Catholic Doctrine

Vatican II Teaches the Heresy that Everyone Receives Grace

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note:

If only warned once against the principal errors of our Time, most people will lose their Faith.  They must be reminded periodically about each of these errors and the opposing Catholic Truth.  They will appreciate these reminders if they love the Faith, just like a man loves hearing people praise his spouse, if he loves her.  

People are continually bombarded with liberalism from all sides.  They will gradually and imperceptibly succumb to liberalism if they simply are not regularly warned and reminded about these errors which are foisted upon them repeatedly.  

Below, is an article about the error that everyone receives grace.  This article is an expanded version of an article we printed in February 2017.  A few weeks before that earlier article, Bishop Richard Williamson published the error that God gives grace to all men.  Here are Bishop Williamson’s words:

[T]o all men He [i.e., God] gives grace sufficient for them to know Him and love Him and so get to Heaven.[1]

The present article does not mention Bishop Williamson because he has changed his position.  He now correctly refers to men “possibly” receiving sanctifying grace, showing he no longer holds that everyone receives grace.  Here are his words:

And men are torn between the two from conception until death, because they receive from God their basic human nature and possibly sanctifying grace which both incline them to God, while from the Fall of Adam their nature is wounded with original sin which inclines them to Satan and to evil. Nor can any man alive avoid this conflict.[2]

Thus, to his credit, Bishop Williamson did his duty and publicly corrected his previous public error and scandal on this issue.  Please pray for him that he corrects his other errors too.[3]  When those errors are corrected, we will enthusiastically and gratefully welcome him and support him!

A person might be tempted to hold the feel-good belief circulating in our modernist age, that everyone receives grace.  This false belief agrees with our democratic mentality that everyone deserves equal opportunity to achieve his goals.  However, grace is a free, undeserved gift of God’s generosity, which He does not give to everyone.  

As St. Thomas Aquinas explains, it is not unfair or unjust that God does not give all men grace because grace is not a debt that God owes in justice.  Here are St. Thomas’s words, in which he contrasts debts owed in justice, to the gratuitous nature of God’s free and undeserved gift of grace:

There is a twofold giving.  One belongs to justice, and occurs when we give a man his due.  In this type of giving, [the sin of] respect of persons takes place [viz., fulfilling (or not fulfilling) our duty of justice based on the status of the particular person].  

The other giving belongs to liberality, when one gives gratis that which is not a man’s due.  Such is the bestowal of the gifts of grace, whereby sinners are chosen by God.  In such giving, there is no place for respect of persons, because anyone may, without injustice, give of his own as much as he will, and to whom he will, according to Matt. 20:14 & 15: “Is it not lawful for me to do what I will?  …  Take what is thine, and go thy way.”[4] 

Modernists (e.g., de Lubac) promote acceptance for the heresy of universal salvation by teaching that God gives grace to everyone.  For, if God gave everyone grace, then it would appear to narrow the chasm between all men and salvation.

The error that everyone receives grace also promotes the heresy of naturalism.  If a person (wrongly) considers grace as something given to every man simply because he is human, then this confuses the supernatural order with the natural order.  That is why Pope Pius XII, as part of his condemnation of heretical naturalism, insisted that God has no obligation to call all persons to salvation (which would require Him to give them grace).  Pope Pius XII condemned the modernist Henri de Lubac (who became a Cardinal after Vatican II), in these words:

Some [persons] … destroy the gratuity of the supernatural order, since God, they say, cannot create intellectual beings without ordering and calling them to the beatific vision. 

Humani generis, §26 (emphasis added).[5]

This “calling them to the beatific vision” would require God to give them grace because (as St. Thomas explains) “no one can come … to the glory of the vision of God … except through grace”.[6] 

Further, as St. Thomas teaches, “the very least grace is sufficient to … merit eternal life.”[7]  Thus, in effect, Pope Pius XII condemned the naturalist heresy that God cannot create mankind without giving all men the grace “ordering and calling them to the beatific vision.”

Because grace and the call[8] to the beatific vision are free, undeserved gifts of God, God gives these gifts to only some men.  God does no injustice to those men to whom He does not give grace.[9] 

Vatican II Teaches the Error that God gives Grace to Everyone

As one of its countless errors, Vatican II teaches that God gives all men grace.  For example, in Lumen Gentium, the council teaches: “Christ … communicated truth and grace to all.”  Lumen Gentium, §8 (emphasis added).

As explained above, Vatican II’s error destroys the gratuitousness of God’s free, undeserved gift of grace.  As shown below, one of the most obvious ways to see this error, is by considering that a baby cannot go to heaven without baptism.

Everyone Who Dies Without Baptism and Before the Use of Reason, Dies Without Grace and Cannot Save His Soul

St. Thomas explains the teaching of the Catholic Church:

[M]an is not justified from sin[10] [including original sin] except by grace … [and] the very least grace is sufficient to … merit eternal life.[11]

But babies can only receive grace through Baptism (because they cannot use their reason and so cannot have Baptism of Desire[12]).  As the Summa explains:

[S]ometimes Baptism cannot be omitted without loss of eternal salvation, as in the case of children who have not come to the use of reason.[13]

Because a baby cannot get to heaven without grace and cannot obtain grace without baptism, the Church insists on prompt baptism.  As St. Thomas explains:

[W]e must make a distinction and see whether those who are to be baptized are children or adults.  For if they be children, Baptism should not be deferred.  First, because in them we do not look for better instruction or fuller conversion.  Secondly, because of the danger of death, for no other remedy is available for them besides the sacrament of Baptism.[14]


Summary of the Above Explanation

We see that God does not owe grace to anyone as a matter of justice.  Rather, grace is a free, undeserved gift of God and He chooses to give it to some persons and not to others.  God could choose to give baptism (and grace) to all unbaptized babies who die before the age of reason, but He does not.

It is a heresy (promoted by conciliar revolutionaries such as de Lubac) that God must call all intellectual beings to beatitude (and thus give them the grace required for this call to beatitude).

Unbaptized babies (who die before the age of reason) are obvious examples of persons to whom God never gives grace.   If they received grace, no one would be in Limbo. 

This suffices to show that Vatican II plainly teaches heresy[15] when it says that God gives grace to everyone.

It is Rash to Declare that God gives Grace even to All Adults.

It is rash to say that God gives grace to all adults.  Such a statement ignores that grace is a free, undeserved gift of God and that God gives grace only to whom He wills.  As St. Thomas explains, following St. Ambrose:

[T]he extrinsic and chief cause of devotion is God, of Whom [St.] Ambrose, commenting on Luke 9:55, says that “God calls whom He

deigns to call, and whom He wills, He makes religious; the profane

Samaritans[16], had He so willed,[17] He would have made devout.”[18]

St. Thomas Aquinas, the Greatest Doctor of the Church, follows St. Augustine, who is the Doctor of Grace, in teaching that God does not give grace to all adults.  Here are St. Thomas’s words, quoting St. Augustine:

If we understand those things alone to be in a man's power, which we can do without the help of grace, then we are bound to do many things which we cannot do without the aid of healing grace, such as to love God and our neighbor, and likewise to believe the articles of faith.  But with the help of grace we can do this, for this help “to whomsoever it is given from above it is mercifully given; and from whom it is withheld it is justly withheld, as a punishment of a previous, or at least of original sin,” as Augustine states.[19]

Note that St. Thomas, quoting St. Augustine, explains that God withholds grace from someone (although that person cannot obey all God’s commands without grace), either because that person has actual sins or at least because of original sin.

Prior unfaithfulness and actual sin are only further reasons (in addition to original sin) why God might never give grace to some adult, just as He also chooses to give no grace to unbaptized babies.

Summary of the Reasons so far, showing that Vatican II Teaches Heresy

The Catholic Faith teaches us that grace is a free, undeserved gift that God owes to no one and does not give to everyone.  

Vatican II falsely teaches that everyone receives grace.  Its teaching is false for at least five reasons:

  1. The council’s error means all unbaptized babies go to heaven, because those babies would receive grace (along with everyone else).  But those babies cannot lose grace because they cannot commit actual sin and so unbaptized babies who die, must all go to heaven because they all die with grace.  The Catholic Faith teaches the opposite, viz., that no unbaptized babies go to heaven.

  1. The council’s error destroys the gratuity of God’s free and undeserved gift of grace.
  2. The council’s error promotes the heretical naturalism condemned by Pope Pius XII.

  1. The council’s error promotes universal salvation, by appearing to narrow the chasm between all men and salvation.

  1. The council’s error rashly contradicts the great Doctors of the Church, and claims that all adults receive grace.

In teaching that God gives grace to everyone, Vatican II teaches an error about the Catholic Faith.  In other words, it teaches heresy.

Another reason it is clear that not everyone receives grace

When a person receives grace, he receives the Catholic Faith because grace causes the Catholic Faith in our souls.[20]  In other words, if a man has grace, he has the Catholic Faith also.[21]

It is the Catholic Faith which causes a person to become (or remain) Catholic.  If the person loses grace (and charity) through mortal sin but still has the Faith, then he becomes a dead member of the Church but remains Catholic.

If it were true that everyone receives grace, then it would be true that everyone receives the Catholic Faith, because grace causes the Faith.  If everyone receives the Catholic Faith, then everyone becomes a Catholic.  

But it is false that everyone becomes Catholic.  The Catholic Church differentiates apostates (who reject the Catholic Faith which they previously held) from other non-Catholics, e.g., Jews and pagans (who never had the Catholic Faith).[22] 

Thus, it is false that everyone receives grace, because it would make them all Catholics, and make all non-Catholics into apostates when they then reject the Catholic Faith (which is caused by grace).

Does this mean that non-Catholics go to hell without their own fault?

No.  We cannot get to heaven without God’s help.  However, anyone who goes to hell, goes there through his own fault.  God judges and blames him for the sins he committed freely, not for lacking the free gifts of grace God chose not to give him.  

The Natural Law is in every man’s heart and a man goes to hell because of his sins against the Natural Law, even if he did not have knowledge of the true Catholic Faith.[23]

If it were supposed that a man would somehow live his whole life without committing any mortal sin, yet he did not have any grace (and so could not go to heaven), then he would go to a place of natural happiness, the Limbo of the Babies.  The reality, though, is that, without grace, such a man commits mortal sin by his own free will and so goes to hell.

Using a Vatican Holy Office condemnation from 1690, to falsely support the error that everyone receives grace

Some people might wrongly suppose that a Vatican Holy Office condemnation from 1690, supports the error that everyone receives grace.  Here is that statement condemned by the Holy Office in 1690:

Condemned:

Pagans, Jews, heretics, and others of this kind do not receive in any way any influence from Jesus Christ, and so you will rightly infer from this that in them there is a bare and weak will without any sufficient grace.[24]

To infer means to “derive as a conclusion from facts or premises”.[25]  The Vatican Holy Office condemns the idea that from the bare fact that a person is not Catholic, we can rightly conclude he has not received grace.  This condemnation tells us that some non-Catholics receive grace (otherwise we could rightly conclude none receive grace).  Of those non-Catholics who receive grace, they either reject that grace or use it to begin a Catholic life.  

Through this condemnation, we know that some non-Catholics receive grace.  But this does not allow us to conclude that all non-Catholics receive grace.  This is like when we know that some members of a family are female, this does not allow us to conclude that all members of the family are female.  

The Jansenists were wrong when they said that no non-Catholics receive grace.  Although this Jansenist statement is justly condemned, it does not pertain to the issue at hand because the truth is that grace is a gratuitous (free) gift which God gives to whom He wills, including to some non-Catholics.  However, God does not give grace to everyone, as is clear from the explanation in this article and from the existence of the Limbo of the Babies; (no one would be in limbo if everyone received grace).

It is a mystery of God’s Providence what graces He does (and doesn’t) give, and to whom He gives (and doesn’t give) them, according to His Will.[26]

Conclusion

Let us thank God with all our heart for the precious gift of grace, through which the Catholic Faith, the Catholic life, and salvation are opened to us!  

How much more we should be grateful for this blessing, because we see that the gift of grace is not given to everyone and that God first gave it to us as His free, undeserved gift, not because of our prior merits!

[1]          January 14, 2017 Eleison Comments #496 (emphasis added; bracketed word added for clarity).

[2]          April 6, 2019 Eleison Comments, #612 (emphasis added).

[3]          Bishop Williams teaches errors on many subjects, e.g., he says that Traditional Catholics can go the new mass if it helps them.  Read his words cited from his own source, here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/williamson-traditional-new-mass.html

[4]          Summa, IIa IIae, Q.63, a.1, ad 3 (emphasis and bracketed words added; ellipsis in original).

[5]          The connection between de Lubac and this condemnation, is set forth in Si Si No No issue #5, December 1993, in an article entitled They Think They’ve Won, Part three.

[6]          Here is the longer quote: “the holy Fathers [of the Old Testament] were delivered from hell by being admitted to the glory of the vision of God, to which no one can come except through grace; according to Rom. 6:23: ‘The grace of God is life everlasting.’”  Summa, III, Q. 52, a.7, respondeo; the quote from St. Paul is in the original.

[7]          Summa, IIIa, Q.62, a.6, ad 3.

[8]          Not only is the Beatific Vision itself a gratuitous gift of God but even the call itself to the beatific vision is a free, undeserved gift of God, which He does not give to all men.  Our Lord teaches us that “many [not all] are called but few are chosen.”  St. Matthew, 22:14 (bracketed words added).

[9]          St. Thomas gives an example of men not given grace, when he teaches: “God hid [true] wisdom from the [worldly] wise by not giving them grace.”  Quoted from Lectures on St. Matthew’s Gospel, St. Thomas Aquinas, ch.11, §960.  St. Thomas is explaining the Gospel verse “because Thou hast hidden these things from the wise and prudent” (bracketed words added to reflect the context).  

Because grace is a free, undeserved gift of God, these worldly-wise men have no cause to claim that God was unjust by withholding His grace.

[10]          i.e., so that his sins are forgiven.

[11]
         Summa, III, Q.62, a.6, ad 3 (bracketed words added).

[12]
         Contrary to the Feeneyite errors, the Catholic Church teaches the possibility of Baptism of Desire and Baptism of Blood.  Read the explanation here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/the-catholic-teaching-of-baptism-of-desire-and-baptism-of-blood.html

[13]
         Summa Supp., Q.8, a.1, ad 2.

[14]
         Summa, III, Q.68, a.3, respondeo (emphasis added).

[15]          Heresy is an error about the Catholic Faith.  Here is how St. Thomas Aquinas explains this truth:

We are speaking of heresy now as denoting a corruption of the Christian Faith.  Now it does not imply a corruption of the Christian faith, if a man has a false opinion in matters that are not of faith, for instance, in questions of geometry and so forth, which cannot belong to the faith by any means; but only when a person has a false opinion about things belonging to the faith.

Now a thing may be of the faith in two ways, as stated above, in one way, directly and principally, e.g. the articles of faith; in another way, indirectly and secondarily, e.g. those matters, the denial of which leads to the corruption of some article of faith; and there may be heresy in either way, even as there can be faith.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.11, a.2, respondeo (emphasis added).

[16]          The Samaritans were heretics who lived between Judea and Galilee.  See, St. John’s Gospel, ch.4.

[17]          One might think that God gives everyone grace because God “will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”  1 Timothy 2:4.  However, God wills all men to be saved upon a condition which was not fulfilled, viz., that there be no sin.

Because sin entered the world, God’s unconditional will is that some persons are not saved and are not even “called” through grace.  For “many [not all] are called but few are chosen.”  St. Matthew’s Gospel, 22:14 (bracketed words added).

Among the examples of men that God could have saved but chose not to save (or even give them any grace), are babies who die without baptism, and also “the profane Samaritans [whom], had He so willed, He would have made devout”.

[18]          Summa, IIa IIae, Q.82, a.3 (emphasis added).

[19]          Summa, IIa IIae, Q.2 a.5. ad 1, emphasis added, quoting St. Augustine from De Corr. et Grat. v, vi [Cf. Epistle 190; De Praed. Sanct., viii.].

[20]          Here is how St. Thomas explains this important truth:

Grace causes faith not only when faith begins anew to be in a man, but also as long as faith lasts.  For it has been said above (I:104:1; I-II:109:9) that God is always working man’s justification, even as the sun is always lighting up the air. Hence grace is not less effective when it comes to a believer than when it comes to an unbeliever: since it causes faith in both, in the former by confirming and perfecting it, in the latter by creating it anew.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.4 a.4, ad 3 (emphasis added).

[21]          As the First Vatican Council teaches:

[Faith is] a supernatural virtue by which, under the inspiration and the aid of the grace of God, we believe that which He has revealed to us to be true: we believe it, not because of the intrinsic truth of the things seen by the natural light of our reason, but because of the very authority of God who has revealed us these truths, Who can neither deceive nor be deceived.

Vatican I, Session 3, ch.3, Denz. 3008 (emphasis added).

[22]          For example, here is St. Thomas Aquinas, distinguishing between those non-Catholics who had previously been Catholic, and other persons who had never been Catholic:  St. Thomas explains:

[T]he unbelief of heretics, who confess their belief in the Gospel, and resist that faith by corrupting it, is a more grievous sin than that of the Jews, who have never accepted the Gospel faith.  Since, however, they accepted the figure of that faith in the Old Law, which they corrupt by their false interpretations, their unbelief is a more grievous sin than that of the heathens, because the latter have not accepted the Gospel faith in any way at all.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.10, a.6.

[23]          The Natural Law is what we know we must do by the light of the natural reason God gave us. One example of the Natural Law is that we must never tell a lie.  We naturally know this because we know that the purpose of speech is to convey the truth and so we naturally know that telling a lie is abusing the purpose of speech.

Here is how St. Thomas explains what the Natural Law is:

[L]aw, being a rule and measure, can be in a person in two ways: in one way, as in him that rules and measures; in another way, as in that which is ruled and measured, since a thing is ruled and measured, in so far as it partakes of the rule or measure. Wherefore, since all things subject to Divine Providence are ruled and measured by the eternal law, as was stated above [in Summa, Ia IIae, Q.91, a.1]; it is evident that all things partake somewhat of the eternal law, in so far as, namely, from its being imprinted on them, they derive their respective inclinations to their proper acts and ends. Now among all others, the rational creature is subject to Divine Providence in the most excellent way, in so far as it partakes of a share of providence, by being provident both for itself and for others. Wherefore it has a share of the Eternal Reason, whereby it has a natural inclination to its proper act and end: and this participation of the eternal law in the rational creature is called the natural law. Hence the Psalmist after saying (Psalm 4:6): "Offer up the sacrifice of justice," as though someone asked what the works of justice are, adds: “Many say, Who showeth us good things?”, in answer to which question he says: “The light of Thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us”: thus implying that the light of natural reason, whereby we discern what is good and what is evil, which is the function of the natural law, is nothing else than an imprint on us of the Divine light. It is therefore evident that the natural law is nothing else than the rational creature’s participation of the eternal law.

Summa, Ia IIae, Q.91, a.2, respondeo.

[24]          Statement condemned in a Decree of the Holy Office, Dec. 7, 1690, 2305 Denzinger’s Enchiridion Symbolorum #1295, °5 (emphasis added).

[26]          The Jansenist statement is also justly condemned for a second reason: it says that no non-Catholics “receive in any way any influence from Jesus Christ”.  There are many ways Our Lord influences various non-Catholics.  For example, He gives some of them grace.  Some, He influences through His Church by sending missionaries to them.  To some, He gives Catholic neighbors.  Some, He causes to attend a Catholic school.  There are countless other ways too, that Jesus Christ influences non-Catholics.  However, we do not discuss this further because we have already shown above that the condemned Jansenist statement does not pertain to the issue whether everyone receives grace.

No Salvation outside the Catholic Church

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note:

If people are only warned once against the principal errors of our Time, most of them will not keep the Faith.  They must be reminded periodically about each of these errors and the opposing Catholic Truth.  They will appreciate these reminders if they love the Faith, just like a man loves hearing people mention his spouse, if he loves her.  

People are continually bombarded with liberalism from all sides.  They will gradually and imperceptibly succumb to liberalism if they simply are not regularly warned and reminded about these errors which are foisted upon them from all sides.  

We see this happening now among the N-SSPX’s followers because that group has largely stopped preaching regularly against Vatican II[1] (as the SSPX used to do).  The article below reviews a crucial Catholic dogma and the N-SSPX’s recent public doubting of this dogma.

        

There is No Salvation outside the Catholic Church

The Catholic Faith infallibly teaches that only Catholics go to heaven, because there is No Salvation outside the Catholic Church.

The Council of Florence and Pope Eugene IV infallibly declare:

The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the ‘eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels’ (Matthew 25:41), unless before death they are joined with Her”.

Session 11.

Pope Boniface VIII infallibly declares:

With Faith urging us, we are forced to believe and to hold the one, holy, Catholic Church and that, apostolic, and we firmly believe and simply confess this (Church) outside which there is neither salvation, nor remission of sin”.

Unam Sanctam, 1302, Denz. 468.

Pope Sylvester II infallibly declares:

I believe that in Baptism all sins are forgiven, that one which was committed originally as much as those which are voluntarily committed, and I profess that outside the Catholic Church no one is saved.

Pope Sylvester II’s Profession of Faith, 991 AD.

Pope Innocent III infallibly declares:

By the heart, we believe and by the mouth we confess the one Church, not of heretics but the Holy Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church, outside which we believe that no one is saved.  

Fitts exemplo, 1208, Denz. 423.

St. Thomas Aquinas, Greatest Doctor of the Church, declares:

[T]here is but one Church in which men find salvation, just as outside the Ark of Noah it was not possible for anyone to be saved.  

Commentary on the Apostles’ Creed, at the article “The Holy Catholic Church”.

Saint Augustine, Doctor of the Church, declares:

He who is separated from the body of the Catholic Church, however laudable his conduct may otherwise seem, will never enjoy eternal life, and the anger of God remains on him by reason of the crime of which he is guilty in living separated from Christ.  

St. Augustine’s Epistle 141.

Pope St. Gregory the Great, Doctor of the Church, declares:

The Holy Catholic Church teaches that … all those who are separated from Her will not be saved.  

De Moralis, bk.14, §5.

Pope Pius IX declares:

There is only one true, holy, Catholic Church, which is the Apostolic Roman Church.  There is only one See founded in Peter by the word of the Lord, outside of which we cannot find either true faith or eternal salvation.  He who does not have the Church for a mother cannot have God for a father, and whoever abandons the See of Peter on which the Church is established trusts falsely that he is in the Church.

Singulari Quidem, §4.

Pope Pius XI declares:

The Catholic Church alone is keeping the true worship.  This is the font of truth, this is the house of faith, this is the temple of God; if any man enters not here, or if any man goes forth from it, he is a stranger to the hope of life and salvation.

Mortalium Animos, §11.

Saint Cyprian of Carthage, a Father of the Church, in writing against the heretics of his time who denied the “faith and truth of the Catholic Church”, declared that “there is no salvation out of the Church”.  3rd Century, Letter LXXII, To Jubaianus, Concerning the Baptism of Heretics, ¶¶ 20 & 21.

