
Those whom ecclesiastical authority has excluded by its own act, that is, those subject to a sentence of perfect excommunication, are also not to be regarded as members.
This doctrine of membership has, for many centuries, been clearly proposed to the faithful, in dozens, possibly hundreds of catechetical texts, which have been approved by the Roman Pontiffs or by the Successors of the Apostles who govern the Church in union with him. This doctrine must be regarded as infallible by virtue of being taught by the universal and ordinary magisterium of the Church.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent expressed the doctrine in these terms:
[T]here are but three classes of persons excluded from the Church’s pale: infidels, heretics and schismatics, and excommunicated persons.
Infidels are outside the Church because they never belonged to, and never knew the Church, and were never made partakers of any of her Sacraments.
Heretics and schismatics are excluded from the Church, because they have separated from her and belong to her only as deserters belong to the army from which they have deserted.
[…]
Finally, excommunicated persons are not members of the Church, because they have been cut off by her sentence from the number of her children and belong not to her communion until they repent.[1]
The most recent authoritative expression of the doctrine is found in the encyclical letter Mystici Corporis Christi, promulgated by Pope Pius XII in 1943, in which the Supreme Pontiff taught that:
Actually, only those are to be included as members of the Church who have been baptized and profess the true faith, and who have not been so unfortunate as to separate themselves from the unity of the body or been excluded by legitimate authority for grave faults committed.[2]
The Vicar of Christ continued:
For not every sin, however grave it may be, is such as of its own nature to sever a man from the Body of the Church, as does schism or heresy or apostasy.[3]
The Catholic Church is:
The society of men who, by their profession of the same faith, and by their partaking of the same sacraments, make up, under the rule of apostolic pastors and their head, the kingdom of Christ on earth.[4]
Membership of this society is attained by the sacrament of baptism, which is accompanied by a public profession of the Catholic faith. This public profession is made in person by the convert who has reached the age of reason, or by godparents on behalf of one without the use of reason.
At baptism a person becomes subject to the authority of Jesus Christ, the Divine Head of the Catholic Church, as exercised through His Vicar, the Roman Pontiff, and the other Successors of the Apostles who govern the Church in union with him as members of the Apostolic College.
Our Lord Jesus Christ exercises a threefold power over the Church. By His sanctifying power, men are made holy by the sacraments, and His Sacrifice is re-presented on our altars. By his teaching power, the Catholic faith is infallibly transmitted to each generation. By His governing authority, He directs His flock towards eternal life.
To become, and to remain, members of the Church it is necessary to be subject to this threefold authority of Jesus Christ, which is exercised by the ecclesiastical hierarchy. To reject it in a fundamental way is to sever oneself from the Mystical Body of Christ.
Dr. Ludwig Ott explained:
According to [Pope Pius XII in the encyclical letter Mystici Corporis Christi] three conditions are required for membership of the Church: a) The valid reception of the Sacrament of Baptism. b) The profession of the true faith. c) Participation in the Communion of the Church. By the fulfilment of these three conditions one subjects oneself to the threefold office of the Church, the sacerdotal office (Baptism), the teaching office (Confession of Faith), and the pastoral office (obedience to Church authority).[5]
He continued:
As the three powers perpetuated in these offices… constitute the unity and the visibility of the Church, subjection to each and all of these powers, is a condition for membership of the Church.[6]
And with reference to the condition of profession of the true faith he stated:
The Confession of the true Faith and the adherence to the communion of the Church are for adults the subjective conditions for the achievement and the unhindered perpetuation of their membership of the Church which is initiated by baptism.[7]
And he continues by affirming:
That those who dissociate themselves from the Faith and from the communion of the Church, cease to be members of the Church, is the general conviction of Tradition.[8]
A more detailed treatment of the Catholic Church as a society, and the relationship between submission to authority and membership of the Church, can be found here.
In brief: every society is formed by members who pursue a common end under the direction of the properly constituted authorities. Membership of a society is impossible for an individual who refuses to share with other members in pursuing that common end under the common leadership of its legitimate authority.
It is therefore impossible for a public heretic or a public schismatic to remain a member of the Catholic Church – even for a second – because those states are a fundamental rejection of the divinely established authority which teaches and governs it. This is why Pope Pius XII taught that public schism and public heresy is “of its own nature” such as “to sever a man from the Body of the Church.”
