I am grateful to Fr. Brian Harrison, OS for taking note of my contribution to the growing number of voices asking whether Francis is Pope. Fr. Harrison, however, thinks that’s one question we ought not to ask:
How are the countless millions of ordinary lay Catholics in the pews to prudently decide this question, given that they don’t have the theological and canonical formation necessary to weigh and evaluate the respective arguments of Dr. Lamont and the scholars who disagree with him?
… “Well, I see that Archbishop Viganò, John Lamont, Matthew McCusker, Edmond Mazza [sic], the writers at ‘Novus Ordo Watch’ and some other intelligent scholars are now saying Francis is not a true pope. But on the other hand, not one other Catholic Successor of the Apostles that I know of, among the 4,000 or so who now govern God’s Church, denies Francis’ status as the true Successor of Peter…Could it be that God has not only allowed the Successor of Peter to lapse from office through notorious heresy, but has also allowed the entire College of Cardinals and all the Catholic bishops bar none to remain blind to Bergoglio’s pertinacious heresy and so continue to recognize a faithless impostor and antipope as true pope?…Won’t I be prudent, therefore, to follow the maxim securus iudicat orbis terrarum – ‘the judgement of the whole world is safe’ – and so continue to recognize Francis as pope…
My reply: Why talk in the abstract?
In 1378, there was a concrete case of “an ordinary lay Catholic in the pews” who had to decide whether Clement VII was Pope because God “allowed the entire College of Cardinals” to recognize him as Successor of Peter instead of Urban VI (still very much alive and kicking).
Against the view of Bishop Schneider that: “There is no authority to declare or consider an elected and generally accepted Pope as an invalid Pope,” Doctor of the Church, St. Catherine of Siena did exactly that: declared and considered an elected and generally accepted “Pope” Clement VII an antipope and defied the entire college of cardinals when she wrote to them:
…I tell you that you [cardinals] did wrong, with the antipope… he was chosen a member of the devil… you have committed all these faults in regard to this devil… to confess him as Pope, which he surely is not…(emphasis added).[1]
Fr. Harrison also writes:
even though through his (putative) notorious heresy Francis would have incurred latae sententiae excommunication the instant after losing the papal office, his continuing acts of papal governance would still be valid, even though illicit. Why? Because according to c. 1331, §2, no. 2, those acts, unlawful though they be, will be invalid only after his excommunication has been declared by the competent authority.
In short, even supposing Francis has indeed lapsed from office as a notorious heretic, all faithful Catholics, paradoxically, will still be obliged to treat him as pope for all practical purposes for as long as our other shepherds, the college of bishops, do so. For as long as they do not declare and enforce Francis’s removal from office, we, like they, will be obliged to obey his just commands, assent to his orthodox magisterial statements, and recognize the validity of his appointments and other acts of church governance.
Again, unlike Fr. Harrison, St. Catherine did not wait for any of the cardinals and bishops to declare Clement VII deposed before she declared that he was an antipope—and a devil!
Furthermore, if Fr. Harrison’s reasoning is correct, then when Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman said:
we hold also that a heretical Pope, ipso facto, ceases to be Pope by reason of his heresy,[2]
what he really meant to add (but did not) is that because of canon law we need to treat him as Pope anyway.
And when Archbishop of Cincinnati John Purcell said:
if he [the Pope] denies any dogma of the Church held by every true believer, he is no more Pope than either you or I,[3]
what he really meant to add (but did not) is that because of canon law we need to treat him as Pope anyway.
And when Cardinal Alfons Maria Stickler, S.D.B. Vatican Librarian said
If the person of the pope becomes a heretic, he no longer holds the office of pope, just as a judge who has become clinically insane, even though he remains the same person, can no longer be regarded as a judge as far as the effects of the office are concerned.[4]
what he really meant to add (but did not) is that because of canon law we need to treat him as Pope anyway.
And when Fr. Malachi Martin said:
a pope who became a heretic would cease to be pope…[5]
what he really meant to add (but did not) is that because of canon law we need to treat him as Pope anyway.