The Conciliar Church, the N-SSPX, and Bishop Williamson All Publicly Doubt the Dogma

The conciliar church promotes the idea of holiness and salvation outside the Catholic Church.  For example, Vatican II declares that the Jews who have not converted to the Catholic Faith “remain most dear to God”.[2]  Likewise, Pope John Paul II declared that Buddhists and other non-Catholics (as well as Catholics), are part of the “Church of the Living God”.[3]

As the “new” SSPX and Bishop Williamson are becoming more liberal, they are adopting more conciliar errors.[4]  For example, Bishop Williamson doubts the dogma that there is No Salvation outside the Catholic Church.[5] 

Recently, the N-SSPX’s superior general, Fr. Davide Pagliarani, doubted this same dogma.  Here are his words:

If a soul can be saved outside the Catholic Church, it is despite the error in which it finds itself, and not thanks to it, and in any case, it is saved by Jesus Christ alone.[6]

Fr. Pagliarani here asserts the possibility that someone can be saved outside the Catholic Church.  When Fr. Pagliarani says:

if a soul can be saved outside the Catholic Church … it is saved by Jesus

Christ

this is a shocking and Faith-destroying statement which suggests the impossible might be possible, leading many souls into liberalism.  

Moreover, Fr Pagliarani contradicts himself.  Jesus Christ saves souls by incorporating them into Himself.  That is the only reason why God’s elect have their sins forgiven.  The Body of Christ is the same thing as the Catholic Church. This is why Pius XI (above) described the Church as the temple of God, which was the way Jesus referred to His Body.  St Paul uses both expressions to refer to his early converts and explain to them how Christ was atoning for their sin by incorporating them into Himself.  See 1 Cor. 3:16-17; 1 Cor. 12:13, 27; Col. 2:11-14; John 2:19-22.

Faithful and informed Catholics would never entertain Fr. Pagliarani’s Faith-denying doubt that there might be salvation outside the Catholic Church even on the condition that salvation outside the Church was still through Jesus Christ.  The statement is similar to:

if the devil can go to heaven, he is saved by Jesus Christ.

Faithful and informed Catholics would never say this about the devil even on condition!  Yet the devil has as much chance of gaining heaven as does someone who dies outside the Catholic Church – that is, no chance!

Faithful and informed Catholics affirm the dogma that outside the Catholic Church “no one is saved.”  Quoted from Fitts exemplo, 1208, Denz. 423 (emphasis added).  

Fr. Pagliarani proves in other ways too, that he is a coward and a doctrinal weakling.  In this same interview, he is directly asked if Jews must become Catholic.  Here is the interviewer’s question:

Do the Jews also have to convert to the Catholic Church, as you say for Protestants?[7]

Weak Fr. Pagliarani does not answer that question which a faithful and informed Catholic could easily answer.  Instead, he gives the non-answer that: 1) priests used to take the anti-modernist oath; and 2) Jews who wished to join the Catholic Church are allowed to enter.  Here is his full answer to the interviewer’s question whether “the Jews also have to convert to the Catholic Church”:

Modernism is one of the most dangerous errors. Until the Second Vatican Council, the Church asked all priests to take the anti-modernist oath, which I have also taken.  As for Judaism, it would be an unforgivable sin to exclude the Jewish people from the assets and the treasures of the Catholic Church.  The salvific mission of the Church is universal, and she cannot leave out any people.[8]

Fr. Pagliarani and the “new” SSPX betray the Catholic Faith!  They neither speak the truth freely nor defend it boldly.  Thus, they betray God and the Catholic Faith.  Here is how St. Thomas declares this truth:

He who does not speak the truth freely also betrays it, for it must be freely spoken; also, he who does not defend it boldly, betrays it, for it must be boldly defended.[9]

Conclusion

The conciliar church leaders betray the Faith.  Beware: the traitors who are leading the N-SSPX and the Williamson group are leading their followers along the same conciliar path of modernism!

[1]          For example, Fr. Daniel Cooper, SSPX, wrote regarding people who want the SSPX “to be attacking Vatican II from the pulpit. Very rarely is there a good reason to do this.”  Read the longer quote here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-cooper-silent-vatican-ii.html

Fr. Cooper followed the liberal new direction of the SSPX.  He has since died.  The N-SSPX declared he entered heaven on the date he died.  Read the quote here, taken from the SSPX’s own source: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-travels-the-conciliar-path-toward-promoting-universal-salvation.html

 

Please pray for the repose of Fr. Cooper’s soul.

[2]          Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, §16.

[3]          Here is the longer quote from Pope John Paul II (before he became pope):

O God of infinite majesty!  The Trappist or the Carthusian confesses this God by a whole life of silence.  The Bedouin wandering in the desert turns toward him when the hour of prayer approaches.  And this Buddhist monk absorbed in contemplation, who purifies his spirit in turning it towards Nirvana: but is it only towards Nirvana?  …  The Church of the Living God unites in her precisely these peoples who in some manner participate to [sic] this admirable and fundamental transcendence of the human spirit, because she knows that no one can appease the most profound aspirations of this spirit but He alone, the God of infinite majesty.

Karol Cardinal Wojtyla, The Sign of Contradiction, Ed. Fayard, 1979, pp. 31-32.

[4]            Bishop Williamson rarely or never publicly condemns the N-SSPX’s liberalism and in fact, agrees with much of it.  His only frequent criticism of the N-SSPX is its seeking a deal with modernist Rome.  While such a deal will hasten the N-SSPX’s descent into ever-greater liberalism, the N-SSPX is continually becoming more liberal now.

[5]          Read Bishop Williamson’s own words about non-Catholics going to heaven, quoted from his own source, in this article:  https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/williamson-bishop-williamson-promotes-vatican-ii-heresy-that-people-can-be-saved-outside-the-catholic-church.html

[6]          Words of Father Davide Pagliarani, Superior General of the Society of Saint Pius X, quoted from the interview he gave to the Austrian daily newspaper the Salzburger Nachrichten, and published on December 15, 2018.  This interview can be found here:  https://fsspx.news/en/news-events/news/it-inconceivable-church-was-mistaken-two-millennia-43158?utm_source=Society+of+Saint+Pius+X+%7C+Newsletter&utm_campaign=fb5d776750-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_12_15_11_06&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8c13eb2341-fb5d776750-203947293

 (emphasis added).

[8]          Words of Father Davide Pagliarani, Superior General of the Society of Saint Pius X, quoted from the interview he gave to the Austrian daily newspaper the Salzburger Nachrichten, and published on December 15, 2018.  This interview can be found here:  https://fsspx.news/en/news-events/news/it-inconceivable-church-was-mistaken-two-millennia-43158?utm_source=Society+of+Saint+Pius+X+%7C+Newsletter&utm_campaign=fb5d776750-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_12_15_11_06&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8c13eb2341-fb5d776750-203947293

 (emphasis added).

[9]
         St. Thomas Aquinas, The Ways of God for Meditation and Prayer, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, ©2007, p.97.

What Gift do most People Appreciate Least, but is Worth more than a King’s Ransom?

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note: The article below was written by a man who has always been Traditional Catholic and who has been continually fighting liberalism since before Vatican II.

The answer to this riddle is: the gift of a Supernatural Faith.

The definition of a Supernatural Faith is:

The act of the intellect assenting to a Divine truth owing to the movement of the will, which is itself moved by the grace of God.[1]

The Catholic Encyclopedia explains further:

And just as the light of Faith is a supernatural gift bestowed upon the understanding, so also this Divine grace moving the will is, as its name implies, an equally supernatural and absolutely gratuitous gift.  Neither gift is due to previous study; neither of them can be acquired by human efforts, but ….  “Ask and ye shall receive.”[2] 

Most receive this gift from God through their parents, at Baptism, without effort or request.  It usually happens at a time when we give it little or no value.  Many people gain little appreciation for this gift over the years and many people discard it without any regret.  Those who keep and nurture this gift gain in virtue and understanding of what is at stake regarding earthly and eternal happiness.

The gift of Faith must be protected by an informed conscience, study, prayer, and courage to stand up against liberalism and modernism, and to stand up for Christ the King.

Two big helps to nurture your gift of Faith are humility and prayer.  Humility is the first virtue, inasmuch as it removes the obstacles to Faith.  Prayer inspires devotion and love for the Gift Giver.

The worst thing you can do with your precious gift of Faith is to put it in the hands of a liberal priest, or to be a follower of a liberal organization like the N-SSPX.  This foolish and misplaced trust does not relieve you of the responsibility for your own salvation.  I believe many follow a misguided path to salvation because they are lazy and/or cowardly; thus, they take the easy way out.  St. Paul in Romans states: “You have to work out your salvation in fear and trembling.”

Your actions demonstrate what value you place on your gift of Faith.  Below is a to-do list, with numbers for a grade.  This will help you determine what value you place on your gift of Faith.  100 points is your goal; less than that, there is work to do.

  1. You set aside a regular time for a daily Holy Hour of prayer and spiritual reading.  20 points

  1. You go out of your way to receive the traditional sacraments and attend Mass, when available.  10 points

  1. You fearlessly stand up for Christ the King no matter the criticism or loss of friendship or family.  10 points

  1. You set a good example at all times for others to follow.  10 points

  1. The traditional Catholic Faith is your whole life, every day, from the morning’s first moment through the night’s last moment.  20 points

  1. You never compromise with liberalism, no matter how slight.  10 Points

  1. You join the real resistance of informed and uncompromising Catholics.  10 points

  1. You leave or disassociate from any compromised group or priest without hesitation.  10 points

The above should confirm and defend your decision to leave the liberal N-SSPX, if you or others previously had any doubt about this.  The above points should also give you the courage to leave the liberal N-SSPX if you have failed to do so before now.

Let’s further take stock of the value you place on your gift of Faith, compared to your gift of Life from God.  The gift of Life has a built-in incentive to preserve it and nurture it.  Many spend much time and treasure to improve their health, no matter what the cost or distance.  But few people make equal efforts and have equal enthusiasm for the gift of Faith, that they have for this gift of Life.

Many protect and nurture their gift of Life to excess, which is a sin against temperance and a distraction from their effort to nurture and protect the gift of Faith.  We all have a duty to nourish and safeguard our health, but not to excess.  Everything in moderation except love for God.

So, let’s all dedicate ourselves to the eight steps listed above to nurture our gift of Divine Supernatural Faith.  You couldn’t make a better or more worthwhile decision.

 

[1]          Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911, Vol. V, page 756, quoting St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa, IIa IIae, Q.4, a.2.

[2]          Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911, Vol. V, page 756.

God Came to Earth to Redeem Man but Also for an additional reason

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note: The article below was written by a man who has always been Traditional Catholic and who has been continually fighting liberalism since before Vatican II.

After God had freely determined to save the human race, He might have done so by pardoning man’s sins without having recourse to the Incarnation of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity.  However, the Incarnation of the Word was the most fitting means for the salvation of man, and was even necessary should God claim full satisfaction for the injury done Him by sin.[1]  He took upon Himself not only the nature of man – a nature capable of suffering and sickness and death – but also He became like man in every respect except sin.[2]

Now, another reason God came to earth as a man is so He could teach us for 33 years – day after day, year after year – how one must live in order to be happy on earth and in heaven.  Any important and difficult subject to be mastered is best taught by demonstration of a leader.  This is why a new physician does a residency and a new plumber does an apprenticeship.  

Our Lord’s personal demonstration spoke much louder than words alone.  Because of that, we can never say it was easy for Him to suffer this or that, or go without this or that.  No, He suffered and gave up much, offering to be our earthly guide to ensure our happiness on earth and in heaven by following His selfless example.

It was all to help us break the grip the devil has on us because of the sin of our first parents, and our own sins.  Without Him showing us the way for 33 long years, I doubt there would be as many wonderful saints and a history of great religious societies.

Our Catholic Faith gives us many reminders of the importance of following Our Lord’s example.  For example, St. Paul urges us in these words:

Brethren, be imitators of God as very dear children and walk in love.

Epistle for 3rd Sunday of Lent (Ephesians, 5:1).

Below are the three phases of Our Lord’s Life on earth that will demonstrate for us the Way, the Truth, and the Life that we should follow for our salvation.

Phase I – Our Lord’s Hidden Life

His first examples for us started with His birth in a stable, a humble beginning.  He preferred poverty and humility to show Himself a friend of the poor, at the same time showing us the best way to heaven is through humility and detachment from earthly goods.

The Holy Family lived in Nazareth, and every year they went to Jerusalem to worship at the temple.  When Jesus was 12 years old, He went with them, but failed to return home with them.  Instead, He went to the temple to be in the midst of the wise men there.  We all know the familiar story.  After a day’s journey, Mary and Joseph could not locate Jesus in the caravan and returned to Jerusalem.  They found Him in the temple, and Mary said, “Behold thy father and I have been seeking Thee, sorrowing.”  Jesus replied, “How is it that you sought Me?  Did you not know that I must be about My father’s business?”  (Luke, 2:49)

He then meekly followed His parents to Nazareth and was subject to them.  He worked hard as a simple Carpenter, with St. Joseph.

Phase II – Our Lord’s Public Life, beginning at age 30

He started by an act of great humility: being baptized by St. John.  He then went to the desert to fast and pray for 40 days and nights.  This teaches us to do penance and prepare ourselves to fight the devil by mortification and prayer.  Jesus’ public life was to give us an example of how we should live day-to-day until our personal judgment.  Words and example directly from the God-man have a greater effect in preparing souls with instructions and training necessary for salvation.  He spoke in parables to help the less educated to understand.  Another lesson taught many times was empathy for the sick and disabled.

Phase III   Our Lord’s Passion and Death

Here again, He taught humility when He washed the feet of His Apostles at the Last Supper.  After that, He instituted the Blessed Sacrament, using common bread and wine, changing them into His own Divine Body and Blood.  

Jesus suffered and died for us, setting the example that no man has greater love than to give his life for another.  Also, He set us the perfect example how we should endure and persevere.  He suffered bitter agony of blood and sweat.  He was cruelly scourged, crowned with thorns, carried His cross, and suffered the excruciating death on the cross – all in silence.  He could not have set a better example for us to follow.  Jesus said, “I have given you an example, that as I have done to you, so you also should do.”  (John, 13:15)

He taught us to practice humility, penance, mortification, and perseverance before we presume to set an example and lead others.

His life on earth illustrated this.  He established the perfect religion, the Catholic Religion, with none of the worthless trappings and false teachings of man-made religions.

Our Lord’s perfect lessons especially fit our needs, in the true Resistance.  We must be humble and longsuffering.  We must stand firm for principle when others “bend” their principles to obtain the sacraments or find acceptance in a particular “traditional” group.  We must persevere without expecting that people will ever
understand us, or accept our stand for Christ.

[1]          Taken from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, article: Salvation, sub-article Salvation of the Human Race, Vol. 13, page 407.

[2]
         Taken from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, article, Incarnation, Vol. 7, page 706.

St. Paul taught this same truth in these words:

Having therefore a great high priest that hath passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God:  let us hold fast our confession.  For we have not a high priest, who cannot have compassion on our infirmities: but one tempted in all things like as we are, without sin.

Hebrews, 4:14-15 (emphasis added).

The Conciliar Church Abuses the Phrase “People of God” to Promote Heresy

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note: When you read the word “conciliar” in the following article, think “anti-Catholic” or “anti-Christ”.

The devil and evil men in the conciliar church know that they can control people’s thinking if they control how people speak.  For example, “Christian” truly means one who follows Christ.  But only Catholics truly follow Christ and so only Catholics are really Christian.[1]

One who truly follows Christ enters heaven.  No one truly follows Christ unless he is a Catholic in the state of grace.  It is a dogma of the Catholic Faith that there is No Salvation Outside the Catholic Church!  If a person is not Catholic, he is not a Christian and cannot save his soul.[2]

The conciliar church abuses the word “Christian” by calling heretics and schismatics “Christian”, to promote the heresy that non-Catholics can go to heaven.

To promote Heresy, the Modernists adopted the phrase “the People of God”

Just as the conciliar church abuses “Christian” to corrupt people’s thoughts by corrupting speech, so also the conciliar church abuses “the People of God”.  Although one can use this phrase in a Catholic way (viz., to refer only to Catholics), the modernists have hijacked this phrase to promote two conciliar errors: ecumenism and collegiality.

Whereas Catholics seldom called the Church “the People of God” before Vatican II, the conciliar church has been continually using this phrase since the 1960s.

 

The conciliar church claims this phrase, “the People of God” as its own.

Vatican II (and the conciliar church it caused), increased the use of “the People of God” so dramatically that the conciliar church claims this phrase as its own innovation.  Pope John Paul II remarked that “the doctrine in which the Church is presented as the People of God” is a “novelty of the Second Vatican Council”.[3] 

Although the phrase is not completely new, nonetheless, because Vatican II widely popularized the phrase to promote heresy, a faithful and informed Catholic risks confusing and scandalizing others by using “the People of God”.

Vatican II’s use of this expression is traceable to the writings of a 20th Century Lutheran heretic.

Former Pope Benedict XVI (who served as a peritus, i.e., an expert, at Vatican II) traces the origin of Vatican II’s usage of the phrase “the People of God” to a Lutheran heretic, Ernst Käsemann.  Here is how this former pope explains Käsemann’s influence upon Vatican II:

There is a third factor that favored the idea of [using the phrase] the “People of God”.  In 1939, the Evangelical exegete, Ernst Käsemann, gave his monograph on the Letter to the Hebrews the title, The Pilgrim People of God. In the framework of Council discussions, this title became right away a slogan because it made something become more clearly understood in the debates on the Constitution on the Church [i.e., Lumen Gentium] ….[4]

The conciliar usage of the expression “the People of God” promotes heretical ecumenism with non-Catholics.

The conciliar church falsely teaches that the Church of Christ encompasses more than just the Catholic Church, and that therefore one need not belong to the Catholic Church to save one’s soul.  The conciliar church uses the phrase “the People of God” to spread this heresy (viz., there is salvation outside the Catholic Church).[5]

Here is the way former Pope Benedict XVI explains how the phrase “the People of God” promotes Vatican II’s ecumenism with the heretics and schismatics:

[T]he Council introduced the concept of “the People of God” above all as an ecumenical bridge.  It applies to another perspective as well: the rediscovery [sic!] of the Church after the First World War that initially was a phenomenon [sic!] common to both Catholics and Protestants. …

[T]he phrase “People of God” … expresses the ecumenical dimension, that is, the variety of ways in which communion and ordering to the Church can and do exist, even beyond the boundaries of the Catholic Church.[6]

The conciliar notion of the Church as “the People of God” allows the conciliar church to falsely posit different degrees of “communion” with the Church.  Here is the way former Pope Benedict XVI explains how the phrase “the People of God” promotes the conciliar idea of degrees of “communion”:

If we use the image of a body to describe “belonging” we are limited only to the form of representation as “member”.  Either one is, or one is not, a member; there are no other possibilities.  One can then ask if the image of the body was too restrictive, since there manifestly existed in reality intermediate degrees of belonging.  

The Constitution on the Church [viz., Lumen Gentium] found it helpful for this purpose to use the concept of “the People of God”.  It could describe the relationship of non-Catholic Christians [sic] to the Church as being “in communion” and that of non-Christians as being “ordered” to the Church where in both cases one relies on the idea of the People of God (Lumen Gentium, nn. 15, 16).[7]

The conciliar usage of the expression “the People of God” promotes the heretical notion of a “horizontal”, non-hierarchical church.

This emphasis on “the People of God”, instead of the Mystical Body of Christ, de-emphasizes the hierarchical nature of the Church, since a body is hierarchical (with some parts more exalted and which control other parts) but “the people” is non-hierarchical.   This de-emphasis of hierarchy panders to the Protestants, as well as to the “we are church” modernist Catholics.[8]

Whereas priestly and Episcopal orders, and the delegation of Divine authority distinguish the clergy from the laity, describing the Catholic Church as “the People of God” obscures these differences.  For example, in Lumen Gentium, §13, Vatican II lumps together the hierarchy and clergy along with laymen as “members of the People of God”.[9]

Here is how former Pope Benedict XVI explained (with approval) how the phrase “the People of God” deemphasizes the hierarchical nature of the Church:

The expression does not lend itself easily to a description of the hierarchical structure of this community, especially if “People of God” is used in “contrast” to the ministers ….[10]

Conclusion

One can correctly describe the Catholic Church as “the People of God”.  However, Catholics seldom used this phrase.  Beginning at Vatican II, the modernists hijacked this phrase, and the conciliar church has used it ever since to promote two heresies.  

The “New” SSPX now uses the phrase “the People of God” as an additional step accustoming their followers to the way the conciliar church speaks
 

Because the SSPX formerly differed greatly from the conciliar church, to merge the SSPX into the conciliar church required enormous changes in how the SSPX thought and spoke.  

Thus, the leaders of the revolution in the SSPX had to tell its followers that they must “continually reposition”[11] themselves, i.e., continually change.  Bishop Fellay declared that the SSPX will try to maintain the support of its followers for a deal with Rome, by working hard to get its followers to understand the “new reality” in the Church.[12]

The “new” SSPX is steadily adopting the vocabulary of the conciliar church so that its followers will get used to how the conciliar church speaks.  The N-SSPX meters out its new conciliar terminology slowly enough to accustom its followers to hearing and using conciliar terms – without waking up those followers.  

The SSPX now speaks of “the People of God”, to accustom its followers to this conciliar lingo so they feel comfortable with it.[13]

But the SSPX also now uses many other conciliar phrases as part of its ongoing revolution against Catholic Tradition.  Here are a few more examples of the N-SSPX’s shift to conciliar terminology:

  1. Just as the conciliar church does, the N-SSPX describes the true Catholic Faith together with false heretical faiths, as “the Christian Faith” (in the singular).[14]

  1. The “new” SSPX promotes what it falsely calls “tradition”, by expanding this term to include groups that promote the new mass, the Assisi ecumenical gatherings, and the writings of Pope Francis.[15]

  1. Following the conciliar church by promoting the heresy of naturalism, the N-SSPX now defines the Catholic term “sacred” to include things such as any kind of bread and any eating together,[16] as well as all human life.[17]  Faithful and informed Catholics know that these are all only natural goods and are not sacred.

  1. The “new” SSPX follows the conciliar church in falsely saying that heretics and schismatics are “Christians”.[18]

  1. The “new” SSPX follows the conciliar church by falsely describing as “martyrs” those heretics who are killed for their heresies (e.g., by Muslims).[19]

  1. The “new” SSPX uses the phrase “faithful Catholics” to include those who attend the new mass.[20]

  1. Like the conciliar church, the “new” SSPX heretically teaches the vice of presumption, calling it the Theological Virtue of Hope.[21]

  1. The N-SSPX uses the conciliar jargon “Catholic Community” to refer to a parish, just as the conciliar church does.[22]        

  1. The N-SSPX uses the conciliar lingo degrees of communion (viz., full communion and partial communion), just as the conciliar church does.[23]

  1. The N-SSPX has begun to call the Traditional Mass by the conciliar name “Extraordinary Form” (just as the conciliar church does).[24]

  1. The N-SSPX follows the modernists by using the conciliar lingo “New Evangelization”, which is a program of indoctrination into conciliar errors.[25]

Conclusion

After Vatican II, most people who disliked the changes nonetheless stayed in their parishes, assuring themselves and each other that they would be strong enough to continue secretly rejecting the changes.  Those people gradually became conciliar.  

In the same way, most SSPX followers who dislike the SSPX’s changes have stayed in their local SSPX parish, assuring themselves and each other that they are strong enough to secretly reject the changes.  These people are gradually becoming conciliar.

Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it!

[1]        Read the explanation of this Catholic principle here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/heretics-are-not-christians.html

[3]          Sacrae Disciplinae Leges, 25 January 1983 (emphasis added).

[4]          The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm (bracketed words added for clarity).