We will now explore this doctrine in more detail with reference to public heresy.
We have seen above that public heresy is fundamentally incompatible with membership of the Catholic Church. No Catholic is a public heretic. No public heretic is a Catholic. There are no exceptions to this rule. This a consequence of the fact that the Church is by its very nature, a “society of men” who are united in “profession of the same faith.” A body which was not united in the same faith would not be the Catholic Church.
Our Lord Jesus Christ established the Catholic Church for the salvation of mankind. He commanded that everyone enter into Her. In order to make it easy for all souls to find identify the true Church and enter into her, Our Lord has given her four marks which she can never lose, and which will always be clearly evident. These are the marks of (i) unity, (ii) sanctity, (iii) catholicity, and (iv) apostolicity. Thus, we refer to the true Church of Christ, as the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.
And because the Church is united under the threefold power of Christ, we say she is united (i) in faith (under the teaching power) (ii) in worship (under the sanctifying power) and (iii) in government (under the governing power).
Pope Leo XIII, in his encyclical letter Satis Cognitum, “On the Unity of the Church,” explains that unity of faith is a necessary characteristic of the Church:
Agreement and union of minds is the necessary foundation of this perfect concord amongst men, from which concurrence of wills and similarity of action are the natural results. Wherefore, in His divine wisdom, He ordained in His Church Unity of Faith; a virtue which is the first of those bonds which unite man to God, and whence we receive the name of the faithful – ‘one Lord, one faith, one baptism.’ That is, as there is one Lord and one baptism, so should all Christians, without exception, have but one faith.[9]
This one faith, he teaches, “though residing essentially in the intellect, must be manifested by outward profession – ‘For with the heart we believe unto justice, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation’ (Rm 10:10).[10]
And he warns the faithful against the erroneous idea that the Church could ever be divided in this external profession of the Catholic faith:
Besides, all who profess Christianity allow that there can be but one faith. It is of the greatest importance and indeed of absolute necessity, as to which many are deceived, that the nature and character of this unity should be recognized. And, as We have already stated, this is not to be ascertained by conjecture, but by the certain knowledge of what was done; that is by seeking for and ascertaining what kind of unity in faith has been commanded by Jesus Christ.[11]
The unity in faith commanded by Jesus Christ is, taught the Supreme Pontiff, to be attained by submission to the teaching authority of the Catholic Church. And, the pope continues:
He absolutely commands that the assent of faith should be given to His teaching, promising eternal rewards to those who believe and eternal punishment to those who do not… He requires the assent of the mind to all truths without exception. It was thus the duty of all who heard Jesus Christ, if they wished for eternal salvation, not merely to accept His doctrine as a whole, but to assent with their entire mind to all and every point of it, since it is unlawful to withhold faith from God even in regard to one single point.[12]
He emphasizes that every revealed truth, without exception, must be accepted:
The Church, founded on these principles and mindful of her office, has done nothing with greater zeal and endeavor than she has displayed in guarding the integrity of the faith. Hence she regarded as rebels and expelled from the ranks of her children all who held beliefs on any point of doctrine different from her own.[13]
And he continued, quoting an ancient author:
‘There can be nothing more dangerous than those heretics who admit nearly the whole cycle of doctrine, and yet by one word, as with a drop of poison, infect the real and simple faith taught by our Lord and handed down by Apostolic tradition’ (Auctor Tract. de Fide Orthodoxa contra Arianos).[14]
And once more he makes clear:
The practice of the Church has always been the same, as is shown by the unanimous teaching of the Fathers, who were wont to hold as outside Catholic communion, and alien to the Church, whoever would recede in the least degree from any point of doctrine proposed by her authoritative Magisterium.[15]
And, therefore, assenting to just one heretical doctrine severs a person from the Church:
St. Augustine notes that other heresies may spring up, to a single one of which, should any one give his assent, he is by the very fact cut off from Catholic unity. ‘No one who merely disbelieves in all (these heresies) can for that reason regard himself as a Catholic or call himself one. For there may be or may arise some other heresies, which are not set out in this work of ours, and, if any one holds to one single one of these he is not a Catholic’ (S. Augustinus, De Haeresibus, n. 88).[16]
This absolute adhesion to the fullness of divine revelation is only possible because:
Christ instituted in the Church a living, authoritative and permanent Magisterium, which by His own power He strengthened, by the Spirit of truth He taught, and by miracles confirmed. He willed and ordered, under the gravest penalties, that its teachings should be received as if they were His own. As often, therefore, as it is declared on the authority of this teaching that this or that is contained in the deposit of divine revelation, it must be believed by every one as true. If it could in any way be false, an evident contradiction follows; for then God Himself would be the author of error in man.[17]
Twentieth century Dutch theologian Monsignor Gerard Van Noort explains further the relationship between the Church’s necessary unity of faith and the necessity of submission to the magisterium of the Church:
The unity of faith which Christ decreed without qualification consists in this, that everyone accepts the doctrines presented for belief by the Church’s teaching office.
