David Martin over at The Remnant has a short piece on the various happenings of the past few days HERE. Mr. Martin is a true trad who totally “gets it” in terms of nuChurch. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend anything he has written on the council and the Mass. I mean no disrespect to him, but I need to point something out, and hope to do it with charity. It is very, very telling in terms of how the severity of the Roman Chaos is really disorienting and disruptive to rational thought.
After he touches on the heresy of AL, the letter to the bishops being entered into the AAS, and the “Dictator” book now out, Martin ends with this:
We shouldn’t rule out the possibility that Francis may come forward one day and declare “ex-cathedra” that the interpretation of Amoris Laetitia VIII, as now taught by the Holy See, is promulgated as “extraordinary magisterium.”
Should this happen, the Mystical Body would then be without its head. In an interview with Catholic World Report (CWR) in December 2016, Cardinal Raymond Burke, who is presently a member of the Apostolic Signatura, said that if a pope were to “formally profess heresy he would cease, by that act, to be the Pope.”
Burke was reiterating Church teaching, as expressed by famed canonist Franz Wernz in his Ius Canonicum: “In sum, it needs to be said clearly that a [publicly] heretical Roman Pontiff loses his power upon the very fact.”
Do you see the problem here?
For someone like Martin who is Catholic and also thinks that Antipope Bergolio is currently the true pope, the first sentence in itself is heretical. Catholics believe that a valid pontiff, due to the unique divine protection and assistance he receives, is INCAPABLE of proclaiming heresy “ex-cathedra.” Therefore, essentially what Martin is saying is, “We should not rule out the possibility of something impossible happening.”
Think about the consequences: If someone claiming to be the pope attempts a heretical ex-cathedra promulgation, he does NOT lose his office at that moment, but rather REVEALS HIMSELF TO BE AN ANTIPOPE BY THE VERY ACT, because a true pontiff is incapable of making a heretical ex-cathedra promulgation. Law of the Excluded Middle.
The next paragraph, “Should this happen, the Mystical Body would then be without its head…” conflates ++Burke’s statement about heresy with the idea of infallibility, to arrive at an erroneous conclusion. As I just explained, “Francis” would NOT lose his office at that moment, but would instead show himself to NOT HAVE BEEN POPE AT ALL. What ++Burke was actually talking about was the possibility of a true pope losing his office by professing formal heresy on matters of faith and morals in a non-infallible way, which a true pope is certainly capable of doing, although extremely rare by reason of the special protections.
Folks, these aren’t meaningless distinctions. You’ve got to get your head around the reality of what is in front of you and draw out the conclusions. As I’ve said before, God loves you and He will continue to make it super easy for you to see the truth and choose wisely. Things are about to get much, much worse, but the signposts will be lit ever brighter.
Actually, it is Martin who is correct and you who are in error.
By definition, an anti-Pope is one who is established as pope in opposition to one held by others to be canonically chosen.
But no one holds that there is another Pope. Those who muse that Benedict is the canonically elected one are a tiny minority and who are not even part of the College of Cardinals.
One is not shown to be an anti-Pope by virtue of proclaiming heresy but by the fact that he reigns opposite another canonically chosen one.
Bergoglio is an antipope not by any statement he has made, but rather by the invalid abdication of Benedict by reason of “substantial error” as already clearly explained elsewhere on this blog.
Truth is not determined by popular opinion. It makes no difference whatsoever if, currently, only a “tiny minority” publicly acknowledge the truth. And you might be surprised by the number of people, including bishops and cardinals, who hold my position privately. By definition, an antipope is someone who claims to be pope, when in fact he is not. Punto.
You are right that truth is not determined by popular opinion, but your opinion is precisely that: just opinion. You cannot provide any support for it.
You ignore the fact that to be anti-Pope one must be in opposition to a current valid Pope. Your reasoning rests on the unsubstantiated statement that Benedict’s abdication is invalid.
Basically, you have made yourself the adjudicator of truth. Which is precisely what anti-Christs and anti-Popes do.
Unsubstantiated? Myself and several others have presented some pretty convincing evidence. How in the world do you think we arrived at the moral certainty that Benedict’s abdication was invalid? Have you read the evidence?
In writing, “… God loves you and He will continue to make it super easy for you to see the truth and choose wisely,” I can’t help but think you are misrepresenting things a bit. While “all things are possible” (Mt 19:26) and God’s “yoke is easy” (Mt 11:30), there are some truths that are hard to bear (Jn 16:12). Because it is the Church, through the guiding of the Holy Spirit (Jn 16:13) that has been given to clarify the truth, and it is the Church that is going through this crisis, discernment is certainly NOT “super easy.” Our position should be in alignment with the Church, and yet there is confusion about who is validly speaking on behalf of the Church. As an example, you, yourself, altered your position somewhat on Pope Francis’ election earlier this spring.
I only point this out because we can fall into a Protestant-type-of-pride if we, as individuals, fall into the trap that we are privileged with “super-easy” discernment of what is true.
Fair enough. And the mass confusion caused by the current situation supports your point, I suppose.
Just some food for thought…It may be that rational thought is being affected by Cognitive Dissonance: when people are presented with evidence that works against a strongly-held core belief, the evidence (in most cases) cannot be accepted. And because it is so important to protect the core belief, people will rationalize, ignore and even deny anything that doesn’t fit with the core belief.
We have to pray that people reach a point where they stop playing mental gymnastics (aka denying the truth) and refuse to give their support and assent.
An observation… the constant changes since V2, have conditioned most Catholics (especially younger ones) to accept that change in the church is normal, and as a result many of them will not question doctrinal changes.
About the whole business of ex-cathedra…most of the 1.2 billion catholics in the world don’t distinguish whether or not the Pope is speaking ex-cathedra, hence he should always be extremely cautious of what he says, writes, and does in any public forum. And since he hasuch celebrity status people will follow him like a pied piper.
Great point about Cognitive Dissonance (also Normalcy Bias). Agree with all you wrote.
The promise of Christ to Peter “the gates of hell will not prevail against her” gives Indefectabity to His Church. So this is not so much about Infallibility as such. It’s about God providing protection to His Vicar in transmitting the doctrine of the Faith. If Francis were truly Pope the Gates of Hell would have prevailed whether or not he takes his heresy to ex-cathedra level ( and supposing God would not take his life before he made such a pronouncement) We have a Pope Emeritus living in the Vatican. This is fact not opinion. Surely God is hereby proving the Indefectability of His Church.