[5]          For a thorough explanation of this Vatican II heresy about a (so-called) “Church of Christ” which the conciliar church teaches is broader than the true Catholic Church, read the explanation in Lumen Gentium Annotated, by the editors of Quanta Cura Press, © 2013, p.47 et seq.  This book is available:


and

[6]          The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at: http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm (emphasis and bracketed words added).

[7]          The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at: http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm (parenthetical citation is in the original; bracketed words added for clarity).

[8]          When promoting the non-hierarchical expression, “the People of God”, former Pope Benedict XVI stated:

  1. “[S]omeone should ask what must I do to become Church and to grow like the Church”;
  2. [E]ach one of us can and ought to say, ‘we are the Church’”; and

  1. “[W]e must be the Church.  We are the Church”.

The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at: http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm

Promoting conciliar collegiality, former Pope Benedict the XVI also warned that there is always a danger that the papal monarchy could have too much power.  Here are his words:

The idea of reform became a decisive element of the concept of the People of God, while it would be difficult to develop the idea of reform within the framework of the Body of Christ.  …  yet above and beyond all distinctions, all are pilgrims in the one community of the pilgrim People of God. … It is certainly true that there are imbalances that need correcting.  We should watch for and root out an excessive Roman centralization that is always a danger.

The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at: http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm (emphasis added).

[9]         For a thorough explanation of the hundreds of heresies in Vatican II’s Lumen Gentium, read: Lumen Gentium Annotated, by the editors of Quanta Cura Press, © 2013.  

This book is available:


and

[10]          The Ecclesiology of Vatican II, 15 September 2001 conference given by (former) Pope Benedict XVI before he became pope, found at: http://www.ewtn.com/library/curia/cdfeccv2.htm

[11]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here:

https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/pfluger-traditional-catholics-change.html

[12]          When Bishop Fellay was asked if the SSPX [can] be confident of the support of SSPX churchgoers for reconciliation (i.e., a “deal”) with Rome, he stated:

It will be quite a work, and it will take time to be able to bring the faithful to realize this new face in the history of the Church, this new reality ….

http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/sspxs-bishop-fellay-little-by-little-rome-is-giving-us-all-we-need-for-reco#ixzz4BfvbVEms

In other words, Bishop Fellay recognizes that, over time, he has to change the way the priests and laymen see things, and get them accustomed to accepting the “new reality” of the conciliar church.  How else could the “new” SSPX ever fit into the conciliar church?  Reflect for a moment: how often has he and the “new” SSPX assured us that “nothing has changed”, while the revolution advances?

[13]          For example, liberal Fr. Jurgen Wegner, N-SSPX U.S. District superior wrote a recent letter which stated:

It is hard to imagine such strong medicine for grave moral ills being prescribed by Rome today, yet that is what the Church requires if she is ever to recover.  In the meantime, the People of God cannot sit idly by waiting for a new Pius V to ascend to the Papal Thone with a divine mandate to secure the faithful and drive the unrepentant from the temple.

Quoted from Fr. Wegner’s undated letter mailed to the N-SSPX’s U.S. mailing list in late October 2018 (emphasis added).

[14]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here:

https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-refers-christian-faith.html

[15]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-meaningless-definition-tradition.html

[16]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-the-new-sspx-falsifies-catholic-terminology.html

[17]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/it-is-a-modernist-error-that-human-life-is-sacred.html

[18]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-calls-heretics-christian.html

[19]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-ecumenism-heretics-martyrs.html

[20]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-novus-ordo-faithful.html

[22]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-conciliar-lingo-community.html

[23]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/schmidberger-conciliar-ideas-jargon.html

[24]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words from its own source here: http://www.angelusonline.org/index.php?section=articles&subsection=print_article&article_id=2658

[25]          Read the N-SSPX’s own words cited to its own sources here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-promote-new-evangelization.html

Final Perseverance is the Last Great Battle with The Devil

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Catholic Candle note: The article below was written by a man who has always been Traditional Catholic and who has been continually fighting liberalism since before Vatican II.

Most people put off till later preparing for death and this battle, because it is something they don't want to think about.  That is a mistake.  It will be the biggest and most important and final spiritual combat of your life.  Being that it will be the devil’s last chance to escort your soul to the everlasting fires of hell, he will “pull out all the stops” to ensure his success.  He will come after you in a different or more promising way, something that he has been saving for you in this final battle.

The definition of perseverance is to persist in an undertaking in spite of counter-influences or opposition. This will be your final test, and you must prepare for it.  As a student, you prepared to do your best for the big test at the end of the school year.  It goes without saying that the most significant test of your life – with the results lasting for an eternity – will take your earnest preparation.  When success is important in some endeavor, you certainly should never wait till the last minute to prepare.

How does one prepare for this encounter?  Let me list a few goals:

  1. Conquer pride

  1. Practice humility

  1. Gain complete control of your passions

     4)  Make the uncompromising Catholic Faith your whole life

     5)  Establish a deep love for God with a definite and regular prayer life

     6)  Practice self-denial daily

     7)  Set a good example in this pagan world

     8)  Study the lives of the Saints to see what they did to succeed

     9)  Say little indulgenced prayers regularly and often

    10) Pray (at least) twice daily for final perseverance: first thing in the morning

and last thing at night

In this endeavor, prayer is certainly the most important preparation.  The Saints, filled with the love of God, would gladly pray all night, following Our Lord’s example.[1]  They were talking to the Love of their life.  Most people pray like they are talking to their strict boss at work and can’t end the conversation soon enough.  Learn to love God and pray gladly.

Most people take a chance that they will be strong and able to withstand the onslaught of the devil at the end of life.  That is wishful thinking without the proper preparation.

I know of a situation where a pious and humble, bed-ridden traditional Catholic was in veterans’ hospice care.  On his death bed, he was under attack by the devil to such an extent that fear took over and he was able to get out of bed and run down the hall shouting, “They [viz., the devils] are trying to get me to commit mortal sin!”  And then he dropped dead.

From all appearances, he did what he had to do to win the battle with the devil.  He had prepared himself to do whatever it took to win.

For Satan does not tempt unbelievers and sinners whom he already holds securely, but he does tempt and trouble the faithful servant in many ways.

Quoted from The Imitation of Christ, Book 4, chapter 18.

We will all face death and this final great battle with the devil.  However, there is powerful help available: prayers to St. Joseph, who is the Patron of a Happy Death and also the Terror of Demons.

So prepare yourself for this great battle that will come.  Don’t risk failure by putting off the important and necessary preparation to win that battle.

Catholic Candle note: To learn more about how to prepare well for death, read Preparation for Death, by St. Alphonsus de Liguori, Doctor of the Church.  This book is available for free, here: https://www.goodcatholicbooks.org/alphonsus.html

[1]          Then Jesus “went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God.”  St. Luke’s Gospel, ch.6, v.12.

Conscience is a Great Gift from God

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The Catholic Encyclopedia definition of conscience is: “A feeling of pain accompanying and resulting from our non-conformity to principles.”[1]  You have a duty to inform your conscience with the highest principles by consulting great philosophical leaders like St. Thomas and St. Paul.

St. Thomas defines conscience as “The judgment or dictates of the practical intellect which (arguing) from the general principle (of Morals) pronounces that something in particular here and now is to be avoided, inasmuch as it is evil, or to be done, inasmuch as it is good.”[2]

Most people living in our immoral world consider their conscience a problem they are stuck with, that it stands in their way of having fun and really isn’t necessary.  They fail to realize that it is a most important gift to be used throughout the day, to obtain salvation.  Oh, what a gift that actually lets you know if you’re on the correct (narrow) path to a heavenly reward, or on the (wide) road to eternal damnation.  A gift beyond your imagination.

You must avoid going through life with an uninformed conscience or a lax conscience.  It is a “minimizer” if it falsely judges actions to be harmless which are sinful.  God has established an objective moral order and cannot be presumed to be indifferent to its maintenance.[3]  Both passion and ignorance interfere with correct dictates of an informed conscience.

There is such a thing as a scrupulous conscience.  The scrupulous person is the victim of an imaginary spiritual impediment to his free action.  He is tormented in every action by the thought that he may be committing a sin.[4]  A scrupulous conscience is really the work of the devil hoping you will become frustrated and refuse to listen to your conscience in the future.  Such a conscience can be informed and corrected with guidance from an uncompromising confessor.  Before confession, we examine our consciences to ensure a “good” confession.  However, it is best to examine our conscience every night in order to avoid a lax conscience.

Let’s pledge to appreciate our conscience as a generous gift from God, and keep it informed and use it as He intended, cooperating with God to work out our salvation.

[1]          1913-1917 Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, page 269.

[2]
         Catholic Dictionary and Encyclopedia of Religious Information, Addis & Arnold, Entry: Conscience, page 215

[3]
         Moral and Pastoral Theology, Davis, volume 1, page 78.

[4]
         Moral and Pastoral Theology, Davis, volume 1, page 73.

God Allows Some People to Damn Themselves to Better Manifest His Perfection

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God created man with free will.  He allows Sin and permits People to Damn Themselves to manifest His Justice, Mercy, and Goodness — for His Greater Honor and Glory.

God allows evil for His greater glory and in order to bring about greater good.[1]  God allows some people to (voluntarily) sin and to damn themselves because their damnation manifests God’s Justice more clearly than if damnation had been something which never occurred but which we understood only as something that could have – but didn’t – ever happen.

Similarly, God’s Mercy and Goodness in saving the elect is more manifest in contrast to the actual damnation of other souls, since the damned very evidently manifest what could have happened to the elect, had God not chosen to save them, because of His Mercy and Goodness.

Although sin itself is evil, this universe which God made, in which He allows sin and damnation, is a better universe as a whole, because it manifests God’s Mercy, Goodness and Justice better than if there had been no sin.  By better manifesting God’s perfections, the universe gives greater Glory to God.[2]  For God’s only end is His Own Glory, that is, Himself.  Any other end (less than God) is unworthy of God.[3]

Thus, we see that, for His own Glory and to manifest His perfections, God saves some persons and gives them happiness.  Likewise, for His own Glory and to manifest His perfections, God allows some persons to damn themselves and be unhappy.[4]

God chooses the elect, whereas the damned, with their free will, cause their own damnation.

God can and does save anyone He wishes to save.  God never forces anyone to sin and never forces anyone to damn himself.  However, there are some men that God allows to damn themselves.

Sacred Scripture infallibly declares:

The heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord: whithersoever He will He shall turn it.

Proverbs 21:1 (emphasis added).

When this passage from Proverbs says God turns the heart of the king “whithersoever He will”, it shows that whenever God chooses to save the king (or anyone else), He does it without forcing a man’s free will.[5]  Notice that Sacred Scripture does not say that God can turn the heart of the king unless the king is one of those unconvertable souls.  There is no such thing (among the living) as a soul which God could not convert.  Although God can convert anyone, He allows some men to damn themselves.  St. Thomas Aquinas and other Doctors of the Catholic Church teach these same truths.[6]

In a certain way, it is true that God Wills all men to be saved, but this is (as it were) a “contingent will” or “antecedent will” subject to a condition that was not fulfilled.

St. Paul teaches that God “will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Timothy 2:4.  However, God wills all men to be saved upon a condition which was not fulfilled, viz., that there be no sin.

Because sin entered the world, God’s eternal, unconditional Will (i.e., His “subsequent” Will) is that some persons are not saved and are not even “called” through grace.  Our Lord teaches: “many [not all] are called but few are chosen.” St. Matthew’s Gospel, 22:14 (bracketed words added).

Also, Our Lord teaches us that most people go to hell and few people even find the path to salvation (much less follow this path):

Enter ye in at the narrow gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there are who go in thereat.  How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it!

St. Matthew’s Gospel, 7:13-14 (emphasis added).

Among the examples of men that God could have saved but chose not to save (or even give them any grace), are babies who die without baptism, and also “the profane Samaritans [whom], had He so willed, He would have made devout” (words of St. Ambrose, quoted in the note above).

Absolutely and unconditionally speaking, God does not desire all men to be saved but Wills to allow some men to damn themselves through their own free will.

Although God Wills (in a manner of speaking) to save all men, subject to a condition which was not fulfilled, unconditionally God Wills to bring about His greater glory by saving the elect He has chosen and He Wills to allow the damned to damn themselves by their own voluntary sins.  This is why Our Lord did not pray for everyone, in His prayer to His Father after the Last Supper.  Here are His words to His Heavenly Father:

I have manifested Thy name to the men whom thou hast given me out of the world.  Thine they were, and to me thou gavest them; and they have kept thy word.  Now they have known, that all things which thou hast given me, are from thee:  Because the words which thou gavest me, I have given to them; and they have received them, and have known in very deed that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.  I pray for them:  I pray not for the world, but for them whom thou hast given me: because they are thine …. 

St. John’s Gospel, 17:6-9.

God chooses His Elect.  They don’t choose Him.  As Christ told His Apostles, who were the beginning of His Church:

You have not chosen me: but I have chosen you ….

St. John’s Gospel, 15:16.

Since it is false that Christ desires absolutely and unconditionally that all men are saved, we should not hope to fulfill Christ’s (supposed) desire for universal salvation, promoted by the liberal N-SSPX and by the rest of the conciliar church.

We should not hope for impossible things.  So, for example, we should not hope we become angelic spirits or that we sprout wings and fly into the air.  Likewise, it is impossible for all men to be saved and so we should not hope for universal salvation, but rather we should hope to help bring about the salvation of whomever God chooses to save from their own voluntary sins.  

We don’t know with certainty which people around us God chooses as His elect,[7] so God Wills that we try to help everyone save his soul, although we know God does not choose to save everyone but allows some men to damn themselves.

Also, as shown above, Our Lord does not Will unconditionally that all men go to heaven.  If He had chosen to save all men, He could have saved them since He can turn their hearts “whithersoever He will” (Proverbs).  Instead God allows some men to damn themselves.  (It is important to note that God does not damn souls but He allows them to damn themselves!)

Thus, we see that the N-SSPX is wrong when it recently taught that we should hope to fulfill Christ’s desire for universal salvation.  Here are the N-SSPX’s words:

Only when the Church is brought back to full health can we hope to fulfill Christ’s desire that all men come to know Him and find salvation.  Supporting the SSPX is about bringing the Gospel to all of those with ears to hear in the hope that, by God’s grace, hearts will be converted, and souls saved.[8]

Conclusion

The elect in heaven have great reason to be humble and grateful, since, in God’s Goodness and Mercy, He gave them the undeserved, free gifts of grace and salvation.  God was not obligated to give them grace and not obliged to choose them as His elect.  

We hope to save our souls and hope to be among God’s elect.  We have great reason to be humble and grateful because God gave us grace and made us Catholics without our deserving these free gifts.  Thus, we must humbly beg God that He choose us to be among His elect.

Let us Glorify God for the Goodness and Mercy He showed us by making us Catholics, giving us the full Traditions of His true Church!

[1]          Here is how St. Thomas Aquinas (the Greatest Doctor of the Catholic Church) explains this truth, quoting St. Augustine, Doctor of the Church:

As Augustine says (Enchiridion xi): “Since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil.”  This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good.

Summa, Ia, Q.2 a.3, ad 1 (emphasis added).

[2]
         Here is St. Thomas’ fuller explanation of this truth:

It is the part of the best agent to produce an effect which is best in its entirety; but this does not mean that He makes every part of the whole the best absolutely, but in proportion to the whole; in the case of an animal, for instance, its goodness would be taken away if every part of it had the dignity of an eye. Thus, therefore, God also made the universe to be best as a whole, according to the mode of a creature; whereas He did not make each single creature best, but one better than another.  And therefore, we find it said of each creature, “God saw the light, that it was good” (Genesis 1:4); and in like manner of each one of the rest.  But of all together it is said, “God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good” (Genesis 1:31).

Summa, Ia, Q.47, a.2, ad 1 (emphasis added).

[3]
         Here is how St. Thomas explains this truth:  

[E]ach and every creature exists for the perfection of the entire universe. Furthermore, the entire universe, with all its parts, is ordained towards God as its end, inasmuch as it imitates, as it were, and shows forth the Divine goodness, to the glory of God.

Summa, Ia, Q.65., a2, respondeo (emphasis added).

God loves mankind and the rest of creation because they are His work and He gave them whatever goodness they have.  But they are finite goods which God loves finitely as part of His infinite love for Himself.  For a fuller explanation of this truth, read this article: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/god-does-not-infinitely-love-any-creature.html

[4]
         Here is how St. Thomas Aquinas (quoting St. Paul) explains this Truth of the Catholic Faith:

Let us then consider the whole of the human race, as we consider the whole universe.  God Wills to manifest His goodness in men; in respect to those whom He predestines, by means of His mercy, as sparing them; and in respect of others, whom he reprobates, by means of His justice, in punishing them.

This is the reason why God elects some and rejects others.  To this, the Apostle refers, saying (Romans 9:22-23):

What if God, willing to show His wrath [that is, the vengeance of His justice], and to make His power known, endured [that is, permitted] with much patience vessels of wrath, fitted for destruction; that He might show the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He hath prepared unto glory;

and (2 Timothy 2:20):

But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver; but also, of wood and of earth; and some, indeed, unto honor, but some unto dishonor.

Summa, Ia Q. 23 a.5, ad 3 (emphasis added).  The bracketed words (in the quotes from St. Paul) are contained in the Summa.

[5]          For an explanation how God never acts against man’s free will even in those whom He chooses to save, read the article here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/williamson-bishop-williamson-teaches-the-heresy-that-even-god-is-powerless-to-save-some-men.html

[6]          St. Thomas Aquinas, following and quoting the Doctor of the Church, St. Ambrose, teaches that:

God calls whom He deigns to call, and whom He wills He makes religious: the profane Samaritans, had He so willed, He would have made devout. 

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.82, a.3, respondeo (emphasis added).

Just as in the Book of Proverbs we see that God can convert the king if He chooses to do so, similarly St. Ambrose teaches that God can convert any profane Samaritans He chooses to convert.

St. Thomas Aquinas, following St. Augustine, the Doctor of Grace, teaches that God can save anyone He wishes to save.  Here are their words:

Hence it is impossible for these two things to be true at the same time — that the Holy Ghost should will to move a certain man to an act of charity, and that this man, by sinning, should lose charity.  For the gift of perseverance is reckoned among the blessings of God whereby “whoever is delivered, is most certainly delivered, ” as Augustine says in his book On the Predestination of the Saints (De Dono Persev. xiv).

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.24, a.11, respondeo (emphasis added).

Charity always comes with Sanctifying Grace and makes a man the friend of God.  In the quote immediately above, St. Augustine teaches that the Holy Ghost will move any man to charity (and Sanctifying Grace) if He chooses to convert him.

[7]          St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine assure us that we cannot know with certainty why God chooses some people as His elect and not others.  Here are St. Thomas’s words, quoting St. Augustine:

Yet why He chooses some for glory, and reprobates others [i.e., allows them to damn themselves], has no reason, except the Divine Will.  Whence Augustine says (Tract. xxvi. in Joan.):

Why He draws one, and another He draws not, seek not to judge, if thou dost not wish to err.

Summa, Ia Q. 23 a.5, ad 3 (bracketed words added for context).

[8]          Emphasis added; quoted from the April 30, 2019 “Dear Friend” letter which Fr. Wegner mass-mailed to everyone on the SSPX U.S. District mailing list and also posted here https://sspx.org/en/news-events/news/fr-wegner-pray-mary-remember-your-mothers-and-pray-holy-mother-church-47813?mc_cid=e244c8c82b&mc_eid=4fbfee0c0b

The Catholic Church’s “Fifth Mark” is Suffering Persecution

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There are four Marks of the Catholic Church, by which She is known to be the one true Church: One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic.[1]

These Marks are certain signs by which the True Church is known and distinguishable from all other “churches” – which are all false and all do the devil’s work.[2]

However, besides these four Marks of the Church by which She can be definitely known, there is also another mark or sign by which we can know Christ’s true Church: viz., the persecution which the Church perennially suffers from the world and the devil because She always opposes them.

Here is one way that Our Lord teaches that the world’s hatred and persecution of the Church comes from the Church’s opposition to the world:

If you had been of the world, the world would love its own:  but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.  

St. John’s Gospel, 15:19.

For this reason, The Catechism Explained teaches that persecution is another mark, or sign, by which we know that the Catholic Church is the true Church:

The true Church is that one which is most persecuted by the world ….[3]

The Church must be persecuted, to be Christ-like and because She is Christ-like.

It is inevitable that the Church will be persecuted because She is the Mystical Body of Christ, Her Head.  Because His Body must be like Him, the Church must be persecuted as He was.

Further, the Church is the Spouse of Christ.  Christ ensures that His Spouse will be like Him and so She will be persecuted like Him.

The world hates the Church because it hates Our Lord, as He predicted in these words:

If the world hates you, know ye, that it hath hated Me before you.

 

St. John’s Gospel, 15:18.

The world’s hatred caused it to persecute Our Lord and similarly to persecute His Church.  Our Lord told his Apostles (who were the Church’s first hierarchy):

If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you ….

St. John’s Gospel, 15:20.

Thus, as Our Lord suffered His Passion, so His Church will suffer Her Passion.  Commenting on St. Matthew’s Gospel where St. Peter, the first pope, followed Our Lord from the Garden of Olives to the court of the High Priest, St. Augustine explains that this event shows:

that the Church will follow, i.e. imitate, the Lord’s Passion, but with a great difference.  For the Church suffers for itself, but Christ [suffered] for the Church.[4] 

Not only the Church as an institution, but individual Catholics also will suffer persecution.  St. Paul declared:

All who will live godly in Christ Jesus, shall suffer persecution ….[5]

The Church and Faithful Catholics benefit from Suffering Persecution.

St. Hilary, Doctor of the Church, teaches that persecutions help the Church.  Here are his words:

It is peculiar to the Church to flourish most when persecuted.[6]

St. Augustine declares that persecutions make Catholics into saints.  Here are St. Augustine’s words:

Persecutions serve to bring forth saints.[7]

Persecution is a type of purging.  Christ describes this purging not only as willed by God but also as brought about by God in some way, for the good of His Church.  Here are Our Lord’s words:

I am the true Vine; and My Father is the Husbandman.  Every branch in Me, that beareth not fruit, He will take away: and every one that beareth fruit, He will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit.[8]

In our times, Traditional Catholics show they are faithful and belong to the true Church by bearing this Mark of Suffering Persecution.

Faithful Catholics might “second guess” themselves and wonder if they are on the true path, because they are everywhere discredited and marginalized.  Traditional Catholics are continually lied about and condemned.  With St. Paul, they could be called “deceivers, and yet true”.  2 Corinthians 6:8.  Such persecution puts Traditional Catholics in the good company of those who have followed in Our Lord’s Footsteps throughout Church history.

Cardinal Newman was a historian who wrote about Arian times and wrote the book called The Arians of the Fourth Century.  The persecution of faithful Catholics which occurred then presents obvious parallels to the persecutions Traditional Catholics suffer now.  Here is how Cardinal Newman described Arian times:

The body of bishops failed in their confession of the Faith ….  They spoke variously, one against another; there was nothing after Nicea, of firm, unvarying, consistent testimony [for the Faith], for nearly sixty years.  There were untrustworthy Councils, unfaithful bishops; there was weakness, fear of consequences, misguidance, delusion, hallucination, endless, hopeless, extending into nearly every corner of the Catholic Church.  The comparatively few who remained faithful were discredited and driven into exile; the rest were either deceivers or deceived.[9] 

As in Arian Times, likewise now.  We could paraphrase Cardinal Newman’s words to describe our own times, as follows:

The body of bishops failed in their confession of the Faith ….  The different factions of conciliar revolutionaries spoke one against another; there was nothing, starting with Vatican II, of firm, Traditional Faith, for nearly sixty years.  There were untrustworthy synods, unfaithful bishops; there was weakness, worldliness, fear of consequences, modernism in every corner of the human element of the Catholic Church.  The comparatively few, viz., Traditional Catholics, who remained faithful were discredited and marginalized; the rest were either modernists or deceived by modernists.