In fact, our Lord requires nothing other than the acceptance by all of the preaching of the apostolic college, a body which is to continue forever; or, what amounts to the same thing, of the pronouncements of the Church’s teaching office, which He Himself set up as the rule of faith.
And the essential unity of faith definitely requires that everyone hold each and every doctrine clearly and distinctly presented for belief by the Church’s teaching office; and that everyone hold these truths explicitly or at least implicitly, i.e., by acknowledging the authority of the Church which teaches them.[18]
To summarize: Our Lord Jesus Christ commands that the Catholic Church possess a perfect unity in its profession of the faith which he has revealed. This means that all members of the Church profess exactly the same faith, without deviating from it by as much as one doctrine. This remarkable unity is to be attained by submission of all members of the Church to the teaching authority which He has established and which He perpetually preserves from error. This unity of faith is a mark of the Church by which she can be known by all mankind. It can never be lost.
The following is the standard definition of a heretic:
A heretic is someone who, after being baptized, obstinately denies or doubts one of the truths that must be believed by divine and Catholic faith.[19]
The Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Church, promulgated by the Vatican Council (1870), defines that the truths that which are to be believed by “divine and Catholic faith” are those:
[C]ontained in the word of God as found in scripture and tradition, and which are proposed by the church as matters to be believed as divinely revealed, whether by her solemn judgment or in her ordinary and universal magisterium.[20]
A person who denies or willfully doubts one of these truths is a heretic.
In the following passage Cardinal Louis Billot further explains the nature of heresy and its relationship to the teaching authority of the Church:
According to the origin of the term and the constant sense of all tradition, someone is properly called a heretic who after receiving Christianity in the sacrament of baptism, does not accept the rule of what must be believed from the magisterium of the Church, but chooses from somewhere else a rule of belief about matters of faith and the doctrine of Christ: whether he follow other doctors and teachers of religion, or adheres to the principle of free examination and professes a complete independence of thought, or whether finally he disbelieve even one article out of those which are proposed by the Church as dogmas of Faith.[21]
For example, one person may choose “scripture alone” as their rule of faith, another may choose the Russian Orthodox Synod, another the writings of John Calvin and his followers, or another may simply decide, on their own authority, that they will not accept a particular doctrine which the Catholic Church proposes as being revealed by God. In each case a rule is being chosen which is other than that of the magisterium of the Catholic Church. Each of these men and women – no matter how sincere they may be – is a heretic.
It is necessary however to make a few further distinctions.
First, a Catholic may express a heretical proposition externally, despite holding the true doctrine, due to an imprecise use of language. This person is not a heretic, their rule of faith remains that proposed by Christ through the hierarchy of the Church. They simply lack the theological knowledge to express themselves accurately.
Secondly, a person may internally assent to a heretical proposition because they mistakenly believe the proposition to be proposed by the Church’s teaching authority, or at least to be compatible with what that authority teaches. Their intellect is in error, but their will remains truly submissive to the magisterium of the Catholic Church. This person is also not a heretic because, once again, the rule of faith to which they publicly submit is the magisterium; if they are correctly disposed, they will abandon their error as soon as it is made clear to them what the Catholic Church actually proposes for their belief.
