Don’t be intimidated, be thorough. The truth is never, ever, something to be afraid of.
Truth bomb: There were highly prominent canonists/theologians raising a stink about Benedict’s “resignation” WITHIN DAYS of it taking place. Not in 2017, not 2016, but within mere hours of his Declaratio being written and read out in Latin (and then mistranslated into several other languages).
Were you aware of that? Well, it’s true: Classically trained, professional canonists and theologians called BS right away, and you are about to read all about it. Here are just a few names:

• Manuel Jesus Arroba, a professor of canon law at the Pontifical Lateran University
• “Leading light of canon law” and former rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University, the Jesuit Gianfranco Ghirlanda
• Valerio Gigliotti, professor of the history of European law at the University of Torino
• Fr. Stefano Violi, professor of law at the theological faculty of Emilia Romagna

I am pasting here a large chunk of Sandro Magister’s blog post from 15 September 2014, because it contains all the relevant links for you to click and investigate the original works of these canonists and why they came to the conclusion that they did. Don’t be lazy; click on the links!
One last note. If you’ve read Pope Benedict’s address from his last (so far) General Audience, 27 February 2013, HERE you know that he called himself out for what he was doing. He called it a “novelty.” That’s a big no no, kiddos, and it’s not like he didn’t know it.

“I have asked God insistently in prayer to grant me his light and to help me make the right decision, not for my own good, but for the good of the Church. I have taken this step with full awareness of its gravity and even its novelty“

It was immediately after this paragraph that he launched into his “Always and Forever” discourse, reflecting his apparent belief that popes can’t really resign, once pope always pope, the very idea that +Ganswein expounded upon in his speech at the Greg in May 2016:

“The “always” is also a “forever” – there can no longer be a return to the private sphere. My decision to resign the active exercise of the ministry does not revoke this…I am not abandoning the cross, but remaining in a new way at the side of the crucified Lord. I no longer bear the power of office for the governance of the Church, but in the service of prayer I remain, so to speak, in the enclosure of Saint Peter.”

Anyway, here is the Magister post. CLICK THE LINKS AND LEARN!

Reigning and “Emeritus.” The Enigma of the Two Popes

It is an unprecedented innovation in the history of the Church. With many unknowns still unresolved, and with serious risks already in play. An analysis by Roberto de Mattei
by Sandro Magister