In the End Times, Bloody Persecution will especially show the true Church as it especially showed the Church in Her Infancy.

Future persecutions will be greater and bloodier than those now.  Sacred Scripture narrates these future persecutions by the anti-christ as follows:

It was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them.   And power was given him over every tribe, and people, and tongue, and nation.  …   And it was given him … that whosoever will not adore the image of the beast, should be slain.

The Apocalypse of St. John the Apostle, 13:7 & 15.

But God is always in charge and those persecutions will work to the good for the elect.  As St. Paul assures us; “All things work together unto the good for those who love God.”  Romans, 8:28.

We should rejoice to be persecuted for the love of Jesus Christ.

Although persecution is not comfortable, it is nothing to fear.  Rather, persecution is a great reason to rejoice.  Here are Our Lord’s words:

Blessed are they that suffer persecution for Justice’s sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.  Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you untruly, for My sake.  Be glad and rejoice, for your reward is very great in heaven.[10]

However difficult or painful these persecutions are at the time, they are a small price to pay for Christ’s love and for eternal happiness.  As St. Paul tells us: “I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come”.  Romans, 8:18.

The “new” SSPX is not persecuted like the “old” SSPX was.

The “old” SSPX was viciously attacked by the world and by the conciliar church (which is a false “church” which belongs to the world).[11]  But the “new” SSPX has been weakening for years, becoming more like the world and the conciliar church.[12] 

The N-SSPX itself says that it is not attacked like it used to be (although this change is not because the world and the conciliar church are becoming better).  Here are the N-SSPX’s words:

World-wide tradition started out very small.  As soon as it grew, it was attacked.  But now the times changed [sic].[13]

Conclusion

Persecution is (as it were) a “Fifth Mark” by which we can recognize the true Catholic Church.  The Catholic Church and faithful Catholics will face persecution.  

Let us face persecution with a strong heart!  Beware of Compromising to Avoid Persecution!

Let us never weaken through growing tired of the persecutions which come.  We must never compromise our Faith but instead live our Faith boldly and fully.

[1]          Here is how The Catechism of St. Pius X explains this truth:

Q. How can the Church of Jesus Christ be distinguished from the numerous societies or sects founded by men, and calling themselves Christian?

A. From the numerous societies or sects founded by men and calling themselves Christian, the Church of Jesus Christ is easily distinguished by four marks: She is One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic.

Quoted from The Catechism of St. Pius X, section: The Apostle’s Creed, subsection: The Ninth Article of the Creed, part concerning The Church in General, Q.13.

[2]          Here is how the Baltimore Catechism #3, Q.518, explains this truth:

Q. What is a mark?

A. A mark is a given and known sign by which a thing can be distinguished from all others of its kind.  Thus, a trademark is used to distinguish the article bearing it from all imitations of the same article.

[3]          Rev. Francis Spirago, The Catechism Explained, Benzinger Bros., New York, 1921, p.242.

[4]          Catena Aurea on St. Matthew’s Gospel, by St. Thomas Aquinas, ch.26, quoting Aug., Quaest. Ev., i, 46 (bracketed word added for clarity).

[5]          2 Timothy 3:12, emphasis added.

[6]          Rev. Francis Spirago, The Catechism Explained, Benzinger Bros., New York, 1921, p.236.  The catechism adds:

The Church comes triumphant out of every persecution.  …  The members of the Church increase under persecution.  The Church is a field, fruitful only when torn up by the plough, or it is a vine, stronger and richer for being pruned. “As fire is spread by the wind, so is the Church increased by persecution,” says St. Rupert.  

Id.

[7]          Rev. Francis Spirago, The Catechism Explained, Benzinger Bros., New York, 1921, p.236.

[8]          St. John’s Gospel, 15:1-2.  Here is how The Catechism Explained explains this truth:

Persecution purifies the Church; even if millions fall away, it is not a loss but

a cleansing.

Rev. Francis Spirago, The Catechism Explained, Benzinger Bros., New York, 1921, p.236.

[9]          John Henry Cardinal Newman, On Consulting the Faithful in Matters of Doctrine (Kansas City: Sheed and Ward, ©1961), p.77 (emphasis added).

[10]          St. Matthew’s Gospel, 5:11-13 (emphasis added).

[12]          For evidence of the N-SSPX’s moral decline, read the many Catholic Candle articles on this subject, quoting and analyzing this decline, including this article: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-continues-moral-decline-2.html 

For evidence of the N-SSPX’s doctrinal decline, read the many Catholic Candle articles on this subject, quoting and analyzing this decline, including this article: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-the-new-sspx-claims-archbishop-lefebvre-endorsed-vatican-iis-lumen-gentium,-as-free-of-all-errors-and-ambiguities.html

The value of a Traditional Catholic school depends on it being different than all of the other schools.  The “old” SSPX knew this and made its schools different.  But the N-SSPX now wants its schools to be like all of the other schools.  Read this article: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/sspx-wants-fit-in.html

[13]          Quote from a June 29, 2019 article which included these words of N-SSPX District Superior in the U.S., Fr. Wegner, available at this link: https://fsspx.news/en/news-events/news/designs-budget-and-timeline-released-unveiling-new-immaculata-project-48917

God Wills Inequalities between People

Posted on by Catholic Candle

 

Difference is the basis for the order in things.  If there were no differences between things, there could be no order between them.  The very idea of order includes within it the concept of priority and of posteriority, and hence, of difference and inequality.  In fact, that very separateness, i.e., the distinctions among things, is the principle of all order.[1]

 

 

God makes creatures unequal.

 

God made difference and inequality in all creatures.  As Ecclesiasticus teaches:

 

Why does one day excel another, and one light another, and one year another year…?  By the knowledge of the Lord they were distinguished.

 

Chapter 33, verses 7-8.

 

Therefore, just as God’s Wisdom is the cause of His making all creatures, so His Wisdom is the cause of Him making creatures unequal.[2]  By making some creatures inferior to other creatures, the whole of creation is more perfect than it otherwise would be.[3]

 

 

Inequality between individual persons

 

All men are equal in some ways.  For example, they are equal before the law, so that their rights as citizens are the same despite differences between them such as in height, in wealth, etc.

 

However, God made persons unequal in many ways and intends this inequality.  God made persons unequal in eyesight, mental acuity, natural prudence, athletic ability, beauty, musical talent, health, height, and in many other ways.  God intends these inequalities. 

 

All mankind is bound together with duties to help those individuals who are more in need of help because of these natural inequalities.  So, a person who can see, can guide a blind man across the street, a taller person might reach something on a high shelf to help a shorter person. 

 

Among all other inequalities between persons, some persons are naturally less prudent than some other persons.  These less prudent persons need to be helped and protected for their own good, including protecting them from their own imprudence.  There are many examples of this.  For example, for their own good, civil laws prohibit persons from making contracts which include interest charges greater than a statutory maximum interest rate.[4]  These laws and many other laws, are ways that society protects those persons against their own imprudence, because they are less able to protect themselves.

 

 

Differences between men in society

 

As explained above, the very idea of order includes within it the concept of priority and of posteriority, and hence, of difference.  In fact, that very separateness, i.e., the distinctions among people, is the principle of all social, political, economic, military and religious order, since difference is a principle of order.  For example, in a proper military order, an army cannot have all generals or all privates.  The army cannot have all equipment operators or all cooks.  Etc.

 

St. Paul emphasizes that God made men unequal and made them to have different roles, strengths and weaknesses.  Here are St. Paul’s words:

 

For as the body is one, and hath many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, yet are one body, so also is Christ.  For in one Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether bond or free; and in one Spirit we have all been made to drink.  For the body also is not one member, but many.  If the foot should say, because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?  And if the ear should say, because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?  If the whole body were the eye, where would be the hearing?  If the whole were hearing, where would be the smelling?  But now God hath set the members every one of them in the body as it hath pleased Him.  And if they all were one member, where would be the body?  But now there are many members indeed, yet one body.  And the eye cannot say to the hand: I need not thy help; nor again the head to the feet: I have no need of you.  Yea, much more those that seem to be the more feeble members of the body, are more necessary.  And such as we think to be the less honorable members of the body, about these we put more abundant honor; and those that are our uncomely parts, have more abundant comeliness.  But our comely parts have no need: but God hath tempered the body together, giving to that which wanted the more abundant honor, that there might be no schism in the body; but the members might be mutually careful one for another.  And if one member suffer anything, all the members suffer with it; or if one member glory, all the members rejoice with it.

 

1 Corinthians, 12:12-27 (emphasis added).

 

As St. Paul shows us, God did not make every man to play whatever role that man chooses.  Some men are made more honorable members of society, some, less.  Some men are made the “eyes” of the collective group and some are made the “feet”.  Id.

 

St. Paul emphasizes that these differences between men give rise to the obligation that “the members might be mutually careful one for another”.  Id.

 

 

God intends differences and inequalities between groups as well as between individuals.

 

Just as God intends the countless inequalities between individuals, He also fully intends the inequalities between different groups/peoples/ethnicities/tribes.  To take a few of countless examples:

 

Ø  one people is better at a sport such as basketball, than any other peoples;

 

Ø  one people is more emotional, with a high-strung temperament, while another ethnic group is more calm, staid and reason-oriented;

 

Ø  one people is more creative in the fine arts, than some other peoples;

 

Ø  one people more apt to the sciences than some other peoples; and

 

Ø  one people is more capable in leadership in society than some other peoples. 

God intends all these natural differences, both the strengths and the weaknesses.

 

Pope Leo XIII assures us that “there will ever be differences and inequalities of condition in the State.  Society cannot exist or be conceived of without them.”  Rerum Novarum, §34.

 

These differences between one people and another, are differences between the members of society on a larger scale.  St. Paul teaches us that these differences oblige “the members [to be] mutually careful one for another”.  1 Corinthians, 12:25.

 

All peoples and groups are bound together with duties in justice and charity.  Some peoples are more capable of leading and other peoples need more guidance, more protection and need to be led because of these natural inequalities that God Wills. 

 

These inequalities include that some peoples are naturally less prudent and don’t guide themselves and others as well as other peoples do.  Such peoples need to be helped and protected for their own good.  A striking example of this need occurred in Colombia, after the Masonic revolution in the early 1800s:

 

The liberal revolutionary governments wanted to decrease the authority of the Catholic Church and to enact land “reforms”, including the abolition of the somewhat-feudal system governing the lives of the Indians (who comprised about one-third of the population).

 

The previous (Spanish) government had protected these Indians (like Medieval serfs were protected) by restricting their ability to freely sell the plots of land which they possessed and farmed.  In the name of freedom and the free market, the new liberal government allowed the Indians to sell their little plots of land.  Rich, unscrupulous men quickly induced most of the Indians to (naïvely and shortsightedly) sell their little plots, thus ruining the small amount of independence the Indians had enjoyed.  Within a few years, the ownership of the Indians’ lands was concentrated in the hands of a few rich and powerful families.  The Indians became landless tenants.  The land which had been cultivated by the Indians was then mostly used for grazing cattle.

Quoted from: Latin America: A Sketch of its Glorious Catholic Roots and a Snapshot of its Present, by the Editors of Quanta Cura Press, p.111, © 2016.

 

In light of the natural inequalities between peoples, and because the men of society are bound together in justice and charity, persons and peoples more capable of leading have a duty to guide and protect those who are less capable.

 

It denies reason and these natural inequalities between peoples, to insist that a society’s or an organization’s leaders would be subject to “quotas” and include a “sampling” of “everybody”, i.e., representatives from each different group or people.  This is as foolish as insisting that a basketball team must fulfill “quotas” and have members who “represent” every people in proportion to every part of the public.

 

 

God’s intent that there be inequality in society includes His intent that there be economic inequality (viz., rich and poor).

 

The revolutionaries in society stir up discontent by complaining there is an “income gap” between the rich and the poor, or that this income “gap” is increasing.  However, an inequality in economic conditions is a natural reflection of other inequalities between men.  God Wills these inequalities.

 

Quoting earlier Doctors of the Church, St. Thomas explains that God Wills wealth inequality for both the rich and the poor, so that the rich might acquire the virtue of liberality and so that the poor might acquire the virtue of patience.  Here are his words:

 

The temporal goods which God grants us, are ours as to the ownership, but as to the use of them, they belong not to us alone but also to such others as we are able to succor out of what we have over and above our needs.  Hence Basil says [*Hom. super Luc. xii, 18]: “If you acknowledge them,” viz., your temporal goods, “as coming from God, is He unjust because He apportions them unequally?  Why are you rich while another is poor, unless it be that you may have the merit of a good stewardship, and he the reward of patience?  It is the hungry man’s bread that you withhold, the naked man’s cloak that you have stored away, the shoe of the barefoot that you have left to rot, the money of the needy that you have buried underground: and so you injure as many as you might help.”  Ambrose expresses himself in the same way.[5]

 

The Socialists seek to abolish private property, pretending that men are equal and that private property destroys this supposed equality.  Here is how Pope Leo XIII explains this truth:

 

Socialists proclaim the right of property to be a human invention repugnant to the natural equality of man ….[6]

 

The Catholic Church, however, recognizes that all men are unequal and their differences in wealth proceeds from their many natural inequalities.  Here is how Pope Leo XIII explains this truth:

 

[T]he Church, much more properly and practically, recognizes inequality among men, who are naturally different in strength of body and of mind; also, in the possession of goods, and it orders that right of property and of ownership, which proceeds from nature itself ….[7]

 

Pope St. Pius X condemned the false idea that:

 

every inequality of condition is an injustice, or at least, a diminution of justice.  Here we have a principle that conflicts sharply with the nature of things, a principle conducive to jealousy, injustice, and subversive to any social order.[8]

 

 

Conclusion

 

God made creatures different and unequal.  God made all men different and unequal to each other.  God made the peoples and groups of society different and unequal.  God intends that we help each other in our deficiencies and not that we try to impose a false equality and quota system so that all roles in society would be composed from “every group”.

 

 

 


[1]           Here is how St. Thomas Aquinas, greatest Doctor of the Church, teaches this important point, quoting Aristotle:

 

As the Philosopher says (Metaph. v, text. 16), the terms “before” and “after” are used in reference to some principle.  Now order implies that certain things are, in some way, before or after.  Hence wherever there is a principle, there must needs be also order of some kind.

 

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.26, a.1 respondeo.

[2]           Here is St. Thomas Aquinas’ fuller explanation of this truth:

 

[I]t must be said that as the wisdom of God is the cause of the distinction of things, so the same wisdom is the cause of their inequality.  This may be explained as follows.  A twofold distinction is found in things; one is a formal distinction as regards things differing specifically; the other is a material distinction as regards things differing numerically only.  And as the matter is on account of the form, material distinction exists for the sake of the formal distinction.  Hence, we see that in incorruptible things there is only one individual of each species, forasmuch as the species is sufficiently preserved in the one; whereas in things generated and corruptible there are many individuals of one species for the preservation of the species.  Whence it appears that formal distinction is of greater consequence than material.  Now, formal distinction always requires inequality, because as the Philosopher says (Metaph. viii, 10), the forms of things are like numbers in which species vary by addition or subtraction of unity.  Hence in natural things species seem to be arranged in degrees; as the mixed things are more perfect than the elements, and plants than minerals, and animals than plants, and men than other animals; and in each of these, one species is more perfect than others.  Therefore, as the divine wisdom is the cause of the distinction of things for the sake of the perfection of the universe, so it is the cause of inequality.  For the universe would not be perfect if only one grade of goodness were found in things.

 

Summa, Ia, Q.47, a.2 respondeo (emphasis added).


[3]           Here is St. Thomas Aquinas’ fuller explanation of this truth:

 

It is part of the best agent to produce an effect which is best in its entirety; but this does not mean that He makes every part of the whole the best absolutely, but in proportion to the whole; in the case of an animal, for instance, its goodness would be taken away if every part of it had the dignity of an eye. Thus, therefore, God also made the universe to be best as a whole, according to the mode of a creature; whereas He did not make each single creature best, but one better than another.  And therefore, we find it said of each creature, “God saw the light, that it was good” (Genesis 1:4); and in like manner of each one of the rest.  But of all together it is said, “God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good” (Genesis 1:31).

 

Summa, Ia, Q.47, a.2, ad 1.

 

[4]           Here, for example, is a prohibition of excessive interest, taken from New York’s civil code of law:

 

4. Except as otherwise provided by law, interest shall not be charged,   taken  or  received  on any loan or forbearance at a rate exceeding such   rate of interest as may be authorized by law at the  time  the  loan  or forbearance  is  made,  whether  or  not the loan or forbearance is made   pursuant to a prior contract or commitment providing for a greater  rate   of  interest,  provided, however, that no change in the rate of interest prescribed in section fourteen-a of the banking law shall affect (a) the validity of a loan or forbearance made before the date such rate becomes effective, or (b) the enforceability of  such  loan  or  forbearance  in accordance  with  its  terms,  except  that  if  any loan or forbearance provides for an increase in the rate of interest during the term of such loan or forbearance, the increased rate shall not exceed  such  rate  of interest  as  may  have  been authorized by law at the time such loan or forbearance was made.

 

Quoted from the 2012 New York Consolidated Laws, General Obligations, Article 5 – CREATION, DEFINITION AND ENFORCEMENT OF CONTRACTUAL OBLIGATIONS

Title 5 – (5-501 – 5-531) INTEREST AND USURY; BROKERAGE ON LOANS

5-501 – Rate of interest; usury forbidden.

 

[5]           Summa, IIa IIae, Q.32, a.5, ad 2.


[6]           Encyclical, Quod Apostolici muneris, Dec. 28, 1878, Denz. 1851.  Here is the longer quote from Pope Leo XIII:

 

But also, Catholic wisdom most skillfully provides for public and domestic tranquility, supported by the precepts of divine law, through what it holds and teaches concerning the right of ownership and the distribution of goods which have been obtained for the necessities and uses of life.  For when Socialists proclaim the right of property to be a human invention repugnant to the natural equality of man, and, seeking to establish a community of goods, think that poverty is by no means to be endured with equanimity; and that the possessions and rights of the rich can be violated with impunity, the Church, much more properly and practically, recognizes inequality among men, who are naturally different in strength of body and of mind; also in the possession of goods, and it orders that right of property and of ownership, which proceeds from nature itself, be for everyone intact and inviolate; for it knows that theft and raping have been forbidden by God, the author and vindicator of every right, in such a way that one may not even look attentively upon (i.e., covet) the property of another, and “that thieves and robbers, no less than adulterers and idolators are excluded from the kingdom of heaven” [cf. 1 Cor. 6:9f.].

Encyclical, Quod Apostolici muneris, Dec. 28, 1878, Denz. 1851.


[7]           Encyclical, Quod Apostolici muneris, Dec. 28, 1878, Denz. 1851.

 

[8]           Here is the longer quote from Pope St. Pius X, condemning the ideas of a liberal and modernist group called the Sillon:

 

Teaching such doctrines, and applying them to its internal organization, the Sillon, therefore, sows erroneous and fatal notions on authority, liberty and obedience, among your Catholic youth.  The same is true of justice and equality; the Sillon says that it is striving to establish an era of equality which, by that very fact, would be also an era of greater justice.  Thus, to the Sillon, every inequality of condition is an injustice, or at least, a diminution of justice.  Here we have a principle that conflicts sharply with the nature of things, a principle conducive to jealously, injustice, and subversive to any social order.  Thus, [according to the claims of the Sillon] Democracy alone will bring about the reign of perfect justice!  Is this not an insult to other forms of government which are thereby debased to the level of sterile makeshifts? 

 

Quoted from the encyclical sometimes called, On the Sillon and sometimes called Our Apostolic Mandate.

 

Gaining Plenary Indulgences

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note:  Sedevacantism is wrong and is schism.  Catholic Candle is not sedevacantist.  On the contrary, we published a series of articles showing that sedevacantism is false (and also showing that former Pope Benedict is not still the pope).  Read the articles here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/against-sedevacantism.html 

A reader would be mistaken to believe that the article below gives any support to sedevacantism.  The article simply shows that we must be careful to not cooperate with (or pray for the success of) the evil intentions of a pope or any other superior.

 

Gaining Plenary Indulgences

In our Times of Great Apostasy


We need all of the help we can get to save our souls.  One help available to Catholics is obtaining plenary indulgences (i.e., complete remission of all temporal punishment due for sins).  But to obtain plenary indulgences, we usually must pray for the intentions of the pope.  How can we do that, without compromise, when the pope has many bad intentions?


The pope’s official intentions are often evil

The Vatican publishes the monthly prayer intentions of Pope Francis and many of them are evil and they often promote political correctness.  For example, Pope Francis uses his monthly prayer intentions to promote his Politically-Correct climate-alarmism, which is a basis for his promotion of a one-world government to regulate the ecology of the world and of the oceans in particular.[1]

To ensure that his climate-alarmism stays in the news, Pope Francis published this politically-correct, ecological prayer intention for September 2019:

 

The Protection of the Oceans

That politicians, scientists, and economists work together to protect the world’s seas and oceans.[2]

Pope Francis uses his prayer intentions to promote many other evils of the conciliar church.  For example, Pope Francis published this ecumenical prayer intention promoting inter-religious dialogue, as his November 2019 prayer intention:


Dialogue and Reconciliation in the Near East

That a spirit of dialogue, encounter, and reconciliation emerge in the Near East, where diverse religious communities share their lives together.[3]

 

However, despite Pope Francis’s own bad intentions, there are some good intentions which are always included in the intentions of the pope.  Here is how The Raccolta[4] explains this:


PRAYER ACCORDING TO THE POPE’S INTENTION

The Pope’s intention always includes the following objects:

                     i.        The progress of the Faith and triumph of the Church.

                    ii.        Peace and union among Christian Princes and Rulers.

                  iii.        The conversion of sinners.

                  iv.        The uprooting of heresy.[5]

God wants us to pray for these Traditional Catholic intentions of the pope, but of course, not pray for any evil intentions.

We suggest that you make your intent explicit – for yourself and for others – by stating that you are praying for the Traditional intentions of the pope, thereby reminding yourself and others that you reject his evil and radical intentions.[6]

Further, Traditional Catholics are not sedevacantists.  Thus, we suggest you remind yourself and others of this fact by praying “for the Traditional intentions of Pope Francis” by name, rather than merely for the “intentions of the pope”.

Finally, we suggest you refer to the purpose of those prayers for the pope: “for the purpose of fulfilling a requirement for obtaining a plenary indulgence”.

 

Conclusion of this section

To gain plenary indulgences during these times of Great Apostasy, we suggest you pray an Our Father, Hail Mary, and Glory Be:

for the Traditional intentions of Pope Francis, for the purpose of gaining a plenary indulgence.

 

How can we gain a plenary indulgence without access to uncompromising priests and sacraments?

As we see above, it is a good thing to pray for the pope’s Traditional intentions in order to obtain a plenary indulgence.  But how can we gain a plenary indulgence without access to uncompromising priests and sacraments?