Thirdly, a person may internally assent to a proposition contrary to divine and Catholic faith, while knowing that the Church teaches otherwise – that is, they willfully refuse to submit to the teaching authority of the Church. This person is a heretic. This will be so, even if the heresy is merely internal – although the social effects of heresy may not apply until it is sufficiently public. In the meantime, they no longer possess the theological virtue of faith (and consequently neither hope nor charity) and, if their heresy is public, they are no longer members of the Catholic Church.
Rev. E. Sylvester Berry summarizes this doctrine as follows:
A doctrine contrary to revealed truth is usually stigmatized as heretical, but a person who professes a heretical doctrine is not necessarily a heretic. Heresy, from the Greek hairesis, signifies a choosing; therefore a heretic is one who chooses for himself in matters of faith, thereby rejecting the authority of the Church established by Christ to teach all men the truths of revelation. He rejects the authority of the Church by following his own judgment or by submitting to an authority other than that established by Christ.[22]
Now that we have a clearer idea of what is meant by heresy, we can draw some more precise distinctions between different kinds of heretics.
The first important distinction that must be drawn is between heresy which is formal and heresy which is material. The following definitions are from Cardinal Billot:
For example, someone who knows that the Catholic Church was established by Christ and given authority to teach His Revelation, and yet takes his own private judgement as his rule of faith is a formal heretic. On the other hand, someone who has been brought up in a Protestant chapel and, trusting the teaching of her parents and ministers, takes the Bible alone as her rule of faith, while never encountering the Catholic Church, may be a material heretic.
The second important distinction is between heresy which is occult and heresy which is public:
For example, someone who refuses submission to the rule of faith, but, out of fear of rejection, doesn’t inform anyone, or only confides in a confessor or their spouse, is an occult heretic. On the other hand, a person whose heresy is known by others, at least outside their intimate domestic circle or confidential friends, is a public heretic.
Berry summarizes the various forms of heresy in this manner:
A person may reject the teaching authority of the Church knowingly and willingly, or he may do it through ignorance. In the first case he is a formal heretic, guilty of grievous sin: in the second case he is a material heretic, free from guilt. Both formal and material heresy may be manifest or occult.[25]
There are thus four kinds of heretics:
Public heretics, whether formal or material, are not members of the Catholic Church.
Ott states simply:
Public heretics, even those who err in good faith (material heretics), do not belong to the body of the Church, that is, the legal commonwealth of the Church.[26]
And Van Noort explains in more detail:
Public heretics (and a fortiori, apostates) are not members of the Church. They are not members because they separate themselves from the unity of Catholic faith and from the external profession of that faith. Obviously, therefore, they lack one of the three factors – baptism, profession of the same faith, union with the hierarchy – pointed out by Pius XII as requisite for membership of the Church. The same pontiff has explicitly pointed out that, unlike other sins, heresy, schism and apostasy automatically sever a man from the Church. […]
By the term public heretics at this point we mean all who externally deny a truth (for example Mary’s Divine Maternity), or several truths of divine and Catholic faith, regardless of whether the one denying does so ignorantly and innocently (a merely material heretic), or willfully and guiltily (a formal heretic). It is certain that public, formal heretics, are severed from Church membership.[27]
It is held by Catholic theologians to be certain that public formal heretics are not members of the Catholic Church. Salaverri asserts:
That formal and manifest heretics are not members of the body of the Church can well be said to be the unanimous opinion among Catholics.[28]
Cardinal Billot affirms:
[W]e must say first what everyone agrees with: notorious heretics are excluded from the body of the Church.[29]
Some theologians have defended the proposition that public material heretics are members of the Church. However, the contrary opinion is the more common opinion of theologians, and for good reason:
[I]f public material heretics remained members of the Church, the visibility and unity of Christ’s Church would perish. If these purely material heretics were considered members of the Catholic Church in the strict sense of the term, how would one ever locate the ‘Catholic Church?’ How would the Church be one body? How would it profess one faith? Where would be its visibility? Where its unity? For these and other reasons we find it difficult to see any intrinsic probability to the opinion which would allow for public heretics, in good faith, remaining members of the Church.[30]
The question of membership is intrinsically connected to the visibility of the Church. Our Lord has commanded all men and women to enter the Catholic Church, which alone possesses the means of salvation. As Pope Pius IX taught, “the Church is the only ark of salvation, and that whoever does not enter will perish in the flood.”[31]
The necessity of membership of the Church for salvation means that all men and women, of whatever level of intelligence or education, need to be able to clearly recognize where the Catholic Church is, and where she is not, and this means being able to recognize who is a member and who is not.
