Catholic Candle note: Sedevacantism is wrong and is (material or formal) schism.  Catholic Candle is not sedevacantist. 

Below is the ninth article in a series which covers specific aspects of the error of sedevacantism.  As context for this ninth article, let us recall what we saw in the earlier eight articles:

In the first article, we saw that we cannot know whether the pope (or anyone else) is a formal heretic (rather than a material heretic only) – and thus whether he is outside the true Catholic Church – based simply on his persistent, public teaching of a heretical opinion.[1]

Then in the second article, we saw that we must not judge a man to be a formal heretic if he professes to be Catholic and says he believes what a Catholic must believe now, in order to be Catholic now.  When a person professes a heretical opinion, we must judge him in the most favorable light (if we judge him at all).  So, we must avoid the sin of rash judgment and we must not judge negatively the interior culpability of the pope and the 1.3 billion[2] people who profess to be Catholic.  We must not judge they are not “real” Catholics if they tell us that they are Catholics.  Instead, we should count them as Catholics who are very confused.[3]

Thus, we must judge the conciliar popes to have been material heretics, not formal heretics, and that each was pope in his turn until his death (or abdication).  Regarding any of the world’s 1.3 billion self-described Catholics who hold heresy, we must judge them to be material heretics only (if we judge them at all), unless they themselves tell us that they know they don’t qualify to be Catholics.[4]

In the third article, we examined briefly the important difference between persons in authority who fulfill their duty to judge those under their charge in the external forum, as contrasted to a sedevacantist or anyone else except God who judges the interior culpability of other persons and (rashly) judges them to be formal heretics.[5] 

In the fourth article, we saw that it does not help us to protect ourselves better from a conciliar pope’s heresy, to declare that we know he is not the pope and is not a Catholic.[6]

In the fifth article, we saw that it is possible for a pope to teach (or believe) heresy and in fact, popes have taught and believed heresy at various times during Church history.[7] 

In the sixth article, we saw that the Church infallibly assures us that we will have a pope at all times until the end of the world, except during very short interregnums between papal reigns, during which the Church is in the process of electing a new pope and during which the Church’s unified government continues to function.[8]

In the seventh article of this series, we saw that the Catholic Church is a visible Body and will be visible to all.  The Catholic Church has a visible monarchical government and the pope is visible to all.  Thus, we know we have a pope and that he is visible to all.[9]

In the eighth article, we saw that the necessary visibility of the Catholic Church and the pope, requires as a corollary that whoever virtually all Catholics see (believe) is pope must be the pope, since the pope must be visible to all.

Below, in the ninth article of this series, we will examine more deeply what schism is and how sedevacantism is schism.

Sedevacantism is Inherently Schism[10]

As St. Thomas Aquinas teaches, schismatics are:

“those who refuse to submit to the Sovereign Pontiff, and to hold communion with those members of the Church who acknowledge his supremacy.”[11] 

That is exactly what sedevacantists do.  There are two parts to St. Thomas’ definition.  Schismatics are those who refuse:

1.    to submit to the Sovereign Pontiff; and

 

2.    to hold communion with those members of the Church who acknowledge his supremacy.”[12]  .

The sedevacantists refuse both of these things. 

1.    The sedevacantists refuse to submit to the current, reigning pope, asserting that he has no authority over them because he is not “really” the pope.

2.    Also, the sedevacantists do not “hold communion with those members of the Church who acknowledge his [viz., the pope’s] supremacy”.[13]  Instead, the sedevacantists declare they themselves do not belong to the same church as the 1.3 billion persons whom the sedevacantists rashly judge to not be “real” Catholics even though these 1.3 billion people consider themselves to be Catholic and are part of the “mainstream” human element of the Church (however confused these Catholics are concerning doctrine and morals). 

Summary of this Section: Sedevacantism is always schism because it is always a refusal to submit to the authority of the current reigning pope (and also to hold communion with those who submit to the pope’s authority).

Don’t Confuse the Sin of Schism with the Sin of Denying the Authority of the Papal Office in the Abstract (Which is Heresy).

We should not confuse the sin of schism (which is refusing submission to the authority of the current, reigning pope), with the sin of heresy, in which a person rejects as a matter of principle the very notion of the authority of the papal office –  the authority of which is revealed as part of our Catholic Faith.^[14]

In contrast to the sedevacantists’ gravely wrong position, faithful and informed Catholics recognize that the current, reigning pope has authority over us all.  Even though we frequently cannot do what the pope commands us to do (because the command is sinful), nonetheless we must “acknowledge his supremacy”, as St. Thomas teaches us that we must.[15] 

We must do what the pope commands us to do if we can do so in good conscience.  We must obey his commands that are not sinful.  Thus, for example, if Pope Leo XIV were to command Catholics to recite at least five decades of the rosary each day, under pain of sin, we would be bound in conscience to do this, under pain of sin.