Should uncompromising Traditional Catholics “bother” praying for the Traditional intentions of the pope to obtain a plenary indulgence, when, in our times of Great Apostasy, there is little or no opportunity to fulfill the other usual conditions for gaining a plenary indulgence, viz., going to confession and receiving Holy Communion?

The answer is “yes”!

God has not abandoned His children!  Although He has – for now – willed to take away most of the Sacraments from most uncompromising Traditional Catholics, in God’s ineffable Providence, this is for our good.  We know infallibly that “all things work together unto the good, for those who love God.”[7]

So, when God takes away most sacraments, He gives us other means and gives those means greater efficacy.  So, e.g., God greatly increased the power of the Holy Rosary during our times.[8]

God understands that we cannot do the impossible, nor does He expect us to do it.  He does not expect, or want us to receive the Sacraments or go to Mass when it is not available without compromise.  Compromise Masses and Sacraments don’t help us and they offend Him![9]

Thus, because we know that the current unavailability of the Sacraments works for our good, if we love God, our inability to fulfill those conditions for a plenary indulgence also works for our good and does not harm us.  God will provide! 

One way that God is able to provide for us is to give us a plenary indulgence when we piously and diligently fulfill the conditions for a plenary indulgence as closely as we can.[10]  God can treat this as if it were literal compliance with the usual conditions for obtaining a plenary indulgence.  Thus,

➢  When confession is not available without compromise, then God expects us to make an Act of Contrition as perfectly as we can. 

➢  When we cannot receive Holy Communion without compromise, He expects us to make as fervent a Spiritual Communion as we can. 

Along with fulfilling these conditions as closely as we can, we also pray “for the Traditional intentions of Pope Francis”.


Conclusion to the entire article

Let us have a strong heart and complete confidence in God.  Let us always have complete confidence that God is providing perfectly for us. 

Let us continue to fulfill the conditions for obtaining plenary indulgences to the extent that we are able, knowing that God provides for us.


[1]           Here are Pope Francis’s words, citing and quoting (former) Pope Benedict XVI and (supposed) “saint” Pope John XXIII:

 

¶174. Let us also mention the system of governance of the oceans.  International and regional conventions do exist, but fragmentation and the lack of strict mechanisms of regulation, control, and penalization end up undermining these efforts.  The growing problem of marine waste and the protection of the open seas represent particular challenges.  What is needed, in effect, is an agreement on systems of governance for the whole range of so-called “global commons”.

 

¶175. The same mindset which stands in the way of making radical decisions to reverse the trend of global warming also stands in the way of achieving the goal of eliminating poverty.  A more responsible overall approach is needed to deal with both problems: the reduction of pollution and the development of poorer countries and regions.  The twenty-first century, while maintaining systems of governance inherited from the past, is witnessing a weakening of the power of nation states, chiefly because the economic and financial sectors, being transnational, tend to prevail over the political. Given this situation, it is essential to devise stronger and more efficiently organized international institutions, with functionaries who are appointed fairly by agreement among national governments, and empowered to impose sanctions.  As Benedict XVI has affirmed in continuity with the social teaching of the Church: “To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security, and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago”.

 

Laudato Si, ¶¶ 174-5 (emphasis added).

 

[4]           A raccolta is a book which collects prayers and other acts of piety, for which specific indulgences were granted by the pre-conciliar popes.

[5]           The Raccolta, translated by Ambrose St. John, Benzinger Bros., New York, 1910 edition, quoted from the preface, page xiii (emphasis added).

 

[6]           Pope Francis’s conciliar intentions reflect and promote conciliar novelties.  These new doctrines are so foreign to Catholicism that St. Thomas Aquinas defines heretics as follows: A heretic is someone who devises or follows false or new opinions. Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.11, a.1 Sed contra (emphasis added). Notice St. Thomas does not say “false and new opinions”. The newness of a doctrine is already sufficient reason to reject it.

[7]           Romans, 8:28. 

 

[8]           Sister Lucy, seer at Fatima, revealed to Fr. Fuentes:

 

God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  …  Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world.  As for the Holy Rosary, Father, in these last times in which we are living, the Blessed Virgin has given a new efficacy to the praying of the Holy Rosary.  This in such a way that there is no problem that cannot be resolved by praying the Rosary, no matter how difficult it is – be it temporal or above all spiritual ….

 

Words of Sister Lucy seer at Fatima, from her December 26, 1957 interview by Fr. Augustin Fuentes, vice-postulator of the cause of beatification for Francisco and Jacinta.  (Emphasis added.)  This interview can be found at: http://radtradthomist.chojnowski.me/2019/03/is-this-interview-that-caused-her.html

 

[9]           Read these articles showing that compromise masses and sacraments offend God and do not give grace:

 

·         https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/new-mass-never-grace.html

 

·         https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/williamson-least-contaminated-mass.html

 

·         https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/priests/williamson-contradicts-archbishop-lefebvre.html

 

[10]         Just as God bountifully gives graces to us without expecting the impossible, likewise the Catholic Church bountifully grants indulgences without expecting the impossible.  For this reason, Pope Pius IX granted:

 

to all the faithful who are habitually prevented by chronic illness or permanent physical inability of any kind, from leaving their dwellings – excepting those who live in religious communities – the privilege of gaining each and all of the plenary indulgences already granted, or which may be hereafter granted by the Sovereign Pontiffs; provided that, being truly penitent and having confessed their sins and fulfilled the other conditions prescribed, they perform faithfully, in place of receiving Holy Communion, some pious work enjoined by their confessors.

 

Quoted from The New Raccolta, published in 1898 by order of His Holiness, Pope Leo XIII, Peter F. Cunningham & Son, Philadelphia, English edition ©1900, quoted from the section On Holy Indulgences, pp.21-22.

The Blessed Virgin Mary, the Co-Redemptrix of the World

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note:  The article below pertains to another scandalous error of Pope Francis.  However, a reader would be mistaken if he assumed that Pope Francis’s grave error somehow means that he is not the pope.

Sedevacantism is wrong and is (material or formal) schism.  Catholic Candle is not sedevacantist.  On the contrary, we published a series of articles showing that sedevacantism is false (and also showing that former Pope Benedict is not still the pope).  Read the articles here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/against-sedevacantism.html 

Here is what St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Doctor of the Church, teaches concerning the need to recognize and respect the authority of a superior – such as the pope – even when he is very bad:

Even should the life of any superior be so notoriously wicked as to admit of no excuse or dissimulation, nevertheless, for God’s sake, Who is the source of all power, we are bound to honor such a one, not on account of his personal merits, which are non-existent, but because of the divine ordination and the dignity of his office.[1]

However, even while recognizing the pope’s authority and our duty to obey him when we are able, we know we must resist the evil he says and does.  Read more about this principle here: https://catholiccandle.neocities.org/faith/against-sedevacantism.html#section-7

 

Defending the pre-Vatican II teaching against Pope Francis’s Scoffing

What the title “Co-Redemptrix” means

God caused the universe to be the best possible one for His own greater honor and glory.[2]  “The Lord hath made all things for Himself”.  Proverbs, 16:4.  No other motive would be worthy of Him.

God could have caused the universe to be different than it is.  Two ways God could have caused the universe to be different, is not to redeem man after his fall, or not to use the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary, in redeeming man.  However, God did redeem man and did use the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary because God does all things in the best possible way.[3] 

One way God used the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to have God the Son become Man through her Divine maternity.  Another way God chose to use the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary is to employ her as an integral part of His redemption of mankind, as Co-Redemptrix. 

Here is how Dom Guéranger explained this truth in The Liturgical Year:

Our Lady’s co-operation in the redemption of the world gives us a fresh view of her magnificence.  Neither the Immaculate Conception nor the Assumption will give us a higher idea of Mary’s exaltation than the title of co-redemptress.  Her dolors were not necessary for the redemption of the world, but, in the counsels of God, they were inseparable from it.  They belong to the integrity of the divine plan.[4]

Again, God could have redeemed man in a different way, without the help of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  But He chose the best way for His own glory and this way involved using her unique and integral help.

 

The Feminine Suffix of the word “Redemptress” (and of the word “Redemptrix”)

The Divine Law and the Natural Law[5] require that men and women have different roles in our life on earth.[6]  The differences between the sexes are naturally (and traditionally) manifest in countless visible ways, e.g., in clothing, as Sacred Scripture commands:

A woman shall not be clothed with man’s apparel, neither shall a man use woman’s apparel: for he that doth these things is abominable before God.

Deuteronomy, 22:5.

God and Nature require these distinctions in dress not only for modesty’s sake but also because such exterior manifestations reinforce these truths in our thoughts, help us to live them, and to oppose the errors and corruptions of the world around us.

Another important way in which the natural distinction between the sexes is (and should be) manifest in everyday life, is in grammatical differences in our speech, which reinforce this distinction between the sexes.  For example, we use feminine pronouns for women and girls and male pronouns for men and boys.  Likewise, in a wholesome society, parents don’t give their children unisex names or (even worse) names of the other gender.  Parents give feminine names to girls and masculine names to boys. 

The destruction of these wholesome customs is perverse and corrupts society.  The enemies of Our Lord have advanced far in trying to destroy these good practices.  Minimizing the outward signs which show the differences in gender leads to blurring the distinction between the sexes.  Gender-blurring is designed to minimize our understanding of the differences between the sexes.  The eventual goal is to promote gender confusion (a lunacy we see today).  This whole corrupting process has its roots in the centuries-old apostasy from the Catholic Faith.[7]

Among many other wholesome grammatical distinctions between the sexes, is using sex-specific endings to indicate the gender of a person who has a certain role.  For example, a man who delivers food to the tables in a restaurant is called a “waiter” and a woman who does this is called a “waitress”.  This “-tress” ending feminizes the word.  There are countless words with such feminized endings, e.g., empress and shepherdess.

A similar Latinized feminine ending to words is “-trix” (instead of “-tress”).  Thus:

➢  a female executor of a person’s will is called an “executrix”.[8]
 

➢  likewise, Our Lady is called the “Mediatrix of all Graces”.

Because we make these wholesome grammatical distinctions between the sexes, a female redeemer is called a “redemptrix” or a “redemptress”.  Thus, the Blessed Virgin Mary is called the “Co-Redemptrix” because she co-redeems man with her Son.

 

Comparison of Our Lady’s titles, “Co-Redemptrix” and “Mediatrix of all Graces”

To better understand the Blessed Virgin Mary’s title “Co-Redemptrix”, let us compare it to her title “Mediatrix of all Graces”.  These two titles correspond to her two unique roles helping her Son, in meriting and distributing all Graces.

Her title “Co-Redemptrix” refers to her unique role (and privilege) assisting her Son in His Redemption of the world, through which she assisted Him in meriting forgiveness and grace for sinners, in a fitting way (as explained below).  By contrast, her title “Mediatrix of all Graces” refers to her unique role (and privilege) assisting her Son in distributing all those Graces to sinners.

Our Lady’s assistance to her Son in the works of redemption and salvation is analogous to a nurse playing a uniquely important role in both helping a physician prepare a lifesaving medicine and also distribute the medicine for him to his patients.  Our Lady uniquely aided her Son although she is not Divine and although she herself depends on her Son, just as the nurse is not a physician but can be a unique aid in his work.

 

Pre-Vatican II teaching that Mary is Co-Redemptrix of the world


Pope St. Pius X

Pope St. Pius X taught that, in the work of redemption, the Blessed Virgin Mary merited in a way of fittingness, what her Son merited strictly speaking.  Here are St. Pius X’s words:

We are then, it will be seen, very far from attributing to the Mother of God a productive power of grace – a power which belongs to God alone.  Yet, since Mary surpasses all in holiness and union with Jesus Christ, and has been associated by Jesus Christ in the work of redemption, she merits for us “de congruo,” [i.e., according to fittingness] in the language of theologians, what Jesus Christ merits for us “de condigno,” [i.e., according to strict deserving] .…[9]

Also, St. Pius X’s Holy Office (viz., his guardian of the Catholic Faith) approved the orthodoxy of a prayer praising Our Lady as “Co-Redemptrix”.  Here is a portion of this prayer:

I praise thine exalted privilege of being truly Mother of God, ever Virgin, conceived without stain of sin, Co-Redemptrix of the human race.[10]

 

Pope Benedict XV 

Pope Benedict XV taught that the Blessed Virgin Mary redeemed the world, along with Christ.  Here are his words:

As the Blessed Virgin Mary does not seem to participate in the public life of Jesus Christ, and then, suddenly appears at the stations of his cross, she is not there without divine intention.  She suffers with her suffering and dying Son, almost as if she would have died herself.  For the salvation of mankind, she gave up her rights as the mother of her Son and, in a sense, offered Christ’s sacrifice to God the Father as far as she was permitted to do.  Therefore, one can justly say that she together with Christ has redeemed the human race.[11]

 

Pope Pius XI

Pope Pius XI called the Blessed Mother the Co-Redemptrix.  Here are his words:

By necessity, the Redeemer could not but associate [non poteva, per necessità di cose, non associare] his Mother in His work.  For this reason, we invoke her under the title of Co-Redemptrix.  She gave us the Savior, she accompanied Him in the work of Redemption as far as the Cross itself, sharing with Him the sorrows and the agony and in the death in which Jesus consummated the Redemption of mankind.[12]

 

Honoring Our Lady as Co-Redemptrix, in the devotional life of the Church

Before Vatican II, not only did the popes teach that Our Lady is Co-Redemptrix, but she was also honored under this title in Catholic devotion.  For example, Dom Guéranger quotes and promotes a 600-year-old liturgical sequence and hymn, praising Our Lady as Co-Redemptrix.  Here is this sequence:

Come, sovereign Lady,

Mary, do thou visit us,

illumine our sickly souls,

by the example of thy

duties performed in life.

 

Come, Co-Redemptrix of the world,

take away the filth of sin,

by visiting thy people,

remove their peril of chastisement.

 

Come, Queen of nations,

extinguish the flames of the guilty,

rectify whatsoever is wrong,

give us to live innocently.

 

Come, and visit the sick,

Mary, fortify the strong with

the vigor of thy holy impetuosity,

so that brave courage droop not.

 

Come, thou Star, O thou

Light of the ocean waves,

shed thy ray of peace upon us,

let the heart of John exult with

joy before the Lord.[13]

Similarly, traditional devotional books contemplate Mary’s role as Co-Redemptrix.[14]

 

Pope Francis scoffs at Our Lady’s title and privilege of being Co-Redemptrix

On December 12, 2019, the great feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Pope Francis scoffed at Our Lady’s title and her privilege of being “Co-Redemptrix”.  Here are his words, as quoted in a news report:

“She never wanted for herself something that was of her son,” Francis said. “She never introduced herself as co-redemptrix.  No.  Disciple,” he said, meaning that Mary saw herself as a disciple of Jesus.

Mary, the pope insisted, “never stole[15] for herself anything that was of her son,” …

“When they come to us with the story of declaring her this or making that dogma, let’s not get lost in foolishness [in Spanish, tonteras],” he said.[16]

Pope Francis then showed his contempt not only for Our Lady’s title and privilege of being Co-Redemptrix, but also his contempt for all of her titles which show her unique glory and which show how Our Lord has honored His Mother through the Church.  Here are Pope Francis’s words of contempt for all of her glorious titles:

“Mary woman, Mary mother, without any other essential title,” Francis insisted.[17]

 

Pope Francis’s words are merely part of Vatican II’s and the conciliar church’s blasphemous minimization of the Glorious Mother of God

Pope Francis’s words (above) are among the countless conciliar attempts to “pull down” Our Lady from her unique, exalted position, and to put her on the level of everyone else.  According to him, she is merely “woman” and “mother”.

In his scandalous minimizing of Our Lady’s glory, Pope Francis reflects the teaching of Vatican II.  For example, Lumen Gentium says the Blessed Virgin Mary is only one of many examples of persons cooperating with Our Lord.[18] 

In his words (above), Pope Francis merely follows Vatican II’s warning not to “exaggerate” devotion to our Heavenly Mother.[19]  Here is Vatican II’s admonition:

[The council] exhorts theologians and preachers of the divine word to abstain zealously both from all gross exaggerations as well as from petty narrow-mindedness in considering the singular dignity of the Mother of God.

Lumen Gentium §67 (emphasis added).

 

Conclusion

One of the hallmarks of the conciliar revolution is its continual efforts to minimize the Glorious Mother of God.

One of the ways we must be counter-revolutionary is by devoting ourselves to her and honoring her at every opportunity, including as Co-Redemptrix! 

Let us continually pray to her and for Pope Francis!


[1]           Quoted from St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Third Sermon for Advent, entitled: On the Three Advents of the Lord and the Seven Pillars which we ought to erect within us.


[2]           Here is how St. Thomas explains this truth: 

 

[E]ach and every creature exists for the perfection of the entire universe. Furthermore, the entire universe, with all its parts, is ordained towards God as its end, inasmuch as it imitates, as it were, and shows forth the Divine goodness, to the glory of God.

 

Summa, Ia, Q.65., a2, respondeo.


[3]           Here is St. Thomas’ fuller explanation of this truth:

 

It is the part of the best agent to produce an effect which is best in its entirety; but this does not mean that He makes every part of the whole the best absolutely, but in proportion to the whole; in the case of an animal, for instance, its goodness would be taken away if every part of it had the dignity of an eye. Thus, therefore, God also made the universe to be best as a whole, according to the mode of a creature; whereas He did not make each single creature best, but one better than another.  And therefore, we find it said of each creature, “God saw the light, that it was good” (Genesis, 1:4); and in like manner, each one of the rest.  But of all together it is said, “God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good” (Genesis, 1:31).

 

Summa, Ia, Q.47, a.2, ad 1 (emphasis added).

 

[4]           The Liturgical Year, by Dom Guéranger, volume 14, (also called volume 5 for the Time After Pentecost) New York, Benziger Bros., 1910, p. 212 (emphasis added).

 

[5]           The Natural Law is what we know we must do by the light of the natural reason God gave us.  One example of the Natural Law is that we must never tell a lie.  We naturally know this because we know that the purpose of speech is to convey the truth and so we naturally know that telling a lie is abusing the purpose of speech. 

 

Here is how St. Thomas explains what the Natural Law is:

 

[L]aw, being a rule and measure, can be in a person in two ways: in one way, as in him that rules and measures; in another way, as in that which is ruled and measured, since a thing is ruled and measured, in so far as it partakes of the rule or measure.  Wherefore, since all things subject to Divine providence are ruled and measured by the eternal law, as was stated above [in Summa, Ia IIae, Q.91, a.1]; it is evident that all things partake somewhat of the eternal law, in so far as, namely, from its being imprinted on them, they derive their respective inclinations to their proper acts and ends. 

 

Now among all others, the rational creature is subject to Divine providence in the most excellent way, in so far as it partakes of a share of providence, by being provident both for itself and for others.  Wherefore it has a share of the Eternal Reason, whereby it has a natural inclination to its proper act and end: and this participation of the eternal law in the rational creature is called the natural law.  Hence the Psalmist after saying (Psalm 4:6): “Offer up the sacrifice of justice,” as though someone asked what the works of justice are, adds: “Many say, Who showeth us good things?” in answer to which question he says: “The light of Thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us”: thus implying that the light of natural reason, whereby we discern what is good and what is evil, which is the function of the natural law, is nothing else than an imprint on us of the Divine light.  It is therefore evident that the natural law is nothing else than the rational creature’s participation of the eternal law.

 

Summa, Ia IIae, Q.91, a.2, respondeo (emphasis added).

[7]           For further analysis of this issue, read the article The Direct Road from Apostasy to Gender Confusion, published in the December 2019 Catholic Candle.

[9]           Ad diem illum laetissimum (On the Immaculate Conception), Pope St. Pius X, February 2, 1904, §14 (emphasis added; bracketed words added for clarity).


[10]         January 22, 1914 decree of the Holy Office, taken from The Raccolta, Benziger Bros., 1957, pp. 228-229.  This prayer was indulgenced by the Vatican office of indulgences, which is part of the Sacred Apostolic Penitentiary, on Dec. 4, 1934.


[11]         Pope Benedict XV, Apostolic Letter Inter soldalica, March 22, 1918 (emphasis added), cited and quoted in The Church Teaches, John F. Clarkson, S.J., et al. (translators), Herder & Co., St. Louis, © 1955, pp. 210-211.

 

[12]         Pope Pius XI, Allocution to Pilgrims from Vicenza, Italy (a city west of Venice), November 30, 1933 (quoted in L’Osservatore Romano, December 1, 1933, p. 1; emphasis added.)

 

[13]         The Liturgical Year, by Dom Guéranger, volume 12, (also called volume 3 for the Time After Pentecost) James Duffy, Dublin, 1890, pp. 523-524 (emphasis added).

[14]         For example, this title is used in a meditation given in Divine Intimacy: Meditations on the Interior Life for Every Day of the Liturgical Year, By Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, TAN Books, Rockford, contained in the meditation for February Second – The Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

 

[15]         Pope Francis insultingly suggests that the way Our Lady would receive a title or an honor is by “stealing” it from her Son.  On the contrary, her Divine Son is the One who Wills that these honors be given to her.  For example, in 1929, Our Lady of Fatima revealed God’s Will that she be honored through Russia being consecrated to her Immaculate Heart and that Russia would be saved by this means.  Here are her words to Sister Lucy of Fatima:

 

The moment has come when God asks the Holy Father to make, in union with all the bishops of the world, the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means.…

 

The Whole Truth About Fatima, Frére Michel de la Sainte Trinité, translator John Collorafi, vol. II, Immaculate Heart Publications, Buffalo, NY, © 1989 for English translation, p.464 (emphasis added).


[18]         The council says Our Lady is one of many [“manifold”] ways of cooperating with her Son just like ministers and laymen have various ways of cooperating with Christ’s priesthood.  Here are the council’s words concerning the Blessed Virgin Mary, in the section of Lumen Gentium pertaining to her:

 

[T]he Blessed Virgin is invoked by the Church under the titles of Advocate, Auxiliatrix, Adjutrix, and Mediatrix .  This, however, is to be so understood that it neither takes away from nor adds anything to the dignity and efficaciousness of Christ the one Mediator.

 

For no creature could ever be counted as equal with the Incarnate Word and Redeemer.  Just as the priesthood of Christ is shared in various ways both by the ministers and by the faithful, and as the one goodness of God is really communicated in different ways to His creatures, so also the unique mediation of the Redeemer does not exclude but rather gives rise to a manifold cooperation which is but a sharing in this one source.

 

Lumen Gentium, §62 (emphasis added).

 

[19]         This pulling down of the Blessed Virgin Mary is like the conciliar church minimizing Our Lord Jesus Christ.  For example, he is called a “superstar” in a blasphemous (so-called) “rock opera”. 

 

To take only one more example of gross disrespect for Our Lord, the conciliar church has named many (of the relatively few) churches built after Vatican II, with the blasphemous title Christ the Servant Church.  (Do an internet search for the websites of the many conciliar churches given that name.)

 

Faithful Catholics honor the greatness of Our Lord’s Divinity and His Kingship, as well as the unique and sublime role of the holy Mother of God.  By contrast, the revolutionaries emphasize Our Lady being a “normal” woman and her Son being a servant.

 

New doctrines are not Catholic. They are heresy.

Posted on by Catholic Candle

Catholic Candle note: Sedevacantism is wrong and Catholic Candle is not sedevacantist. In fact, we published a nine-part series setting out the errors of sedevacantism (and also why it is wrong to believe that former Pope Benedict XVI continues to be pope).