ROME, September 15, 2014 – That the figure of “pope emeritus” is an unprecedented innovation in the history of the Church, “instituted” by Benedict XVI himself in his act of resignation, has been recognized by Pope Francis himself, during the press conference on the airplane that brought him back from Korea to Rome last August I8.
This does not change the fact that from both the juridical and the doctrinal point of view it is by no means established that this new figure in the Catholic hierarchy has any real foundation. “Time will tell if it is right or wrong, we shall see,” Francis said prudently, although he is personally an enthusiast of the innovation.
Among theologians and canonists, in fact, the viewpoints continue to be highly discordant.
Just two days after the announcement of the abdication, Manuel Jesus Arroba, a professor of canon law at the Pontifical Lateran University, warned against the use of the title: “Juridically there is only one pope. A ‘pope emeritus’ cannot exist.”
But it was above all a leading light of canon law and former rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University, the Jesuit Gianfranco Ghirlanda, who refuted the legitimacy of the figure of “pope emeritus” in a long and thoroughly substantiated article published on March 2, 2013 in “La Civiltà Cattolica” and therefore – as for all the articles of this magazine – printed after review and authorization by the Vatican secretariat of state:
> Cessazione dall’ufficio di Romano Pontefice
At the end of his article, Fr. Ghirlanda drew this conclusion:
“To deal at some length with the question of the relationship between the acceptance of legitimate election and episcopal consecration, and therefore of the origin of the authority of the Roman pontiff, has been necessary precisely in order to understand more deeply that the one who ceases from the pontifical ministry not because of death, although evidently remaining bishop is pope no longer, in that he loses all of the authority of primacy, because this did not come to him from episcopal consecration, but directly from Christ through the acceptance of legitimate election.”
And he therefore ruled out the notion that the one resigning could continue to use the name of “pope,” even as emeritus:
“It is evident that the pope who has resigned is no longer pope, and therefore no longer has any authority in the Church and cannot interfere in any matter of governance. One might wonder what title Benedict XVI will retain. We think that he should be given the title of bishop emeritus of Rome, like any other diocesan bishop who steps down.”
Afterward, however, it was Ratzinger himself who took the title of “pope emeritus” and in a certain sense retained the trappings by continuing to wear the white cassock.
He enigmatically anticipated the meaning of this decision in the last of his general audiences as pope, on February 27, 2013, the eve of his effective abdication:
“Anyone who accepts the Petrine ministry no longer has any private dimension. […] My decision to resign the active exercise of the ministry does not revoke this. I do not return to private life, to a life of travel, meetings, receptions, conferences, and so on. I am not abandoning the cross, but remaining in a new way at the side of the crucified Lord. I no longer bear the power of office for the governance of the Church, but in the service of prayer I remain, so to speak, in the enclosure of Saint Peter.”
(In other words, he attempted to split off or delegate the power of governance, while retaining the office itself.)
There are those who remember that Pius XII, when he prepared his letter of resignation that would go into effect in the event that the Germans should come to arrest him, said to his closest collaborators: “When the Germans cross that line, they will find not the pope, but Cardinal Pacelli.”
But this was not at all the case for Benedict XVI. In resigning, he had no thought of being able to go back to being “Cardinal Ratzinger.” It was and is his firm conviction that there is something of his election as pope that remains “forever.”
And this is what some scholars have been trying to identify and justify.
Like Valerio Gigliotti, a professor of the history of European law at the University of Torino, in the book “La tiara deposta,” which www.chiesa covered last April:
> The Pope’s Third Embodiment
Or like Fr. Stefano Violi, a professor of law at the theological faculty of Emilia Romagna, in an article in the “Rivista Teologica di Lugano”:
> La rinuncia di Benedetto XVI. Tra storia, diritto e coscienza
According to Violi, in abdicating Benedict XVI indeed left the active exercise of the Petrine ministry, but not the office, the “munus” of the papacy, inalienable precisely because it was entrusted to him forever with his election as bishop of Rome and successor of Peter.
Those who know Ratzinger know that he would never subscribe to such a splitting of the papal office, which in his judgment can be only accepted or rejected as a whole.
But he has never said anything to clarify what he sees as the nature of his being “pope emeritus” even after the abdication.
The adjective “emeritus,” borrowed from bishops who have resigned, is of no help in understanding.
A bishop remains bishop forever, by virtue of the indelible character of the sacrament of orders, even after he no longer governs any diocese.
And a successor of Peter also remains bishop forever, after his resignation. But how can he still remain “pope,” after he has renounced all, not only a part, of what constitutes the specifically Petrine?
This silence of Ratzinger gives free rein not only to doctrinal conjectures that he certainly does not share – like the invention of an indelible “character” impressed by election as pope, as if it were a sacramental act – but also to the disorientation of not a few of the faithful, tempted to maintain that there can be two popes in the Catholic Church – perhaps on different levels, but still more than one – and to take sides for one against the other.
Full post is HERE. Be warned, it’s about 3500 words.

Many thanks to Miss B. for sponsoring a guest post this morning HERE. If you happen to derive any value from it, please consider a small recurring donation directly to Ann HERE.  I will mirror the essay on this site tomorrow, for the benefit of allowing comments.
I was trying to decide the best way to thank her, and I think this might do the trick:
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Published with permission from the author, Paul Muessig:

“If in the difficult times in which Our lot is cast, Catholics will give ear to Us, as it behoves them to do, they will readily see what are the duties of each one in matters of opinion as well as action. As regards opinion, whatever the Roman Pontiffs have hitherto taught, or shall hereafter teach, must be held with a firm grasp of mind, and, so often as occasion requires, must be openly professed.”