And speaking of canon law, Fr. Harrison ignores the clear teaching of the most authoritative commentary on canon law from 1917 to 1982, that of Fathers Werner SJ and Vidal, SJ:
Through notorious and openly divulged heresy, the Roman Pontiff, should he fall into heresy, by that very fact is deemed to be deprived of the power of jurisdiction even before any declaratory judgement by the Church… A pope who falls into public heresy would cease ipso facto to be a member of the Church; therefore, he would also cease to be head of the Church (emphasis added).[6]
The antipope is deemed deprived of jurisdiction before any declaratory judgement.
Wener and Vidal also disagree with Fr. Harrison about whether individuals are allowed to believe that a putative Pope is an antipope:
…they cannot be numbered among the schismatics, who refuse to obey the Roman Pontiff because they consider [him]… suspect or doubtfully elected on account of rumors in circulation.[7]
And in this Werner and Vidal are following the view of Cardinal Thomas Cajetan, OP who taught:
If someone, for a reasonable motive, holds the person of the Pope in suspicion and refuses his presence, even his jurisdiction, he does not commit the delect of schism nor any other whatsoever, provided… he be ready to accept the Pope were he not held in suspicion.[8]
Lastly, Fr. Harrison claims that scholars like Dr. John Lamont and myself “owe it” to the rest of the Catholic world to tell them
which of the cardinals he appointed (if any) are true cardinals possessing the right to elect a new Pontiff. But in any case, since the names of those who voted for this or that candidate during a conclave are never made known publicly, and since after the December 2024 consistory 80% of all voting cardinals will have been appointed by Francis, there will be an overwhelming probability that whoever is elected will owe his election partly to the votes of men who, having received their red hats after Bergoglio lapsed from office, are not true cardinals.
In short, if Lamont, Viganó et al are right, the next man elected to the See of Peter at the next conclave will almost certainly not be a true pope. And since the cardinals he appoints will also not be true cardinals, and since the bishops he appoints will have no true jurisdiction over the faithful in their dioceses, there will be no foreseeable future way out of this rabbit hole. The Church as a recognizable, visible entity will have ceased to exist, because no future conclave will have certainly valid papal electors. And the ecclesiology implied by affirming that the entire college of bishops could ever be, and has in fact been, seduced into following an antipope is surely heterodox. It implies the Protestant ecclesiology that the true Church is invisible, that it needs no recognizable earthly head, and that it consists of all those scattered individuals who hold orthodox Christian belief. This runs up against the dogma of the indefectibility of the Church and the dogma, defined by Vatican I, that Blessed Peter will have perpetual successors i.e., right up till the Second Coming.
Again, I would point out that against a fact, there is no argument.
As I stated above, history shows that Fr. Harrison is wrong when he says the notion that “the entire college of bishops could ever be, and has in fact been, seduced into following an antipope is surely heterodox.” In St. Catherine’s day, that was precisely the case. The Visibility of the Church survived. It also survived the Great Western Schism when for forty years there were two “popes” and then three at a time. And those cardinals and bishops appointed by antipopes were ultimately considered valid. Why not today?
As for which of the cardinals are eligible to vote in the next conclave, I would say the ones who have never publicly and pertinaciously denied or cast doubt on any Catholic dogma of faith and morals. That should narrow the number down to about twelve or so, don’t you think Father?
To learn the true history of papal conclaves: past, present (and future) might I invite the reader to enroll in my Advent course, Conclave/Antipope?
[1] St. Catherine of Siena, “Letter to Three Italian Cardinals,” (1378) trans. Vida D. Scudder
[2] Blessed John Henry Cardinal Newman, Certain Difficulties Felt by Anglicans in Catholic Teaching Considered, 1879.
[3] Archbishop John B. Purcell, in Rev. James J. McGovern, Life and Life Work of Pope Leo XIII, (Chicago, IL: Allied Printing, 1903), pp. 239-241.
[4] Cardinal Alfons Maria Stickler, S.D.B. The Catholic Historical Review, vol. 60, no. 3 168 (October 1974), pp. 427-441.
[5] Fr. Malachi Martin, The Keys of This Blood, (New York, NY: Touchstone/Simon & Schuster, 1991), p. 677.
[6] Fr. Franz Wernz and Fr. Pedro Vidal, Ius Canonicum II, p. 453, our translation.
[7] Fr. Franz Wernz and Fr. Pedro Vidal, Ius Canonicum, 7, p. 398.
[8] Cardinal Thomas Cajetan, OP, Commentary on the Summa Theologiae of St. Thomas Aquinas; entry 186 on “schism”; 2up