A reader would be mistaken to believe that the article below gives any support to sedevacantism. This article simply shows that Vatican II’s teachings, because they are new, cannot be Catholic and must be rejected. In this way, Vatican II’s teachings are like any other erroneous teachings of a pope or bishops. See, e.g., Pope John XXII’s denial (in the 14th century) of a doctrine that the Church has always taught infallibly (although this denial did not prevent him from being pope).

The First Vatican Council infallibly teaches that new teachings are not the proper subject matter for the guidance of the Holy Ghost:

For the Holy Ghost was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by His revelation, make known some new doctrine, but that, by His assistance, they might religiously guard and faithfully expound the revelation or Deposit of Faith transmitted by the Apostles.

Vatican I, Pastor Aeternus, Sess. 4, ch.4, #6 (emphasis added).

The Council of Trent Catechism teaches:

[The Catholic Church’s] doctrines are neither novel nor of recent origin, but were delivered, of old, by the Apostles, and disseminated throughout the world. Hence, no one can, for a moment, doubt that the impious opinions which heresy invents, opposed, as they are, to the doctrines taught by the Church from the days of the Apostles to the present time, are very different from the faith of the true Church.

Council of Trent Catechism, under Creed: Apostolicity (emphasis added).

New doctrines are so foreign to Catholicism that St. Thomas Aquinas defines heretics as follows: A heretic is someone who devises or follows false or new opinions. Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Q.11, a.1 Sed contra (emphasis added). Notice St. Thomas does not say “false and new opinions”. The newness of a doctrine is already sufficient reason to reject it.

The Second Council of Nicea, in 787 AD, condemned doctrinal innovators and rejected all innovations, with these words:

[W]e declare that we defend free from any innovations all the written and unwritten ecclesiastical traditions that have been entrusted to us. … Therefore, all those who … devise innovations or who spurn anything entrusted to the Church …, we order that they be suspended if they are bishops or clerics, and excommunicated if they are monks or lay people.

Emphasis added.

Pope St. Pius X describes modernists in terms of their break with tradition and their embrace of novel doctrines:

[T]hey pervert the eternal concept of truth and the true meaning of religion; in introducing a new system in which they are seen to be under the sway of a blind and unchecked passion for novelty, thinking not at all of finding some solid foundation of truth, but despising the Holy and Apostolic Traditions.

Pope St. Pius X, Pascendi Dominici Gregis, ¶13, quoting from the encyclical Singulari nos of Pope Gregory XVI, June 25, 1834 (emphasis added).

Summary

It is clear that the Holy Ghost is not promised as a guide for the teaching of new doctrines. Further, the Catholic Church has always taught that Her doctrines are not new. Rather, the Catholic Church condemns new doctrines and considers them heresy.

As Admitted by the Conciliar Revolutionaries, Vatican II’s Teachings Are New, Which shows that Those Teachings are False.

Having seen above that the Catholic Church rejects new doctrines and certainly does not teach them infallibly, we next look at whether Vatican II’s teachings are new. If they are, then they cannot be infallible and must be rejected. Below, we set forth the testimony of the hierarchy that the teachings of Vatican II are new. (This is merely one “level” of proof among many, showing that we must reject the teachings of Vatican II.)

The testimony of Pope John Paul II:

[W]hat constitutes the substantial “novelty” of the Second Vatican Council, in line with the legislative tradition of the Church, especially in regard to ecclesiology, constitutes likewise the “novelty” of the new Code [of canon law].

Among the elements which characterize the true and genuine image of the Church, we should emphasize especially the following: the doctrine in which the Church is presented as the People of God (cf. Lumen Gentium, no. 2), and authority as a service (cf. ibid., no. 3); the doctrine in which the Church is seen as a “communion”, and which, therefore, determines the relations which should exist between the particular Churches and the universal Church, and between collegiality and the primacy; the doctrine, moreover, according to which all the members of the People of God, in the way suited to each of them, participate in the threefold office of Christ: priestly, prophetic and kingly. With this teaching there is also linked that which concerns the duties and rights of the faithful, and particularly of the laity; and finally, the Church’s commitment to ecumenism. …

[T]he Second Vatican Council has … elements both old and new, and the new consists precisely in the elements which we have enumerated ….

Pope John Paul II, Sacrae Disciplinae Leges, January 25, 1983 (emphasis added).

As quoted above, Pope John Paul II specifically identified key doctrines of Vatican II as novelties. Among the chief novel teachings of Vatican II (and which are contained in the 1983 code of canon law), he lists: the Church, the universal sacrament of salvation [meaning everyone goes to heaven] is shown to be the People of God and its hierarchical constitution to be founded on the College of Bishops together with its head. Pope John Paul II, Sacrae Disciplinae Leges, January 25, 1983.

We have other warnings that the conciliar doctrines are novelties, (for which the Holy Ghost was not promised). Pope John Paul II admitted the council’s novelties in these words:

Indeed, the extent and depth of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council call for a renewed commitment to deeper study in order to reveal clearly the Council’s continuity with Tradition, especially in points of doctrine which, perhaps because they are new, have not yet been well understood by some sections of the Church.

Ecclesia Dei, (1988), ¶5b.

The pope is calling for deeper study because 23 years after the council, he acknowledges that Vatican II’s continuity with Sacred Tradition is still not shown (nor can it be)!

The testimony of Pope Benedict XVI:

In the first year of his pontificate, Pope Benedict XVI said:

[W]ith the Second Vatican Council, the time came when broad new thinking was required.

December 22, 2005 Christmas address (emphasis added).

Before he became pope, Cardinal Ratzinger taught:

If it is desirable to offer a diagnosis of the text [of the Vatican II document, Gaudium et Spes] as a whole, we might say that (in conjunction with the texts on religious liberty and world religions) it is a revision of the Syllabus of Pius IX, a kind of countersyllabus. … Let us be content to say that the text serves as a countersyllabus and, as such, represents, on the part of the Church, an attempt at an official reconciliation with the new era inaugurated in 1789 [by the Masonic French Revolution].

Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology, translator, Sr. Mary Frances McCarthy (San Francisco: Ignatius Press 1987), pp. 381-382; French edition: Les Principes de la Theologie Catholique – Esquisse et Materiaux, Paris: Tequi, 1982, pp. 426-427 (emphasis added; bracketed words added; parenthetical words are in the original).

Note: Obviously, whatever is the opposite (that is, the “countersyllabus”) of the Catholic Church’s prior teaching, must be a novel teaching which the Church did not previously teach. Yet this is how Pope Benedict XVI described some of the main teachings of Vatican II! Thus, clearly, Vatican II’s teachings contain novelties (which are therefore false).

The testimony of Pope Paul VI:

The new position adopted by the Church with regard to the realities of this earth is henceforth well known by everyone …. [T]he Church agrees to recognize the new principle to be put into practice …. [T]he Church agrees to recognize the world as ‘self-sufficient’; she does not seek to make the world an instrument for her religious ends ….

August 24, 1969 Declaration of Pope Paul VI, L’Osservatore Romano; (emphasis added).

Further, Pope Paul VI also referred to the “newness” of the doctrine of the Second Vatican Council, in a general audience on January 12, 1966.

Statements Made by other Members of the Hierarchy

Other members of the hierarchy have also made clear statements concerning the novelty and rupture of the teachings of Vatican II.

Near the close of the council, Cardinal Congar stated:

What is new in this teaching [regarding religious liberty] in relation to the doctrine of Leo XIII and even of Pius XII, although the movement was already beginning to make itself felt, is the determination of the basis peculiar to this liberty, which is sought not in the objective truth of moral or religious good, but in the ontological quality of the human person.

Congar, in the Bulletin Etudes et Documents of June 15, 1965, as quoted in I Accuse the Council, Archbishop Lefebvre, p. 27, Angelus Press, 2009 (emphasis added; bracketed words added).

Yves Cardinal Congar was made a Cardinal by Pope John Paul II in recognition for Cardinal Congar’s lifelong dedication to the conciliar revolution. Cardinal Congar likened Vatican II to the triumph of the communists in Russia, calling Vatican II the “October Revolution” in the Church. Yves Congar, The Council Day by Day: Second Session p. 215, (1964).

By this parallel, Cardinal Congar is telling us that Vatican II was an overthrow of the established order in the Catholic Church. Note that, by making this particular comparison, Cardinal Congar saw fit to compare Vatican II to the triumph of the anti-God communists in Russia!

Cardinal Suenens compared Vatican II to a different anti-God revolution. He made the same parallel as Cardinal Ratzinger did (quoted above), comparing Vatican II to the anti-God, Masonic French Revolution, saying that Vatican II was the “1789” in the Church. Quoted in the Catechism of the Crisis in the Church, Pt., 5, by Fr. M. Gaudron, SSPX.

In all three of the cardinals’ comparisons of Vatican II with a communist or Masonic revolution, it is clear that they are stating that Vatican II’s teaching is revolutionary, and thus it is new and false.

Conclusion Regarding the Non-Infallibility (and Falsity) of Vatican II’s Teachings based on their Newness (Novelty)

We have seen that the Holy Ghost is not promised for the teaching of new doctrines. Further, the Catholic Church has always taught that Her doctrines are not new and cannot change. Rather, the Catholic Church condemns new doctrines and considers them heresy.

We have also seen that Pope Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II and Pope Paul VI (as well as some cardinals), have all stated that Vatican II’s doctrines are new. Therefore, Vatican II’s teachings cannot be infallible (and further, they must be rejected because they are new and heretical).

A pope who taught heresy in the past

Posted on by Catholic Candle

In this article

  1. The Catholic Church will always have a pope
  2. The Catholic Church is not in an interregnum
  3. The Catholic Church will always be visible and will always have a pope who is visible to all
  4. The man whom the whole Church accepts as pope, is the pope
  5. Rash judgment: concluding the pope is a formal heretic
  6. Sedevacantism is un-Catholic because it is revolutionary
  7. Our Catholic duty: resist the harm done by a bad pope but (of course) recognize his authority
  8. Judging the pope’s words and deeds according to Catholic tradition
  9. An example of a pope teaching heresy before his election and during his reign
  10. A Man Need not be Consecrated a Bishop or Ordained a Priest to be a Valid Pope
  11. The Revelations to Sister Lucy of Fatima Show That the Catholic Church has a Pope

Sedevacantists’ questions answered

1. The Catholic Church Will Always Have a Pope

Because the conciliar popes regularly commit shocking scandals, a Catholic might be tempted to the visceral reaction that there is no pope. However, that reaction is an error. The Catholic Church teaches that She will always have a pope, until the very end of the world:
  1. Vatican I infallibly teaches us: If anyone says that it is not by the institution of Christ the Lord Himself (that is to say, by Divine Law) that blessed Peter should have perpetual successors in the primacy over the whole Church; or that the Roman Pontiff is not the successor of Blessed Peter in this primacy, let him be anathema. Vatican I, Session 4, Ch. 2 (bold emphasis and parenthetical words are in the original, italic emphasis added).
  2. The great Doctor of the Church, Saint Francis de Sales, teaches us: St. Peter has had successors, has them in these days, and will have them even to the end of the ages. Catholic Controversy, part 2, art. 6, ch. 9.

  3. Pope Pius XII teaches us: If ever one day . . . material Rome were to crumble, . . . even then the Church would not crumble or crack, Christ’s promise to Peter would always remain true, the Papacy, the one and indestructible Church founded on the Pope alive at the moment, would always endure. January 30, 1949, Address to the Students of Rome, Quoted from The Pope Speaks, Pantheon Books, New York, 1957 (emphasis added).

2. The Catholic Church is not in an Interregnum

Sedevacantists generally hold that Pope Pius XII has had no successors, during the last 57 years. In an attempt to avoid the contradiction between Vatican I’s infallible teaching and their own theory, the sedevacantists simply label the last 57 years as a “papal interregnum”.
But if a sedevacantist would examine his position objectively, he would see that the supposed “facts” he asserts would not constitute a real interregnum but rather would be in an interruption in papal succession. The sedevacantists assert that there will be a pope in some future time. But their theory (viz., no pope now, but there will be a future pope) really supposes there would be (what historians call) a restoration of the (papal) monarchy. See, the history of monarchy in various countries in which the monarchy has been restored, e.g., England and France.

The difference between papal interregnums and the sedevacantist theory.

Throughout Church history, no pope was ever elected until the previous pope dies (or abdicates). Thus, there is always a short interregnum, during which the electors promptly begin the process of choosing a new pope and they continue their task until a new pope is chosen.
Choosing a new pope has often taken only days. But the sedevacantists try to liken the 57-year (supposed) papal interregnum which they assert, to the very extreme and unusual interregnum which ended in Pope Gregory X’s election. This interregnum was 2¾ years and is the longest in Church history. The Primacy of the Apostolic See Vindicated, Bishop Francis Kenrick, 3rd ed., Dunigan & Bro., New York, 1848, p.288.
The election of Pope Gregory X took 2¾ years because the Cardinal electors had a profound disagreement which caused those Cardinals to labor that long electing a new pope. But they kept trying until they succeeded in electing a new pope.
This interregnum (before Pope Gregory X’s election) is very different from the supposed interregnum asserted by the sedevacantists, for five reasons:
  1. The sedevacantists assert an interregnum which is over 20 times longer than the Church’s longest interregnum (ending in the election of Pope Gregory X).
  2. Taking into account the speed of communication of particular times throughout history, never in Church history did virtually every Catholic think we had a pope when we had no pope. By contrast, the tiny sedevacantist “elite” thinks that the Chair of St. Peter is vacant and only this “elite” “knows” it.
  3. In the case of any anti-pope in history, it has never happened that virtually every Catholic throughout the world, has been deceived into believing that an anti-pope was the true pope. In fact, it would be impossible for this to happen, as shown in Section 4 below. But the tiny sedevacantist “elite” wrongly thinks this has occurred today and that only their tiny “elite” “knows” the truth.
  4. In every interregnum beginning with St. Peter’s death, the papal electors promptly set about the task of choosing a new pope. Even in the most extreme case of laboring 2¾ years to choose a new pope, the electors began promptly and did not stop trying until they succeeded.
    By contrast, the sedevacantists assert there has been no attempt to even begin electing a new pope during this 57-year (supposed) interregnum, because the sedevacantists assert that no Cardinal electors remain to elect a new pope because they are all disqualified by (supposedly) ceasing to be Catholic.
  5. During papal interregnums, the Church’s Unified Government continues operating without interruption. But that is not true under the sedevacantist interregnum theory, which results in a concrete denial of Catholic teaching that Unity of Government is an element of the Church’s Mark of Unity. See the discussion below.

The sedevacantist interregnum theory contradicts Catholic Teaching that the Church’s Unity of Government, is part of the Church’s Mark of Unity.

It is basic catechism that the Catholic Church has a Unified, Monarchic Government. See, e.g., Summa Suppl., Q.26, a.3, Respondeo. This Government makes the Church one throughout the world. Summa Supp. Q.40, a.6, Respondeo. This central government is an element of the Church’s Mark of Unity. See, Council of Trent Catechism, article: Marks of the Church, section: Unity, subsection: Unity in Government.
One large Catholic Dictionary explained the need for the Church’s unity of government, by setting forth the contrast to the disunited German States of the early 19th Century, which were united under a common language, beliefs and practice, but were not one country:

The Catholic Roman Church … is one because all her members are united under one visible head …. Some years ago a great deal was said about the unity of Germany, which was eagerly desired by many. Germans had many points in common: they all spoke the same language; the same blood flowed in their veins; they were proud of the same literature; they were bound together by many ennobling recollections, and, in some measure, by common aspirations. But the German States were not one, because they were not under one government.

Catholic Dictionary, Addis & Arnold, Catholic Publication Society, 3rd ed., New York, 1884, article: Church of Christ, page 174.
For the Catholic Church to lose Her Unity of Government, even temporarily, would be to lose an element of the Mark of Unity, at least temporarily. Id. If there were times when the Church did not have this element of the Mark of Unity, then this element would never be part of the Mark, because the Marks of the Church are inseparable from the Church and are signs by which we can always discern the true Church. 1917 Catholic Encyclopedia, article: Unity (as a Mark of the Church); Catechism of St. Pius X, section: Ninth Article of the Creed, Q.13.
Just as the Church is always unified in Faith, She is always unified in Government. Thus, when a pope dies, if the Church’s central Government ceased to function, the Church’s Unity of Government would also cease. That does not happen. Even during papal interregnums, the Church’s central Government continues to function, although under somewhat different rules.
Important Pontifical matters which are not urgent, are deferred until the election of the new pope. See, e.g., St. Pius X’s Constitution Vacante Apostolica Sede, December 25, 1904, title 1, ch. 1, §1. Urgent Pontifical matters are handled by majority decision of the cardinals. See, e.g., Id., §5. Sacred Congregations continue to handle routine matters. Id., title 1, ch. 4. We could give a lot more details about the continuation of the Church’s central Government. See, e.g., Id., title 1, ch. 3, §12, regarding the continued functioning of the offices of Camerlengo and the Grand Penitentiary. In summary, the Church’s central Government always continues functioning and the Church maintains Her Mark of Unity in Her Government even during a papal interregnum.
Above, we use as an example, Pope St. Pius X’s 1904 revision of the rules for the operation of the Church’s central Government during a papal interregnum. But this revision is only one of the various versions of the rules over the centuries. The rules have also been tweaked by Pope Pius IV, Pope Gregory XV, Pope Clement XII and other popes. But regardless of the details, the Church’s central Government always continues to function even during an interregnum (although under somewhat different rules than when a pope is alive).
Because sedevacantists assert that not only the pope but everyone else in the Church’s government (Cardinals, Chamberlains, etc.) is outside the Catholic Church, the sedevacantists’ interregnum theory results in the (supposed) destruction of the Unity and the Continuity of the Church’s central Government, for 57 years now. This results in a concrete denial of Catholic teaching that Unity of Government is an element of the Church’s Mark of Unity, since the Church’s Marks are never lost, even temporarily.

Conclusion

The past 57 years are much different than a papal interregnum and the sedevacantist theory destroys the Unity and Continuity of the Church’s Government, which is an element of the Mark of Unity.
The truth is, that the Catholic Church will always have Unity and Continuity in Her central Government even during a papal interregnum, but this does not mean that She will always be governed well.
Whoever the pope is (which is a different question), we must have a pope because St. Peter will have perpetual successors, he has them in these days and there is a pope who is alive at the moment. (Quoted from Section 1 above.)

3. The Catholic Church Will Always Be Visible And Will Always Have a Pope Who is Visible to All

Knowing that we must have a pope, there are a few tiny dispersed groups who so despise the pope in the Vatican, that they concoct theories that there is a hidden pope, whom only their tiny “elite” “knows” about.
These tiny “elite” groups are disunited in their views about who the hidden “pope” is. Some hold that he lives in a farmhouse in Kansas, others that the “pope” is in Montana, Croatia, Argentina, Kenya, Spain or elsewhere. Each of these “popes” is “known” and recognized only by his own tiny group.

The Catholic Church is visible and will always be visible.

But we know from our catechism that the Catholic Church will always be visible. This is why Pope Pius XI declared that the one true Church of Christ is visible to all. Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928. ¶10.

Pope Leo XIII identified the cause of this visibility: the Church is visible because she is a body. Satis Cognitum, ¶3.

Pope Pius XII affirmed this same truth, quoting these words of Pope Leo XIII. Mystici Corporis Christi §14.
St. Francis de Sales replied to his adversaries who would maintain that the Church is invisible and unperceivable that he consider[ed] that this is the extreme of absurdity, and that immediately beyond this abide frenzy and madness. He then proceeds to discuss at length eight clear proofs that the Church is always visible. Catholic Controversy, Part 1, ch. 5.
Thus, because the Catholic Church will always be a body, she will always be visible.

This visible Church will always have a visible government with a visible head.

Because the Church will always be visible, and because Unity of Government is an element of the Mark of Unity by which the Church can always be known, the Church will always have a visible government, so that the true Church can be recognized by this Mark of Unity of Government. See, Section 2 above.

Because the Church’s government is visible and monarchical, the Church, being a visible body, must have a visible head and centre of unity. Catholic Dictionary, Addis & Arnold, Catholic Publication Society, 3rd ed., New York, 1884, article: Church of Christ, page 176.
This is obviously true. For the Church is not one, with a visible government, if it is unknown “who is in charge”. In fact, governing authority is the efficient cause giving unity as one body, to any society of men. Summa Supp., Q.40, a.6, Respondeo. For there is not one visible society if it consists of men united only by ideas and not by one, visible government. That is why even basic catechisms teach us that the Catholic Church is under one visible head. See, e.g., Baltimore Catechism #4, Q.115.
Such a visible head has always been necessary but even more evidently so, as the Catholic Church spread throughout the world. A Full Catechism of the Catholic Church Joseph Deharbe, S.J., Catholic Publication Society, New York, 1889, p.132.
That is why Pope Pius XII sums up Catholic teaching by declaring that it is absolutely necessary that the Supreme Head, that is, the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth, be visible to the eyes of all. Mystici Corporis, ¶69.

Conclusion

We have no assurance that the pope will be holy or will govern well. However, we do know that the Catholic Church is a visible body and that her head, the pope, is visible to all. Thus, the pope is not living unknown and hidden from the attention of the world, in some Kansas farmhouse or similar place.
Further, it is clear that the pope is also not someone such as Cardinal Siri (who a tiny group had supposed to have been a secret pope). Such supposed “pontificate” was not visible. In other words, he was not the pope who is visible to the eyes of all. Mystici Corporis, ¶69.
Thus, we have a pope who is visible to all.

4. The Man Whom the Whole Church Accepts as Pope, Is the Pope

Because the pope must be visible, a necessary corollary of this truth is that whoever is accepted as the pope by virtually all Catholics, we know must be the pope by that very fact, since the pope must be visible to the Church as the pope. This is true because, if virtually all Catholics accepted the legitimacy of an anti-pope, then the true pope would be “invisible”, i.e., unknown to the Church. Thus, because the pope must be visible to all, whoever is accepted as pope by virtually all Catholics, we know must be the pope.
St. Alphonsus de Liguori, Doctor of the Church, explained this truth as follows:

It is of no importance that in past centuries some Pontiff was illegitimately elected or took possession of the Pontificate by fraud. It is enough that he was accepted afterwards by the whole Church as Pope, since by such an acceptance he would become the True Pontiff.

Verità della Fede Part 3, Ch.8, §9, emphasis added.

This entire work of St. Alphonsus is available in an online library, for free, in Italian.

Here is the original Italian version, of the sentences quoted above: Niente ancora importa che ne’ secoli passati alcun pontefice sia stato illegittimamente eletto, o fraudolentemente siasi intruso nel pontificato; basta che poi sia stato accettato da tutta la chiesa come papa, attesoché per tale accettazione già si è renduto legittimo e vero pontefice.

When teaching this same truth, Cardinal Louis Billot identified the cause of this truth, viz., the indefectibility of the Church:

Beyond all doubt, it ought to be firmly held, that the adhesion of the universal Church would, in itself, always be an infallible sign of the legitimacy of a particular pope, and even for the existence of all conditions which are required for his legitimacy as pope. Nor does it take long to identify the reason for this fact. For the reason is taken directly from the infallible promise of Christ and from Providence: The gates of hell shall not prevail against Her [the Church]. And again: Behold, I am with you all days, which is equivalent.