Pope Leo XII, Immortale Dei p.41, 1 November 1885

Keep those words in mind as you read the following, while remaining totally convinced that Bergoglio is 100%, obviously, absolutely zero evidence to the contrary, the pope.
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ROME — Christians must embrace the “imbalance” of the gospel rather than trying to put everything in order, Pope Francis said, which leads to a “dictatorship of functionalism.” HERE

It is an error to try to “fix” things and impose order on the world or the Church, the pope told participants in a diocesan assembly in Rome, adding that it is a “temptation” to think we can “reorganize the city, reorganize the diocese, put everything in order.”
Having everything in order converts the Church into a “museum,” Francis said, which would mean “taming things, taming young people, taming people’s hearts, taming families” and making everything “perfect.”
“But this would be the greatest sin of worldliness and of the anti-evangelical worldly spirit,” he said.
“Today we have been called to embrace the imbalance. We cannot do anything good or evangelical if we are afraid of imbalance,” he said. “We must grasp the imbalance in our hands: this is what the Lord tells us, because the Gospel — I believe you understand me — is an ‘unbalanced’ doctrine. Take the Beatitudes: they deserve the Nobel Prize for imbalance!”
The apostles did not get this, Francis suggested, because they had fallen into the clericalism of right thinking and a desire for order and balance.
“This is the illusion of the balance of ‘Church’ people,” he said.
We do not need “a beautiful, functionalized diocese,” he said, where “clericalism and functionalism” reign. The pope says he knows of a diocese that has more employees than the Vatican, and “that diocese is getting further away from Jesus Christ because it worships ‘harmony,’ harmony not of beauty, but of functionalist worldliness.”
“And in these cases we have fallen into the dictatorship of functionalism,” he said. “It is a new ideological colonization that tries to convince us that the Gospel is a wisdom, it is a doctrine, but it is not an announcement, it is not a kerygma.”
“We need the Holy Spirit,” he continued, “and the Holy Spirit gives the table a kick, knocks it over and starts over from scratch,” he said.

That last sentence really drives the point home, doesn’t it? Welcome to the Doctrine of Chaos. As a layman, do you submit to this? Or as a priest? Or as a bishop, or as a Cardinal…DO YOU SUBMIT TO THIS?

When the divine Founder decreed that the Church be one in faith, and in government, and in communion, He chose Peter and his successors in whom should be the principle and as it were the center of unity. . . . But, order of bishops, as Christ commanded, is to be regarded as joined with Peter, if it be subject to Peter and obey him; otherwise it necessarily descends into a confused and disorderly crowd…there is absolute need of true authority and a supreme authority which the entire community should obey. . . . Hence those special expressions of the ancients regarding St. Peter, which brilliantly proclaim him as placed in the highest degree of dignity and authority. They everywhere called him prince of the assembly of disciples, prince of the holy apostles, leader of that choir, mouthpiece of all the apostles, head of that family, superintendent of the whole world, first among the apostles, pillar of the Church. . . . But Roman Pontiffs, mindful of their office, wish most of all that whatever is divinely instituted in the Church be preserved…
Denz. n.1960, 1962

Pope Francis offered HERE what he considers a true example of the “ecumenism of prayer,” telling journalists:

In one European city, there is a good relationship between the Catholic archbishop and the Lutheran archbishop. The Catholic archbishop was scheduled to come to the Vatican on Sunday evening, and he called me to say that he would arrive on Monday morning. When he arrived, he told me: “Excuse me, but yesterday the Lutheran archbishop had to go to one of their meetings, and he asked me: ‘Please, come to my cathedral and lead the worship.’” Eh, there’s fraternity. Coming this far is a lot. And the Catholic bishop preached. He did not do the Eucharist, but he preached. This is fraternity.

Fraternity is placed above love. Fraternity replaces the Gospel. Lying to people you call your friends, risking their eternal damnation for the sake of fraternity, is about the most uncharitable thing I can think of.

He then explained that, as cardinal archbishop of Buenos Aires, he too was in the habit of preaching in Protestant churches.
“I was invited to the Scottish church to preach a number of times,” he said. “I went there, I preached. You can do it. You can walk together. Unity, fraternity, extending a hand, looking after each other, not speaking ill of others.”
“We all have defects,” he added, “but if we walk together let’s leave our defects to the side. Let the spinsters criticize us.”

He’s not talking about PEOPLE having defects, he’s talking about all “churches” having defects, including the Catholic Church (lower case “churches” in scare quotes because they aren’t “churches” at all.
Do you submit to this man as the true Roman Pontiff?
Spinsters for Christ… UNITE!