If public material heretics were members of the Church, it would be impossible to recognize the Catholic Church by means of her visible unity in the external profession of one and the same faith. Yet this unity is one of the “four marks” that must at all times be obvious to all sincere seekers of truth.
If one were to accept that public material heretics were members of the Church then her visibility, and her necessary unity, would evaporate. It would be impossible to clearly distinguish the Catholic Church from sincere professors of Orthodoxy, Protestantism, or another objectively heretical form of belief.
For this reason, only the doctrine that all public heretics are severed from membership of the body of the Church is compatible with what the Church teaches about her own visibility.
And, therefore, Cardinal Billot states:
[T]he unity of the profession of faith, which is dependent on the visible authority of the living magisterium, is the essential property by which Christ wanted His Church to be adorned forever, it follows clearly that those cannot be part of the Church who profess differently from what its magisterium teaches. For then there would be a division in the profession of faith, and division is contradictory to unity. But notorious heretics are those who by their own admission do not follow the rule of the ecclesiastical magisterium. Therefore they have an obstacle that prevents them from being included in the Church, and even though they are signed with the baptismal character, they either have never been part of its visible body, or have ceased to be such from the time they publicly became heterodox after their baptism.[32]
Therefore, we may assert with confidence: no public heretic has ever been, is now, or ever will be, a member of Christ’s Church.
In should be quite clear from what has been said above that a public heretic cannot be elected pope. If a man is not a member of the Church, then he certainly cannot be elected to the office of the papacy.
Theologian Rev. Sylvester Berry writes:
Any person of the male sex having the use of reason can be elected Supreme Pontiff, provided he be a member of the Church and not excluded from office by ecclesiastical law.[33]
He explains further that:
The very nature of the office makes it necessary that the Supreme Pontiff be a member of the Church and have the use of reason; the will of Christ demands that he be of the male sex.[34]
These conditions for election are of divine law and can never be altered.
The same doctrine is found in the commentary of canonists Francis X. Wernz and Peter Vidal, who specify that the following are the conditions required for a valid election:
All those who are not impeded by divine law or by an invalidating ecclesiastical law are validly eligible. Wherefore, a male who enjoys use of reason sufficient to accept election and exercise jurisdiction, and who is a true member of the Church can be validly elected, even though he be only a layman. Excluded as incapable of valid election, however, are all women, children who have not yet arrived at the age of discretion, those afflicted with habitual insanity, heretics and schismatics.[35]
Consequently, the attempted election of a public heretic is invalid.
Public heretics are not members of the Church, but the pope is a member of the Church. Therefore, it can never be the case that a pope is a public heretic.
If a situation arises in which we seem to be confronted by the impossible existence of a “heretical pope,” there are two possible explanations.
First possibility: the “heretical pope” was never in fact elected to the papacy, either as a result of his pre-existing public heresy, or for some other reason.
Second possibility: the “heretical pope” was once a true pope but has ceased to be pope as a result of his public heresy, or for some other reason.
Many theologians have held, though never as more than a probable opinion, that it is impossible for a true pope to fall into public heresy. St. Robert Bellarmine also regarded this as the most probable opinion. If this position is correct – as it may well be – then only the first of the above explanations is available to us: the “heretical pope” was never the pope to begin with.
However, the saint did not regard his favored position as certain, and therefore he proceeded to explore what the consequences would be of a true pope falling into heresy.
In De Romano Pontifice, St. Robert Bellarmine writes:
[I]t is proven with arguments from authority and from reason that the manifest heretic is ‘ipso facto’ deposed.
The argument from authority is based on St. Paul (Titus, c. 3), who orders that the heretic be avoided after two warnings, that is, after showing himself to be manifestly obstinate — which means before any excommunication or judicial sentence. And this is what St. Jerome writes, adding that the other sinners are excluded from the Church by sentence of excommunication, but the heretics exile themselves and separate themselves by their own act from the body of Christ.