Cardinal Billot, Tractus De Ecclesia Christi, Book 1, Q.14, De Romano Pontifice, Thesis 29, §3; emphasis added.
When discussing the invalidity of simoniacal elections to the papacy, Bishop Kenrick teaches that the Church’s acceptance of a pope cures any defect in his election but that the pope nonetheless has a moral duty to resign:

Should the contemplated case unfortunately occur, the guilty individual must know that he cannot conscientiously exercise the papal power. . . . [T]he acquiescence of the Church heals the defect as far as the faithful are concerned, although it does not relieve the delinquent from the necessity of abdicating the high office which he sacrilegiously assumed.

Bishop Francis Kenrick, The Primacy of the Apostolic See Vindicated 3rd Ed., 1848, Dunigan & Bro., New York, pp. 287-8.

There are Five Consequences of the Fact that Whoever the Whole Church Accepts as Pope, is the Pope.

  1. Pope Francis is the pope now.
    More than 1.2 billion people worldwide, profess to be Catholic.
    Virtually all 1.2 billion Catholics accept Pope Francis as pope. Thus, we know that Pope Francis is the pope currently.
  2. Pope Benedict XVI is no longer pope.
    The fact that Catholics universally accept Pope Francis as pope, is one of many reasons why it is wrong to suppose that Pope Benedict XVI did not “really” resign, and is still pope (instead of Pope Francis). Virtually the whole Church accepts Pope Francis as pope, and the whole Church could never accept an anti-pope.
  3. Each of the other post-conciliar popes was pope, in his turn.
    Over the last 57 years, the whole Church accepted each of the other post-conciliar popes, as pope, in his turn. Thus, we know each was the pope.
  4. This is a further reason we know Cardinal Siri was not pope.
    It is clear that Cardinal Siri was not pope (as a tiny group supposes). Not only was his supposed “pontificate” invisible, but it would have opposed the pontificate of the pope universally accepted by Catholics.

  5. This further shows the impossibility of the Church being now in a papal interregnum.
    The Church accepts Pope Francis as pope and accepted each of his post-conciliar predecessors. This is one of many compelling reasons why we know the Church is not in a papal interregnum because, when the Church accepted each post-conciliar pope in his turn, each one became the true pope (if he wasn’t pope already). St. Alphonsus de Liguori, Verità della Fede Part 3, Ch.8, §9.

5. Rash Judgment: Concluding the Pope is a Formal Heretic

Trying to escape the fact that the pope in the Vatican is visible to all and is accepted as pope by virtually all Catholics, a tiny group holds that no “real” Catholics exist besides the members of their own tiny group. Thus, they assert that the pope in the Vatican is not the “real” pope because he is not accepted as pope by the “real” Catholics (who are exclusively members of their own tiny group). Or alternatively, they assert that their own “pope” (accepted only by their own tiny group) is visible to “all” Catholics and accepted by “all” Catholics, because their tiny group is the only group of “true” Catholics.
Therefore, in order to reach the result they seek, this tiny group judges the 1.2 billion people who profess to be Catholic. This tiny group decides that the Faith and morals of those 1.2 billion people show they are not “real” Catholics. Similarly, this tiny group also judges the pope in the Vatican and decides that his Faith (and morals) show he is not “really” the pope.

The distinction between material heresy and formal heresy.

It is true that many people who profess to be Catholics, hold objective errors against the Catholic Faith. This problem occurred in past centuries also, even if it is more common today than in (at least some) past centuries. For example, a child might believe that God has a body. Or an adult might profess the Pelagian heresy (about grace and free will).
But we would not be forced to conclude that such a person (who professed himself Catholic but has always held the Pelagian heresy), has never really been Catholic. For a person ceases to be Catholic when he holds a position against the Catholic Faith which he knows to be incompatible with what he must believe in order to be Catholic.
If a man held the Pelagian heresy, but wrongly believed that he held the Catholic Faith (concerning matters of grace and free will), then that man would be a material heretic. That is, the man would hold the “material” of heresy (i.e., a heretical opinion) not knowing it was heresy. But this man would not be a formal heretic because he would not know his position was against the teaching of the Catholic Church (and God).

A formal heretic denies the formal aspect of Faith, which is the authority of God. The material heretic denies only the material aspect of Faith. Here is how St. Thomas explains this distinction between the Faith’s formal and material aspects:

If we consider, in the Faith, the formal aspect of the object, it is nothing else than the First Truth. For the Faith of which we are speaking, does not assent to anything, except because it is revealed by God. Hence, the mean [i.e., the middle term of the syllogism] on which Faith is based is the Divine Truth [i.e., God’s authority].

If, however, we consider materially the things to which Faith assents, they include not only God but also many other things ….

Summa, III, Q.1, a.1, Respondeo (emphasis and bracketed words added).

In other words, the formal aspect of the Faith is God alone, because God is the infallible authority of revealed Faith. The material aspect includes many other things, e.g., our Lady’s Assumption into heaven, because the material aspect of the Faith includes all the various revealed truths of our Faith.

Definitions—In summary:

  • A person is a formal heretic if he denies any part of the Catholic Faith in its formal aspect, i.e., if he denies any statement which he knows is revealed by the infallible teaching authority of the Church (God). Such denial involves rejecting the Church’s (God’s) infallible authority itself.
  • A person is a material heretic only, if he denies a part of the Catholic Faith in its material aspect only. In other words, a material heretic is a person who denies a statement of the Catholic Faith without knowing the Church (God) teaches that this statement is infallibly true. Such material heretic’s denial does not involve rejection of the Church’s (God’s) infallible authority, because he errs about what the Church (God) teaches.
Thus, a material heretic can be a Catholic. However, a formal heretic cannot be Catholic, because he rejects the Church’s (God’s) authority by denying part of the Faith, knowing the Church (God) teaches it.
Holding formal heresy always places a person into the state of mortal sin and outside the Church, even if no one else knows of the formal heresy. By contrast, holding material heresy neither places a person in mortal sin nor outside the Church because the person holds the error against the Faith blamelessly, i.e., without knowing his opinion is against the Faith.
Material heresy does not exclude someone from the Church, no matter how public the heresy is, no matter how much harm the heresy causes, and no matter how unshakably he professes it. Thus, the very fact that a person professes a heretical opinion does not, in itself, tell us if he is interiorly culpable for a sin against the Faith. In other words, professing heresy does not, in itself, tell us if the person is a formal heretic or if he is Catholic.
This distinction between formal heresy and material heresy, is a matter of common sense and is the same type of distinction we make in everyday life, between an objectively sinful act and interior culpability for the sinful act.
When leaving a restaurant, suppose a man takes an umbrella which does not belong to him but which he innocently believes to be his own. He has committed an objectively sinful act of theft (i.e., wrongfully taking someone else’s property), but interiorly he has not sinned.

Here is how the Summa Theologica explains that ignorance can excuse a person from culpability for an act which is objectively sinful:

An act is said to be excused … on the part of the agent, so that although the act be evil, it is not imputed as sin to the agent, or [in the case of an agent who had some culpable negligence] at least not as so grave a sin. Thus, ignorance is said to excuse [interior culpability for] a sin wholly or partly.

Summa Supp., Q.49, a.4, Respondeo (emphasis and bracketed words added).

There is no sin of theft on the man’s soul (i.e., no interior culpability) because taking the umbrella was an innocent mistake.

This man is like the material heretic, who innocently believes a statement which is objectively false (i.e., heresy). Thus, the material heretic is objectively wrong but interiorly blameless for the sin of heresy. By contrast, the formal heretic knows he believes something contrary to the Church’s (God’s) teaching, like a person who takes someone else’s umbrella knowing it is not his own. The formal heretic is interiorly culpable for his heretical opinion.
Thus, people who profess heresy could be material heretics only, or they could be formal heretics. If they profess themselves to be Catholics and are material heretics only, their clinging (however tightly and publicly) to objective heresy does not put them outside the Church, since they do not deny the Church’s teaching, knowing the Church (God) teaches the statement infallibly. Such material heretics are merely Catholics who are mistaken about some aspect of the Faith.
By contrast, a person is outside the Church (and is a formal heretic) who rejects a statement of the Faith in its formal aspect, knowing the Church (God) teaches the statement infallibly. This rejection is a rejection of the Church’s (God’s) authority.
If we were to judge someone to be a formal heretic (which always brings interior culpability for mortal sin), we would be judging the sin on his soul, not merely judging that he made an objective error against the Faith (which might be blameless). Judging someone to be a formal heretic is to conclude that such a person really “knows” he denies what the Church (God) teaches, but he won’t admit this “fact”.

We are not discussing the case of a non-Catholic (e.g., a Lutheran) who denies a truth of the Catholic Faith and tells us (by his very adherence to Lutheranism) that he is not Catholic and does not believe everything the Catholic Church teaches. Instead, we are treating of a man who professes to be a Catholic but denies part of the Catholic Faith.

It is Rash Judgment to Judge a Person’s Interior Culpability

God wills men to know the unchanging truth especially of the Faith, and this knowledge perfects our intellects. In other words, truth makes our intellects good. In seeking the truth, we should strive to be completely objective in knowing things exactly as they are.

Here is how St. Thomas explains this principle:

[W]hen we judge of things … there is question of the good of the person who judges [viz., the good of his intellect], if he judge truly, and of his evil [viz., of his intellect] if he judge falsely, because the true is the good of the intellect, and the false is its evil, as stated in [Aristotle’s] Ethics, bk.6, ch.2. Wherefore everyone should strive to make his judgment accord with things as they are.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 2 (emphasis and bracketed words added).

For this reason, when determining whether a particular statement is against the Catholic Faith, we should judge the statement with complete objectivity.

By contrast, when we judge the motives or culpability of persons, we must judge in the best possible light, not with complete “even-handed objectivity”. This is true even if we were usually wrong about such a person’s culpability. Judgments about the culpability of our neighbor are singular, contingent facts (in contrast to eternal, universal truth) and such singular facts do not perfect our intellect. It is better to be usually wrong making too-favorable a judgment about a person’s culpability than to be wrong even occasionally, making too negative a judgment.

Here is how St. Thomas explains this important point:

It is one thing to judge of things and another to judge of men. … [W]hen we judge of men, the good and evil in our judgment is considered chiefly on the part of the person about whom judgment is being formed. For he is deemed worthy of honor from the very fact that he is judged to be good, and deserving of contempt if he is judged to be evil. For this reason we ought, in this kind of judgment, to aim at judging a man good, unless the contrary is proven. … [We] may happen to be deceived more often than not. Yet it is better to err frequently through thinking well of a wicked man, than to err less frequently through having an evil opinion of a good man, because in the latter case an injury is inflicted, but not in the former. … And though we may judge falsely, our judgment in thinking well of another pertains to our goodwill toward him and not to the evil of the intellect, even as neither does it pertain to the intellect’s perfection to know the truth of contingent singular facts in themselves.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1-2 (emphasis added).

Such an unproven, negative judgment about a person’s culpability is called rash judgment. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.2, Respondeo.

For this reason, when determining whether a person is blamable for holding a heretical opinion, we should not judge his interior culpability with complete objectivity but rather, in the best possible light (if we judge at all). For, as St. Thomas explains: Our Lord forbids rash judgment, which is about the inward intention or other uncertain things, as Augustine states (De Serm. Dom. in Monte ii, 18). Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.2, ad 1.
If a man says he is a Catholic and that he believes that a Catholic is permitted to hold the opinions he does, we should judge him in the best possible light and not assume he “knows” his position is contrary to the Catholic Faith, but won’t admit the “fact”. Nor should we assume that, just because we are unsuccessful in changing his opinion, that this means the man “knows” his position is contrary to what he must believe in order to be Catholic.
Thus, it is good to judge objectively the errors themselves, taught by Pope Francis (or others), because the truth of statements should be judged objectively. But it is rash to judge Pope Francis’s culpability with objective “even-handedness” and assume he certainly “knows” that he holds heresy and thus, is not “really” Catholic (and pope).
To the extent we judge Pope Francis’ interior culpability at all, we must judge in the best possible light. Thus, we would judge him to be a material heretic (not a formal heretic) and judge him to still be Catholic (as he professes he is) and to still be the pope (as he professes to be).
Similarly, whatever objective heresies are held by the 1.2 billion people who profess to be Catholic, we should judge their interior culpability in the best possible light (if we judge at all). We should not conclude they are formal heretics and are not “real” Catholics. Thus, their acceptance of Pope Francis is an alternate way to prove he is the pope. See, section 4 above.

When can We Conclude Someone is a Formal Heretic?

We could conclude Pope Francis was a formal heretic if he told us that he did not believe what the Church (God) teaches, that a Catholic must believe now. We would not be judging him rashly because we would merely believe what he tells us about himself.
However, it is rash to judge the interior culpability of Pope Francis (or anyone else) and conclude he is a formal heretic simply because he is a material heretic, i.e., has heretical opinions and refuses to be corrected by traditional Catholics.

Protecting Ourselves from Evil without Judging Interior Culpability

Of course, even when we judge someone not be a formal heretic (if we judge him at all), this does not mean we should accept him as our child’s catechism teacher. For our child would be harmed by his errors, however interiorly blameless the man might be for professing his heresy.
Without judging someone’s interior culpability, we should take into account the person’s wrong-doing (which we must judge objectively). For, when a man is prone to take other people’s umbrellas, we should keep a close eye on our own umbrella (when he is present) even if he innocently took the other umbrellas in the past.
Likewise, we should warn people not to attend sermons of a particular priest who professes errors against the Faith, even if he teaches these errors innocently. We should be wary and warn others, simply based on the priest’s proneness to teach error, whether he is culpable or not.
Judging any person to be interiorly culpable for his sinful act only results in concluding his soul is lower with regards to our own soul, than would be true if he were not culpable. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 2. But our rashly judging his interior culpability does not allow us to protect ourselves any better than if we didn’t judge him.

But isn’t it “Obvious” that Pope Francis is a Formal Heretic?

But “rash judgers” will exclaim that it is “obvious” that the man (in the example above) knows he is taking someone else’s umbrella (and is interiorly culpable), because his own umbrella is a different color or because he did not bring his own umbrella with him today, etc. Notice the hidden assumptions in the “rash judger’s” conclusion. He assumes that the “umbrella thief” remembers which umbrella he brought today, etc. St. Thomas replies about such rash judgment: “it is better to err frequently through thinking well of a wicked man, than to err less frequently through having an evil opinion of a good man”. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1.
Similarly, “rash judgers” say the pope is “obviously” a formal heretic. They say he “must” know he denies Church teaching because he was trained in the Catholic Faith before Vatican II or that his errors have been pointed out to him, etc. Notice the hidden assumptions in the “rash judger’s” conclusion. He assumes that the “heretic” had a good (or at least an average) Catholic education, etc. St. Thomas replies to these “rash judgers” that we must not judge based on such probabilities and assumptions. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1.
We are not obliged to search for an explanation of how the pope (or anyone else) might not be blamable for whatever objective heresy he holds. The members of the post-Vatican II hierarchy are not stupid, but they received an extremely bad philosophical formation, including the principle (which is at the root of modernism) that all truth evolves. By contrast, all correct reasoning (and the Catholic Faith) rely on the philosophical principle that there is eternal, unchanging truth.
In his masterful treatment of modernism, St. Pius X explained that modernists profess that all truth changes:
[T]hey have reached that pitch of folly at which they pervert the eternal concept of truth …. [They say] dogma is not only able, but ought to evolve and to be changed. … Thus far, Venerable Brethren, We have considered the Modernist as a philosopher.
Pascendi Dominici Gregis, Pope St. Pius X, September 8, 1907, §§13-14.
Thus, because of bad philosophy, modernists think a dogma used to be true (and used to be taught by the Church) but is no longer true or taught by the Church. This explains why the present hierarchy treats the Church’s past teaching, not as false at the previous time, but as “obsolete” or no longer binding. For example, Cardinal Ratzinger treated the (truly infallible) teachings in the syllabi of Pope Pius IX and Pope St. Pius X as if they were now-outdated and no longer true. He says that:
[T]here are decisions of the Magisterium that cannot be a last word on the matter as such, but are, in a substantial fixation of the problem, above all an expression of pastoral prudence, a kind of provisional disposition. Its nucleus remains valid, but the particulars, which the circumstances of the times have influenced, may need further ramifications. In this regard, one may think of the declarations of popes in the last century about religious liberty, as well as the anti-Modernist decisions at the beginning of this century, above all, the decisions of the Biblical Commission of the time. As a cry of alarm in the face of hasty and superficial adaptations, they will remain fully justified. A personage such as Johann Baptist Metz said, for example, that the Church’s anti-Modernist decisions render the great service of preserving her from immersion in the liberal-bourgeois world. But in the details of the determinations they contain, they become obsolete after having fulfilled their pastoral mission at the proper moment.
Cardinal Ratzinger, June 27 1990 L’Osservatore Romano, p.6 (emphasis added).
Again, we are not obliged to search for an explanation of how post-Vatican II Catholics (including the pope) avoid being formal heretics. It suffices that we judge them (if at all) in the most favorable light. Even if a modernist were absolutely clear in denying a dogma (such as our Lady’s Assumption), it would not necessarily mean he was a formal heretic and he ceased to be Catholic. This is true even assuming that he knows the Church defined the Assumption as a dogma. For a modernist could think the particular dogma had been true and Catholics used to be required to believe it, but that this particular truth has changed.
Such changeability of truth is a philosophical error underlying modernism. However, the unchangeability of truth is not itself a dogma of the Faith. Of course, the philosophical principle that truth does not change, underlies Church dogma and all natural truth. A person who holds a (materially) heretical position does not become a formal heretic unless he knows that the Catholic Church not only used to teach a particular dogma, but still teaches it and that we must believe it now, in order to be Catholic now.
A modernist could think that Catholics of a past age would have been required to be martyred rather than deny a particular dogma even though that “former” dogma is now no longer even true. The false philosophy underlying modernism corrodes the mind but can be one of many reasons why various modernists are material heretics but not formal heretics. For us, though, it is better to err frequently through thinking well of a wicked man, than to err less frequently through having an evil opinion of a good man. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1.

A Superior who Punishes his Subordinate in the External Forum, for the Good of the Community, is not thereby Judging Rashly

Civil and ecclesiastical authorities cannot read the interior souls of their subordinates any more than parents can read the souls of their children. But because these authorities have a special duty to care for the community over which they have charge, they have a duty to punish the wrong-doing of their subordinates, for the good of the whole community.

Here is how St. Thomas explains this principle:

[J]ust as a law cannot be made save by public authority, so neither can a judgment be pronounced except by public authority, which extends over those who are subject to the community [i.e., subject to the particular public authority]. Wherefore, even as it would be unjust for one man to force another to observe a law that was not approved by public authority, so too it is unjust, if a man compels another to submit to a judgment that is pronounced by anyone other than the public authority.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.6, respondeo.

They must use their best efforts to administer justice, although they could be wrong in their particular judgments. God will judge them according to their efforts.

Thus, a civil judge has a duty to punish murderers (and other criminals), although it is possible for him to be mistaken in his judgment. The judge is judging outwardly, i.e., in the external forum. He must do the best he can, and judges based on the evidence in front of him.
Similarly, Church authorities have a duty to protect the community over which they have been placed, although they could be mistaken in their judgments. These authorities must punish persons who spread heresy even though these authorities could be mistaken, just as a civil judge could be mistaken. Among other punishments, a superior can separate from the flock (excommunicate) the person who spreads heresy. Of course, the easiest way for a superior to protect his flock, is often to try to convince the material heretic that he is wrong, rather than inflict punishment.
Here is how St. Pius X explains the duty of ecclesiastical superiors to judge in the external forum and punish their subordinates’ evil deeds, even though the subordinate might not be interiorly culpable for any sin:
Although they [the Modernists] express their astonishment that We should number them amongst the enemies of the Church, no one will be reasonably surprised that We should do so, if, leaving out of account the internal disposition of the soul, of which God alone is the Judge, he considers their doctrines, their manner of speech, and their actions [which are the outward, objective criteria upon which a man judges in the external forum].
Pascendi, St. Pope Pius X, §3 (emphasis and bracketed words added).
Thus, as St. Pius X explains, a superior might be mistaken about the internal disposition of the soul, of which God alone is the Judge but nonetheless, the superior must protect the community over which he has authority, by judging the outward conduct of wrong-doers under him (and punishing, where necessary).

Sedevacantism is Schism

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. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, respondeo. That is what sedevacantists do, viz., they refuse to submit to the current pope, asserting that he has no authority over them because he is not “really” the pope.
We should not confuse the sin of schism (which is refusing submission to the authority of the current pope), with the sin of heresy, viz., rejecting as a matter of principle the authority possessed by the papal office (e.g., that a pope is infallible when speaking ex cathedra).

Here is how St. Thomas explains this distinction:

Heresy and schism are distinguished in respect of those things to which each is opposed essentially and directly. For heresy is essentially opposed to faith, while schism is essentially opposed to the unity of ecclesiastical charity. Wherefore, just as faith and charity are different virtues, although whoever lacks faith lacks charity, so too schism and heresy are different vices, although whoever is a heretic is also a schismatic, but not conversely. This is what Jerome says in his commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians: I consider the difference between schism and heresy to be that heresy holds false doctrine while schism severs a man from the Church.

Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, ad 3.

In contrast to the course taken by sedevacantists, traditional Catholics have a duty to recognize that the current pope has authority over us. Even though we frequently cannot do what the pope commands us, we must acknowledge his supremacy, as St. Thomas teaches we must. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, Respondeo. We do what the pope commands us to do, if we can do so in good conscience. Thus, for example, if Pope Francis commanded 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.

Incidentally, Pope Francis professes to recite 15 decades per day.

Thus, schism severs a man from the Church. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, ad 3 (quoting St. Jerome). But when a man holds this false position that we have no pope, he does so either culpably (i.e., he “knows better”) or it is an innocent error. If the sedevacantist is blameless for his error, then he has no interior culpability (no sin on his soul), like the man who commits the objective act of theft by innocently (although wrongfully) taking someone else’s umbrella.
So sedevacantism is always an act of schism. But it is material schism only, if the particular sedevacantist is not interiorly culpable for his false opinion that we have no pope. By contrast, the sedevacantist is a formal schismatic, if he has interior culpability because he truly “knows better”. This distinction (between material and formal schism) is analogous to the distinction between material and formal heresy.
For the reasons set forth above (concerning the sin of rash judgment), we must not judge particular sedevacantists to be formal schismatics, unless they tell us they are schismatics (in which case, we would merely believe them). But, if we judge individual sedevacantists at all, we must judge them in the best possible light, even if we would err frequently through thinking well of them. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 1.

The Common Root of Schism and Rash Judgment, is not an Accident

As St. Thomas teaches, schism is a sin against charity. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.39, a.1, ad 3, (quoted above).
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, we fail to “do unto others”, as we would have them “do unto” us. Matt. 7:12. Thus, we are not loving and treating our neighbor as ourselves, as required by the Second Great Commandment. Matt. 22:39.
Further, our judgments should always be made with a habit of charity. Summa, Q.60, a.4, respondeo & a.2, ad 1. We must judge our neighbor (if at all) according to our goodwill toward him, ready to believe the best of him. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 2. For charity believeth all things. 1 Cor. 13: 7. Our Lord forbids judgment which proceeds not from benevolence but from bitterness of heart. Summa, Q.60, a.2, ad 1.
Although we do not judge the interior culpability of particular sedevacantists, it is not by chance that schism and rash judgment are both, at their root, sins against charity. This connection is no more by chance 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

A person could profess heresy but still be Catholic, if he were a material heretic only. We must not judge a man’s interior culpability. Therefore 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. We must judge in the most favorable light (if at all) the interior culpability of the pope or the 1.2 billion people who profess to be Catholic. We must not judge they are not “real” Catholics.
Thus, we must judge Pope Francis to be a material heretic, not a formal heretic, and that he is the pope. We must judge (if at all) that the 1.2 billion people who profess to be Catholic, are material heretics. Thus, their acceptance of Pope Francis is a further proof he is pope. See, section 4 above.
Finally, sedevacantists are in schism—material or formal—depending on whether they are culpable for their error.