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“For every human creature it is absolutely necessary for salvation to be subject to the Roman Pontiff” – Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam, 18 November 1302 HERE

As in, he is your Monarch, you are his Subject. His loyal subject. You must be faithful to him, because as Christ’s Vicar, he is most deserving of your fidelity.
Your salvation depends on it.
If he tells you that “The tradition of the church is always in motion”, meaning there is no rock, there is nothing that’s unchangeable, we must always move forward, then you are bound to be faithful. If he tells you that “The nostalgia of the ‘integralists’ is to return to the ashes, but that is not Catholic,” then you are bound to be faithful. If he tells you that you need to pray for the future of the EU, if he tells you that walls are sinful, if he tells you that questioning climate change is sinful, if he tells you that the death penalty is sinful, if he tells you that inviting unrepentant fornicating adulterers to sacrilegiously receive Holy Communion is “WHAT GOD HIMSELF IS ASKING,” HERE HERE HERE HERE   …just remember that the fate of your eternal soul is bound up in your fidelity to this man.
Please remember this the next time you go on social media and declare with all sincerity that Bergoglio is totally obviously universally peacefully the pope and there is zero evidence to the contrary shut up.

Modernists and their admirers should remember the proposition condemned by Pius IX: The method and principles which have served the doctors of scholasticism when treating of theology no longer correspond with the exigencies of our time or the progress of science (Syll. Prop. 13). They exercise all their ingenuity in diminishing the force and falsifying the character of tradition, so as to rob it of all its weight. But for Catholics the second Council of Nicea will always have the force of law, where it condemns those who dare, after the impious fashion of heretics, to deride the ecclesiastical traditions, to invent novelties of some kind . . . or endeavour by malice or craft to overthrow any one of the legitimate traditions of the Catholic Church; and Catholics will hold for law, also, the profession of the fourth Council of Constantinople: We therefore profess to conserve and guard the rules bequeathed to the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church by the Holy and most illustrious Apostles, by the orthodox Councils, both general and local, and by every one of those divine interpreters the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. Wherefore the Roman Pontiffs, Pius IV. and Pius IX., ordered the insertion in the profession of faith of the following declaration: I most firmly admit and embrace the apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions and other observances and constitutions of the Church.  – Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi p.42, 8 September 1907 HERE

UPDATE! 1 June 2016 8:16pm Arizona time: It has been confirmed that Antonio Socci himself was against the change in the book title, along with the translator. This answers questions one and two in the post that follows. Question three remains unanswered.
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You can’t make this stuff up.
About an hour ago, I received my paperback copy of the English version of the Socci book, “The Secret of Benedict, Why He is Still Pope.” What I noticed right away, which had escaped my attention in the past few days of nonsense, was that they
LITERALLY CHANGED THE TITLE OF THE BOOK.
The English version title reads, “The Secret of Benedict, Is He Still Pope?” Ann B. has since put up a post about it HERE, with pictures of both versions.
I mean, when you don’t like the evidence presented therein, I guess it’s totes legit to deliberately mistranslate a demonstrative statement into an open question in the title of the book. After all, words mean whatever we say they mean. You have no right to claim you know what those words meant. That’s not your realm. It was a question, see? Shut up.
I have some questions of my own:

• Did Socci know about this? Did he approve it?
• Was this change the work of “Giuseppe Pellegrino,” who translated the book, or did his bosses at Angelico Press do it without his knowledge?
• Was anyone at Angelico Press influenced by Dr. de Mattei’s detailed “refutation” (sic) of Socci’s book back in January (for which, wait for it, “Giuseppe” himself was the English translator)? SEE HERE
• Are there any other shenanigans in the other 170 pages, or is it just the front cover?
• Did Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, who himself is employed as an editor by Angelico Press, exert any influence in this matter? SEE HERE
• Did Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, who himself has had several books published by Angelico Press, have an obligation to disclose those entanglements when he left a Five Star review for Socci’s Giuseppe’s work on Amazon?

Before you come in the combox and start bashing me for instigating a Trad circular firing squad, ask yourself if these would be fair questions if it were Fr. James Martin on the hot seat.