[…]
This principle is most certain. The non-Christian cannot in any way be Pope, as Cajetan himself admits (ib. c. 26). The reason for this is that he cannot be head of what he is not a member; now he who is not a Christian is not a member of the Church, and a manifest heretic is not a Christian, as is clearly taught by St. Cyprian (lib. 4, epist. 2), St. Athanasius (Scr. 2 cont. Arian.), St. Augustine (lib. de great. Christ. cap. 20), St. Jerome (contra Lucifer.) and others; therefore the manifest heretic cannot be Pope.
[…]
Finally, the Holy Fathers teach unanimously not only that heretics are outside of the Church, but also that they are ’ipso facto’ deprived of all ecclesiastical jurisdiction and dignity. St. Cyprian (lib. 2, epist. 6) says: ‘We affirm that absolutely no heretic or schismatic has any power or right’; and he also teaches (lib. 2, epist. 1) that the heretics who return to the Church must be received as laymen, even though they have been formerly priests or bishops in the Church. St. Optatus (lib. 1 cont. Parmen.) teaches that heretics and schismatics cannot have the keys of the kingdom of heaven, nor bind nor loose. St. Ambrose (lib. 1 de poenit., ca. 2), St. Augustine (in Enchir., cap 65), St. Jerome (lib. cont. Lucifer.) teach the same.
[…]
Therefore, the true opinion is the fifth, according to which the Pope who is manifestly a heretic ceases by himself to be Pope and head, in the same way as he ceases to be a Christian and a member of the body of the Church; and for this reason he can be judged and punished by the Church. This is the opinion of all the ancient Fathers, who teach that manifest heretics immediately lose all jurisdiction, and outstandingly that of St. Cyprian (lib. 4, epist. 2) who speaks as follows of Novatian, who was Pope [i.e. antipope] in the schism which occurred during the pontificate of St. Cornelius: “He would not be able to retain the episcopate [i.e. of Rome], and, if he was made bishop before, he separated himself from the body of those who were, like him, bishops, and from the unity of the Church.”
[…]
The foundation of this argument is that the manifest heretic is not in any way a member of the Church, that is, neither spiritually nor corporally, which signifies that he is not such by internal union nor by external union. For even bad Catholics [i.e. who are not heretics] are united and are members, spiritually by faith, corporally by confession of faith and by participation in the visible sacraments; the occult heretics are united and are members although only by external union; on the contrary, the good catechumens belong to the Church only by an internal union, not by the external; but manifest heretics do not pertain in any manner, as we have already proved.[36]
It should also be noted that while Bellarmine stated that he held the opinion that the pope could never fall into heresy to be the most probable, he makes clear that the above conclusions – the fifth opinion – would be true and certain if the first opinion was false. This is summarised by Arnaldo da Silveira:
This conditional, alternative-successive opinion may be expressed as follows: of all the opinions St. Robert Bellarmine preferentially held the first as probable; but, as it might prove to be erroneous, of the others he held the fifth.[37]
It will be seen that in this explanation above, St. Robert Bellarmine refers to the same theological principles that we have already extensively discussed in the sections above, in order to make plain that a true pope who fell into public heresy, would thereby cease to be the pope.
This point is often missed by those who regard the debate over a pope falling into heresy and thus losing office, as primarily a matter of canon law, as opposed to being primarily about the radical incompatibility between heresy on the one hand, and membership and holding office on the other.
Francis is a public heretic. That is, he publicly refuses submission to the rule of faith proposed by the magisterium of the Catholic Church. Further, he persists in this refusal to submit to the magisterium, in the face of public corrections.
Since his purported election he has publicly departed from the profession of the Catholic faith dozens, perhaps hundreds, of times in his documents, his sermons, and his interviews. It is absolutely evident that he does not submit to the rule of faith proposed by the magisterium of the Catholic Church.
And, as we have seen, the denial or doubt of just one revealed doctrine is sufficient to sever a man from the body of the Church.