Of  course, it would be the sin of false “obedience” if we were to “obey” a sinful command of our superior – including the pope – because that supposed “obedience” to the superior would be false obedience and would actually be disobedience to God.[16]

Can a Sedevacantist Go to Heaven?

“Schism severs a man from the Church”, as St. Thomas teaches, quoting St. Jerome.[17]  Further, there is No Salvation Outside the Church.  So it would seem that no sedevacantist could ever go to heaven.

But we must make a crucial distinction; there are two ways to be severed from the Church: 1) Materially; and 2) Formally.  Let us look into this distinction further.

When a man holds the grave, false position that we have no pope (whereas we do have a pope), there are two ways he can hold this position.  He can either:

v  Hold this error culpably (i.e., he “knows better”); or
 

v  Hold this error innocently (i.e., he does not “know better” and does so in ignorance).

If the sedevacantist is blameless for his grave act of schism, then he has no interior culpability (i.e., no sin on his soul) although his position is objectively a grave act of schism.  This is like the man who commits the objective act of theft by innocently (although wrongfully) taking someone else’s umbrella (believing it to be his own umbrella), as he departs from a restaurant.  The man taking the umbrella commits an objective act of theft without having interiorly culpability (on his soul) for the sin of theft.  This man is a “material thief” but not a “formal thief”.

Similarly, if the particular sedevacantist is ignorant and is not interiorly culpable (according to God’s judgment of his soul) for his false opinion that we have no pope, (and thus not recognizing the authority of the pope who is then reigning), then he is a “material schismatic” and not a “formal one”.  The material schismatic is a person who refuses to submit to the authority of the current reigning pope, wrongly believing that it is permissible for a Catholic to do this.

By contrast, the sedevacantist is a formal schismatic if he has interior culpability (according to God’s judgment of his soul) because he truly “knows better” than to deny the authority of the reigning pontiff.  This distinction (between material and formal schism) is analogous to the distinction between material and formal heresy: 

Just as:

Ø  a material schismatic is a person who ignorantly holds that we have no pope, and thus, this materially schismatic person is materially outside the Catholic Church,

Ø  so also, a material heretic is ignorant that he holds heresy and this material heretic is materially outside the Catholic Church. 

But both the material schismatic and the material heretic are still formally inside the Church and so it is still possible for such persons to go to heaven because their grave error is (by hypothesis, in this example) innocent and committed in ignorance.

By contrast, a formal schismatic, is a person who is sinfully culpable for his error of holding that we have no pope.  This schismatic is formally outside the Catholic Church.  This is like the formal heretic who is sinfully culpable for his error in holding heresy.  This heretic is formally outside the Catholic Church.  Such persons – both formal schismatics and formal heretics – cannot go to heaven because there is No Salvation Outside the Catholic Church.

For the reasons set forth in Catholic Candle’s article which examines the sin of rash judgment,[18] we must not judge particular sedevacantists to be formal schismatics.  Only God can judge that (unless they themselves tell us that they know that they do not qualify as Catholics because of their refusal to recognize the authority of the pope).  Instead, if we judge individual sedevacantists at all, we must judge them in the best possible light (as St. Thomas teaches).  This would result in our supposing that they are material schismatics, not formal schismatics.[19]  This is true even if, in our judgment of the sedevacantists’ culpability, we would “err frequently through thinking well” of them.  Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1.

The Common Root of Schism and the Sedevacantists’ Rash Judgment, is not an Accident.

As St. Thomas teaches, the sin of “schism is essentially opposed to the unity of ecclesiastical charity.”  Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, ad 3.

Rash judgment also, is a sin against charity.  One way to see this is true, is that we would want our neighbor to judge us (if at all) in the best possible light.  If we do not judge our neighbor this same way, then we fail to “do unto others”, as we would have them “do unto” us.  St. Matthew’s Gospel, 7:12.  Thus, we are not charitable and are not treating our neighbor as ourselves, as required by the Second Great Commandment.  St. Matthew’s Gospel, 22:39.

Further, our judgments should always be made with a “habit of charity”, as St. Thomas explains.[20]  We must judge our neighbor (if at all) according to “our goodwill toward him”, ready to believe the best of him.[21]  For charity “believeth all things”, as St. Paul teaches us.  1 Corinthians, 13: 7.  St. Thomas teaches us that Our Lord “forbids judgment which proceeds not from benevolence but from bitterness of heart.”[22]

Although we must not judge the interior culpability of individual sedevacantists, it is not by chance that schism and rash judgment are both, at their root, sins against charity.  This connection is not by chance any more than the fact that gluttons tend to commit other kinds of sins connected to gluttony, such as pampering their flesh through inordinate attachment to bodily comfort.  (These connections between sins are objectively true, regardless of a particular person’s culpability.)

Summary of this article

All sedevacantists are in schism because they all refuse to submit to the authority of the pope and refuse to be in communion with (i.e., acknowledge as fellow Catholics) the mainstream of people who consider themselves to be Catholic but are greatly confused about doctrine and morals. 

The schism of the sedevacantists is material or formal – depending on whether they are culpable for their grave error.