It would be impossible here to catalogue the dozens of heresies – or more – of which Francis is guilty. But here are seven, which the authors of 2017 Filial Correction found present in the document Amoris Laetitia and which they formulated as follows:
1). ‘A justified person has not the strength with God’s grace to carry out the objective demands of the divine law, as though any of the commandments of God are impossible for the justified; or as meaning that God’s grace, when it produces justification in an individual, does not invariably and of its nature produce conversion from all serious sin, or is not sufficient for conversion from all serious sin.’
2). ‘Christians who have obtained a civil divorce from the spouse to whom they are validly married and have contracted a civil marriage with some other person during the lifetime of their spouse, who live more uxorio with their civil partner, and who choose to remain in this state with full knowledge of the nature of their act and full consent of the will to that act, are not necessarily in a state of mortal sin, and can receive sanctifying grace and grow in charity.’
3). ‘A Christian believer can have full knowledge of a divine law and voluntarily choose to break it in a serious matter, but not be in a state of mortal sin as a result of this action.’
4). ‘A person is able, while he obeys a divine prohibition, to sin against God by that very act of obedience.’
5). ‘Conscience can truly and rightly judge that sexual acts between persons who have contracted a civil marriage with each other, although one or both of them is sacramentally married to another person, can sometimes be morally right or requested or even commanded by God.’
6). ‘Moral principles and moral truths contained in divine revelation and in the natural law do not include negative prohibitions that absolutely forbid particular kinds of action, inasmuch as these are always gravely unlawful on account of their object.’
7). ‘Our Lord Jesus Christ wills that the Church abandon her perennial discipline of refusing the Eucharist to the divorced and remarried and of refusing absolution to the divorced and remarried who do not express contrition for their state of life and a firm purpose of amendment with regard to it.’
I draw attention to these heresies in particular because the “filial correction” is one of a number of public fraternal corrections by which Francis has been confronted with his heresies and has had the rule of faith, proposed by the magisterium, presented to him. It cannot be denied that Francis knows what the Church teaches on these matters. Yet, in the face of this correction, he continues to profess a different rule of faith.
Francis is therefore, most certainly, a public heretic.
The only question that remains is whether this public heresy is something for which he is morally guilty, which would make him a formal public heretic, or something for which he is morally innocent, which would make him a material public heretic.
I will not attempt to see into his soul. I will only remark, that given the office he purports to hold and the frequency with which the discrepancy between his opinions and the teaching of the Church has been brought to his attention, it is very difficult to see how he could be in good conscience. But the final judgment of his soul must be left to God.
However, the judgment as to whether he is the pope, is one that we, as members of Christ’s Church, must confront. We must confront it because we are obliged to submit to the pope as the supreme teaching and governing authority in the Church. This is not, ultimately, a question which we can continue to evade.
We have seen that Francis, in his public statements, does not publicly profess the Catholic faith.
He does not submit to the rule of faith proposed by the magisterium of the Catholic Church, but rather substitutes another rule in its place. Francis is certainly a public heretic.
We have further seen that a formal public heretic is certainly not a member of the Catholic Church.
Therefore, if Francis is a formal public heretic, that is if he “openly and guiltily refuses submission to the rule of faith proposed by the magisterium” then he is certainly not a member of the Catholic Church. And if he is not a member of the Catholic Church, then he is not the pope.
We have also seen that it is the common opinion of theologians that a material public heretic is not a member of the Catholic Church. We have examined the strong arguments which have led Catholic theologians to this position. We have seen that the contrary position – that material public heretics remain members – would seem to be incompatible with the visibility of the Catholic Church. This position lacks intrinsic probability and seems impossible to reconcile with other aspects of Catholic doctrine. This is why the majority of Catholic theologians have rejected it, and those who wish to resurrect it will have to overcome their formidable objections.
Therefore, even if Francis is a material public heretic, that is he “openly but innocently refuses submission to the rule of faith proposed by the magisterium,” according to the common opinion of theologians, he is still neither a member of the Church, nor the pope. And given that the common opinion of theologians may be safely followed, Francis’s claims to the papacy must be regarded as at least doubtful even if we were to regard him as innocent of moral fault in his public departures from the Catholic faith.
And, as explained at length in the original piece of which this is a sequel, papa dubius, papa nullus, a doubtful pope is no pope.
One of a number of authorities quoted in that piece were the canonists Francis X. Wernz and Peter Vidal who state:
But if the fact of the legitimate election of a particular successor of St. Peter is only doubtfully demonstrated, the promulgation is doubtful; hence that law is not duly and objectively constituted of its necessary parts, and it remains truly doubtful and therefore cannot impose any obligation.
Indeed, it would be rash to obey such a man who had not proved his title in law.[38]
And they continue:
The same conclusion is confirmed on the basis of the visibility of the Church. For the visibility of the Church consists in the fact that she possesses such signs and identifying marks that, when moral diligence is used, she can be recognized and discerned, especially on the part of her legitimate officers. But in the supposition we are considering, the pope cannot be found even after diligent examination. The conclusion is therefore correct that such a doubtful pope is not the proper head of the visible Church instituted by Christ.[39]
Therefore, we may conclude:
Therefore, as a result of his public heresy, we ought to hold that Francis is not the pope.
ReferencesReferences
| ↑1 | Catechism of the Council of Trent, Part I, Article IX. |
|---|---|
| ↑2 | Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis Christi, No. 22. |
| ↑3 | Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis Christi, No. 22. |
| ↑4 | Van Noort, Dogmatic Theology Volume II: Christ’s Church, p xxvi. |
| ↑5, ↑6, ↑7, ↑8 | Dr. Ludwig Ott, The Fundamentals of the Catholic Dogma, p309-11. |
| ↑9 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 6 |
| ↑10 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 3 |
| ↑11 | Van Noort, Christ’s Church, pp 127-28. |
| ↑12 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 8. |
| ↑13 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 9. |
| ↑14 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 9. |
| ↑15, ↑16, ↑17 | Pope Leo XIII, Satis Cognitum, No. 9. |
| ↑18 | Van Noort, Dogmatic Theology Volume II: Christ’s Church, pp 127-28. |
| ↑19 | Joachim Salaverri S.J., Sacrae Theologiae Summa IB, (1956; translated by Kenneth Baker S.J., 2015), p422. |
| ↑20 | Vatican Council, Dogmatic Constitution of the Catholic Faith, Session III, 24 April 1870. |
| ↑21 | Louis Cardinal Billot, De Ecclesia, Question 7: The Members of the Church, (extracts translated by Fr Julian Larrabee). |
| ↑22 | Rev. E. Sylvester Berry, The Church of Christ: An Apologetic and Dogmatic Treatise, (Mount St. Mary’s, 1955), p128. |
| ↑23 | Billot, De Ecclesia, Q. 7. |
| ↑24 | Billot, De Ecclesia, Q. 7. |
| ↑25 | Berry, Church of Christ, p128. |
| ↑26 | Ott, Fundamentals, p309-11. |
| ↑27 | Van Noort, Christ’s Church, p241. |
| ↑28 | Salaverri, STS Vol 1.B, p424. |
| ↑29 | Billot, De Ecclesia, Q. 7. |
| ↑30 | Van Noort, Christ’s Church, p242. |
| ↑31 | Pope Pius IX, Singulari Quadem. |
| ↑32 | Billot, De Ecclesia, Q.7. |
| ↑33 | Berry, Church of Christ, p227. |
| ↑34 | Berry, Church of Christ, p227. |
| ↑35 | Wernz-Vidal, Ius Canonicum, vol II, no. 415. |
| ↑36 | St. Robert Bellarmine, De Romano Pontifice, lib. II, cap. 30, translated by Mr James Larrabee. |
| ↑37 | Arnaldo da Silveira, Fr Gleize and the Question of the Heretical Pope. |
| ↑38, ↑39 | Wernz, P. F-X, and Vidal, P. Petri,. Ius Canonicum ad Codicis Normam Exactum, Universitatis GregorianaeUniversitas Gregoriana, Rome, Vol vii, 1937, n. 398. |
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Ping
To all of which one may add that Francis is guilty of formal heresy through cooperation with other formal heretics, namely his creatures whom he refuses to correct or remove.
Bergoglio, in my eyes, is the false pope of prophecy.
The Archbishop of Vienna said that in my presence twenty years ago.
Frankie is a gay commie.
Schönborn?
I wouldn’t be surprised.
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