6. Sedevacantism is Un-Catholic because it is Revolutionary

When someone in authority commands something evil, it is one thing to refuse to consent to that superior’s command, but it is a further step to use that evil command as a basis for rejecting the ruler’s authority as such. This further step is to revolt.
For example, the American revolutionaries considered it evil that King George III imposed taxes on them without their consent and did many other things to which they objected. But the American revolutionaries not only refused such commands of King George but also used the commands as a (purported) justification for revolution.
In their Declaration of Independence, the revolutionaries objected to many things such as their king quartering large bodies of armed troops among us; imposing taxes on us without our consent; and depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury.
After listing their grievances, the American revolutionaries then did what all revolutionaries do: they said that their ruler was to blame for their own revolution because his conduct caused him to lose his status as their king. The American revolutionaries declared that King George III whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
The American revolutionaries then did something else which revolutionaries always do: they declared that it was their right (or duty) to revolt:
[W]hen a long train of abuses and usurpations … evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is [the colonies’] right, it is their duty, to throw off such government.
Finally, the American revolutionaries did more that revolutionaries always do: they declared that their ruler has lost all authority over them:
[T]hese United Colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved.
This is what it is for a person to be a revolutionary: to reject not just particular (perhaps evil) commands but to also reject the very authority of his ruler.
The American revolutionaries followed the same pattern as countless other revolutionaries, e.g., in France, Russia, Latin America, and by the Protestant revolutionaries. In all human history—civil as well as religious—there is not even one revolution which the Catholic Church recognizes to have been praiseworthy and not sinful.

Generally, political revolt is called by the name “sedition” and revolt against the Church, by the name “schism”. But at the root of all such revolts, there is the same “non serviam!” which echoes that of Satan, the father of all revolutionaries.
In summary, revolutionaries follow a common pattern:
  1. they assert that their ruler committed wrongs (actual or merely imagined); and then
  2. they use such wrongs as a basis to declare that their ruler’s own conduct has resulted in his losing his authority to rule them.

The Cristeros were Not Revolutionaries

On a superficial level, a person might have the false impression that the Mexican Cristeros were revolutionaries because they took up arms against their government. But the Cristeros’ goal was to defend their priests, their churches and the Catholicism of their families. The Cristeros resisted the many wrongs committed by their anti-Catholic government. But unlike revolutionaries, the Cristeros did not use such wrongs as a basis to declare that their government had lost all authority over them.

Sedevacantists are Revolutionaries

Unlike the Cristeros, sedevacantists are revolutionaries. Sedevacantists correctly recognize that the pope has committed many wrongs. Instead of resisting only the wrongs committed by the pope, they follow the pattern of other revolutionaries by using these wrongs as a basis for rejecting the pope’s authority as such. Like other revolutionaries, they blame the pope for their own revolt, saying that his words and actions have caused him to lose his authority over them.
Some sedevacantists vainly attempt to avoid their status as revolutionaries, by saying they are not revolting against any ruler (the pope) because his conduct makes him not their real ruler (pope). But they fail to see how they beg the question, just like any American revolutionaries who might have said they are not revolting against their ruler (King George) because his conduct makes him not their real ruler. Such circular “reasoning” merely assumes their conclusion as a premise for their “argument” that they are not revolutionaries. In other words, they claim that they do not deny the authority of the ruler over them because they deny he has the authority of the ruler over them.
Of course, the Church is several rulers (popes) past the beginning of the sedevacantist revolution. Having revolted against Pope John XXIII, sedevacantists now take as a “matter of course” the rejection of the current pope’s authority, just as the American Revolutionaries took as a “matter of course” that King George III’s successors had no authority over them.
A person might wrongly believe that sedevacantists are not revolutionaries, based on the superficial supposition that revolution must involve physical fighting. But what is essential to revolution is for persons to declare that their ruler has lost his authority to rule them. A revolution need not involve physical fighting. For example, the Hawaiian Revolution of 1893 did not involve any physical fighting. Likewise, any physical fighting was not essential to the Protestant Revolution against the Catholic Church.
Also, a person might wrongly believe sedevacantism is not revolutionary, based on the superficial supposition that revolution must involve deposing a ruler from his throne or office. However, what is essential to revolution is the rejection of a ruler’s authority, but this might pertain to only certain persons or places. For example, in the American Revolution, the colonists did not cause King George III to lose his throne entirely. They succeeded merely in revolting against his authority in the thirteen American colonies. Similarly, the Protestant Revolution did not depose the pope from his throne but the Protestant revolutionaries merely rejected his authority among certain persons or places.

Revolution is Always Wrong

It is un-Catholic to be a revolutionary. All authority comes from God, regardless of the method by which a ruler is chosen to wield civil or religious power. St. Paul taught:
[T]here is no power but from God: and those [powers] that are, are ordained of God. Therefore he that resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God. And they that resist, purchase to themselves damnation. … For [the ruler] is God’s minister. … Wherefore be subject of necessity, not only for [the ruler’s] wrath, but also for conscience’s sake.
Romans, 13:1-2, 4-5 (emphasis added).
Pope Pius IX faithfully echoed St. Paul:
[A]ll authority comes from God. Whoever resists authority resists the ordering made by God Himself, consequently achieving his own condemnation; disobeying authority is always sinful except when an order is given which is opposed to the laws of God and the Church.
Qui Pluribus, November 9, 1846, §22.
Pope Pius IX taught this same doctrine in his infallible condemnation of the following proposition:

It is permissible to refuse obedience to legitimate rulers, and even to revolt against them.

Quanta Cura, proposition #63 (emphasis added).

Pope Pius IX used his ex cathedra (infallible) authority to condemn this error as part of a list of errors contained in the syllabus of Quanta Cura. Regarding these condemnations, the pope said:

We, truly mindful of Our Apostolic duty, and especially solicitous about our most holy religion, about sound doctrine and the salvation of souls divinely entrusted to Us, and about the good of human society itself, have decided to lift our voice again. And so all and each evil opinion and doctrine individually mentioned in this letter, by Our Apostolic authority We reject, proscribe and condemn; and We wish and command that they be considered as absolutely rejected, proscribed and condemned by all the sons of the Catholic Church.

Thus, Pope Pius IX’s condemnation fulfills the conditions for infallibility set out in Vatican I’s document, Pastor Aeternus, because the pope was: 1) carrying out his duty as pastor and teacher of all Christians; 2) in accordance with his supreme apostolic authority; 3) on a matter of faith or morals; 4) to be held by the universal Church.

Pope Leo XIII taught the same doctrine as St. Paul and Pope Pius IX:
If, however, it should ever happen that public power is exercised by rulers rashly and beyond measure, the doctrine of the Catholic Church does not permit rising up against them on one’s own terms, lest quiet and order be more and more disturbed, or lest society receive greater harm therefrom.
Encyclical, Quod Apostolici muneris, December 28, 1878, §7 (emphasis added).
Because it is sinful to even willfully desire to sin, Pope Leo XIII taught that even the “desire for revolution” is a “vice”. Auspicato Concessu, §24.
Although revolution is forbidden, Pope Leo XIII gave us the remedies of patience, prayer and resistance to the particular evil commands of a bad ruler:
Whenever matters have come to such a pass that no other hope of a solution is evident, [the doctrine of the Catholic Church] teaches that a remedy is to be hastened through the merits of Christian patience, and by urgent prayers to God.
But if the decisions of legislators and rulers should sanction or order something that is contrary to divine and natural law, the dignity and duty of the Christian name and the opinion of the apostles urge that we ought to obey God, rather than men (Acts 5:29).
Quod Apostolici muneris, December 28, 1878, §7 (bracketed words added).
St. Thomas offers the same remedy to persons who suffer the evil of a bad ruler:
[S]ometimes God permits evil rulers to afflict good men. This affliction is for the good of such good men, as St. Paul says above (Rom. 8:28): All things work for the good, for those who love God.
Commentary on Romans, ch.13, lect.1.

The Example of the Saints shows Revolution is Wrong

Look at the example of Catholics, including great saints like St. Sebastian, who served bravely and faithfully even in the army of the pagan emperors of Rome. They did not revolt, even when their emperor openly sought to kill all Catholics.
Here is Pope Gregory XVI’s praise for the Catholics of the Roman Empire, who were faithful to God first but also to their emperor (whenever the emperor’s commands were not themselves evil):
[T]he early Christians … deserved well of the emperors and of the safety of the state even while persecution raged. This they proved splendidly by their fidelity in performing perfectly and promptly whatever they were commanded which was not opposed to their religion, and even more by their constancy and the shedding of their blood in battle. Christian soldiers, says St. Augustine, served an infidel emperor. When the issue of Christ was raised, they acknowledged no one but the One who is in heaven. They distinguished the eternal Lord from the temporal lord, but were also subject to the temporal lord for the sake of the eternal Lord.
St. Mauritius, the unconquered martyr and leader of the Theban legion had this in mind when, as St. Eucharius reports, he answered the emperor in these words: We are your soldiers, Emperor, but also servants of God, and this we confess freely . . . and now this final necessity of life has not driven us into rebellion. …
Indeed the faith of the early Christians shines more brightly, if we consider with Tertullian, that since the Christians were not lacking in numbers and in troops, they could have acted as foreign enemies. We are but of yesterday, he says, yet we have filled all your cities, islands, fortresses, municipalities, assembly places, the camps themselves, the tribes, the divisions, the palace, the senate, the forum. … For what war should we not have been fit and ready even if unequal in forces—we who are so glad to be cut to pieces—were it not, of course, that in our doctrine we would have been permitted more to be killed rather than to kill? … [Y]ou have fewer enemies because of the multitude of Christians.
These beautiful examples of the unchanging subjection to the rulers necessarily proceeded from the most holy precepts of the Christian religion.
Encyclical Mirari Vos, August 15, 1832, §§ 18-19 (emphasis added), quoting and relying on the teaching of St. Augustine (Doctor and Father of the Church), as well as St. Mauritius and Tertullian (Father of the Church).

Prohibition against All Revolution, Especially Forbids Rebellion against the Pope’s Authority as such

Since the Catholic Church’s ruler, above all others, has authority from God, the sin of revolution most especially applies to revolt against the pope’s authority, as such.
Thus, St. Robert Bellarmine explains that it is licit to resist the Pontiff who … tries to destroy the Church. I say that it is licit to resist him by not doing what he orders and by impeding the execution of his will; it is not licit, however, to judge him, to punish him, or depose him, for these are acts proper to a superior. De Summo pontifice Book II, ch. 29 (emphasis added).

Sedevacantism is an Oversimplification

Addis & Arnold characterize the traits of revolutionaries in this way:
The methods of the Gospel are not revolutionary; they do not deal in those sweeping general assertions which fuller experience always shows to be but half truths.
A Catholic Dictionary, Addis & Arnold, The Catholic Publication Society, New York, 1884, pp.767-68 (emphasis added).
The sedevacantist exhibits such revolutionary traits. He “leaps” from the truth that the pope has done much evil, to the declaration that we have no pope. Thus, the sedevacantist oversimplifies the truth through sweeping general assertion and half-truth about his ruler.

Conclusion

Without judging sedevacantists’ interior culpability, it is nonetheless plain that sedevacantists follow the objectively sinful pattern of revolutionaries. They assert that the wrongs committed by their ruler are (purported) justification for declaring their ruler has lost his authority to rule them.

7. Our Catholic Duty: Resist the Harm Done by a Bad Pope But (Of Course) Recognize His Authority

Two different mortal sins prevent an informed Catholic from being a sedevacantist:
  1. If we rashly judge the pope to be a formal heretic because he is a material heretic, this is a mortal sin (because it is the sin of rash judgment on a grave matter). See, Section 5 above.
  2. If we revolt against the pope’s authority as such, this is a mortal sin of revolution. See, Section 6 above.
Therefore, because Catholics must neither be rash-judgers nor revolutionaries, we must recognize the authority of the pope who is in the Vatican.

Although Recognizing the Pope’s Authority, We must also Recognize His Evil Conduct

When judging a person’s interior culpability, it must be done (if at all) in the most favorable light. By contrast, we judge a person’s statements and actions objectively and we must resist objective evil and error, however blameless its proponent might be. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.60, a.4, ad 2.
Thus, we assume the best (if we assume anything) about the pope’s interior, subjective culpability, but we also must recognize that the current pope’s words and deeds are often objectively evil.

True Obedience is Subordinate to Faith and Must Conform to Faith

The virtue of obedience is a subordinate virtue under the Cardinal Virtue of Justice. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.104. a2. Faith and Charity are superior. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.4 a.7 sed cont. & ad 3; IIa IIae, Q.23 a.6.
Because obedience is subordinate to Faith, the Apostles told the Jews that we ought to obey God, rather than men. Acts, 5:29.
Pope Leo XIII faithfully echoed the Apostles in teaching this truth:
[W]here a law is enacted contrary to reason, or to the eternal law, or to some ordinance of God, obedience is unlawful, lest, while obeying man, we become disobedient to God.
Libertas Praestantissimum, §§ 11 & 13.
For this reason, anyone who obeys the sinful command of his superior, commits the sin of disobedience to God’s law. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.33, a.7, ad.5 (…ipse peccaret praecipiens, et ei obediens, quasi contra praeceptum Domini agens…).

But What Should We Do, While the Pope Harms the Church (in Her Human Element)?

When a superior (e.g., the pope) commands that we do something wrong (including the instruction to believe something false), the Catholic response is: We resist! This is why Pope St. Gregory the Great taught:
Know that evil ought never to be done through obedience, though sometimes something good, which is being done, ought to be discontinued out of obedience.
De Moral., bk. XXXV, §29 (emphasis added).
When we resist a superior’s sinful conduct (or command), we do not thereby reject the superior’s authority as such, but only his evil conduct (or command). St. Thomas made this crucial distinction when he discussed St. Paul resisting St. Peter, the first pope, to his face. Galatians, 2:11. St. Thomas explained that the Apostle opposed Peter in the exercise of authority, not in his authority of ruling. Super Epistulas S. Pauli, Ad Galatas, ch.2 lectio III (emphasis added).

The Duty to Resist a Pope’s Abuse of Authority, Pertains to Matters of Faith and Morals as well

The principle of resisting any superior’s evil command, applies to any evil command—whether to do something, to say something or to believe something.
Thus, a pope might command us to believe his errors on matters of Faith. The pope can make such errors whenever he is not speaking ex cathedra. The First Vatican Council carefully listed the conditions for papal infallibility, because only when the pope fulfills all of the conditions, is he infallibly prevented from erring on matters of Faith or morals. At any other time, the pope might err on those matters, triggering a Catholic’s duty to resist the error.
In A Catholic Dictionary, Addis & Arnold explain:
Even when he [viz., the pope] speaks with Apostolic Authority [which is only one of the conditions for papal infallibility], he may err. The Vatican Council only requires us to believe that God protects him from error in definitions on faith or morals when he imposes a belief on the Universal Church.
A Catholic Dictionary, under the topic “Pope”, Addis & Arnold, The Catholic Publication Society, New York, 1884, pp.767-68 (bracketed comments added).
St. Thomas Aquinas teaches that, when St. Paul resisted St. Peter to the face [Galatians, 2:11], the impending danger of scandal St. Peter caused, was with respect to the Faith. Summa, IIa IIae, Q.33, a.4, ad 2.
Pope Paul IV tells us we are right to resist the pope whenever he deviates from the Faith:
[T]he Roman Pontiff, who is the representative upon earth of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, who holds the fullness of power over peoples and kingdoms, who may judge all and be judged by none in this world, may nonetheless be contradicted if he be found to have deviated from the Faith.
Cum Ex Apostolatus Officio, §1 (emphasis added).
Likewise, St. Robert Bellarmine assures us that we are right to resist a pope who uses his office to attack souls (whether through false doctrine or bad morals):
Just as it is licit to resist a Pontiff who attacks the body, so also is it licit to resist him who attacks souls or destroys the civil order or above all, tries to destroy the Church. I say that it is licit to resist him by not doing what he orders and by impeding the execution of his will. It is not licit, however, to judge, to punish, or to depose him, for these are acts proper to a superior.
De Romano Pontifice, St. Robert Bellarmine, Bk.2, ch.29 (emphasis added).
St. Thomas explains the reason for this distinction St. Robert Bellarmine makes, viz., that we are right to resist (correct) the pope or other superior, but we cannot punish or depose him:
A subordinate is not competent to administer to his prelate the correction which is an act of justice through the coercive nature of punishment. But the fraternal correction which is an act of charity is within the competency of everyone in respect of any person towards whom he is bound by charity, provided there be something in that person which requires correction.
Summa, IIa IIae, Q.33, a. 4, respondeo.
Juan Cardinal de Torquemada (revered medieval theologian responsible for the formulation of the doctrines that were defined at the Council of Florence) teaches:
It is necessary to obey God rather than men. Therefore, where the Pope would command something contrary to Sacred Scripture, or to an article of Faith, or to the truth of the Sacraments, or to a command of the Natural Law or of the Divine Law, he ought not to be obeyed, but such command ought to be despised.
Summa de Ecclesia, bk.2, ch.49, p.163B.

Conclusion

Because Catholics must not be rash-judgers or revolutionaries, we recognize the authority of the pope. But because we must obey God rather than men when they abuse their authority, we must resist a bad pope when he does harm.

8. Judging the Pope’s Words & Deeds According to Catholic Tradition

It is (objectively) a mortal sin of rash judgment for a person to decide that the pope is a formal heretic. See Section 5 above. It is (objectively) a mortal sin of revolution for a person to declare the pope has lost his authority as such. See Section 6 above.
On the other hand, it is also clear that we have a duty to resist the pope’s errors and the harm he causes. See Section 7 above.
However, we are not Church Doctors or popes. How do we know what is true (and what to believe), unless we simply believe whatever the pope teaches us? But on the other hand, if we do not decide for ourselves what to believe, then how do we know when we have a duty to resist what the pope says or does?
One false argument many sedevacantists use, is to present the following false alternatives:
  • Either you must deny the authority of the pope in the Vatican (as they do);

  • Or you must accept everything he does and says. Because (these sedevacantists say), if he were pope and you pick and choose what you accept from him, then (they say) it shows you have a protestant mentality (of picking and choosing).
This sedevacantist “argument” relies on a false understanding of papal infallibility.

The pope’s ex cathedra infallibility

We know the pope’s words are infallible (viz., from the very fact that he utters them), only when he speaks ex cathedra, that is, when:

  1. in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians,
  2. in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority,
  3. he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals,
  4. to be held by the whole church.
Dogmatic definition quoted from Vatican I, Session 4, ch.4. (We will treat elsewhere concerning the teachings of a Church Council.)
Here is an example of Pope Pius IX speaking ex cathedra, fulfilling these conditions, in Quanta Cura (with its syllabus of errors):

We, truly mindful of Our Apostolic duty, and especially solicitous about our most holy religion, about sound doctrine and the salvation of souls divinely entrusted to Us, and about the good of human society itself, have decided to lift our voice again. And so all and each evil opinion and doctrine individually mentioned in this letter, by Our Apostolic authority, We reject, proscribe and condemn; and We wish and command that they be considered as absolutely rejected, proscribed and condemned by all the sons of the Catholic Church.

The post-conciliar popes have taught nothing false which fulfills these rigid conditions for ex cathedra infallibility.

Popes can err in all other teachings

Popes can err in any other teachings, unless those teachings are themselves a faithful repetition of truth contained in infallible Catholic Tradition. No pope (or anyone else) can err when faithfully repeating the teachings of Catholic Tradition.
But popes cannot teach any new doctrine infallibly. As the First Vatican Council declared: the Holy Ghost was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by His revelation, make known some new doctrine. Vatican I, Session 4, ch.4 (emphasis added).

We must measure all doctrine according to its fidelity to Catholic Tradition

Catholic catechisms distinguish between the pope’s infallible and non-infallible teachings because infallible teachings cannot conflict with the Catholic Faith (but rather, are part of it), whereas non-infallible teachings might conflict with the Catholic Faith. This distinction warns Catholics to accept all infallible teachings without possibility of error, but to accept the non-infallible ones only provided that they do not conflict with Catholic Tradition, i.e., the consistent teachings of the Catholic Church through the ages.
This distinction (between the pope’s infallible and non-infallible teachings) also shows that Catholics must both understand their Faith and measure other teachings against that standard (viz., infallible Catholic Tradition).
This is why St. Paul instructed his flock to hold fast to the traditions which you have learned, whether by word, or by our epistle. 2 Thess., 2:14. St. Paul is telling Catholics to measure all doctrine according to Catholic Tradition.
St. Paul further warned his flock to reject all new or different doctrines, which do not fit with the Tradition he taught them: If anyone preach to you a gospel, besides that which you have received, let him be anathema. Galatians, 1:9.
In the year 434, St. Vincent Lerins, gave this same rule to all Catholics: viz., to adhere to Catholic Tradition and reject what is contrary:

[I]n the Catholic Church itself, all possible care must be taken, that we hold that faith which has been believed everywhere, always, by all. For that is truly and in the strictest sense “Catholic” …. [I]f some new contagion were to try to poison no longer a small part of the Church, but all of the Church at the same time, then [a Catholic] will take the greatest care to attach himself to antiquity which, obviously, can no longer be seduced by any lying novelty.

Commonitorium, ch. 2 & 3 (emphasis added).

St. Athanasius, Doctor of the Church and Patriarch of Alexandria, told his flock that faithful adherence to Tradition shows who is Catholic: Even if Catholics faithful to Tradition are reduced to a handful, they are the ones who are the true Church of Jesus Christ. St. Athanasius’ letter to his flock (emphasis added).
This Catholic duty to judge all doctrines according to Catholic Tradition, is described in Liberalism is a Sin:

[B]y use of their reason[,] the faithful are enabled to suspect and measure the orthodoxy of any new doctrine presented to them, by comparing it with a doctrine already defined. If it be not in accord, … they can lawfully hold it as perverse and declare it such, warn others against it, raise the cry of alarm and strike the first blow against it. The faithful layman can do all this, and has done it at all times, with the applause of the Church.

Liberalism is a Sin, by Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany, 1886, ch.32.

Not only does the Church instruct us to measure new doctrines according to Catholic Tradition, but even the way God made the human mind requires this measurement. When we understand a truth of our Faith, we understand there is a connection between the particular subject and predicate which form that truth. For example, we understand that our Faith teaches us there is the link between “God” and “omnipotent”, so that we profess that “God is omnipotent”. For this reason, we know the opposite statement (i.e., de-linking this subject and predicate) must be false, viz., that “God is not omnipotent”.
If a person wrongly supposes that a Catholic is forbidden to compare current conciliar teachings, with Catholic Tradition, this position would forbid a Catholic from understanding what he is saying (and believing) when he is professing his Faith. (In the above example, it would forbid a Catholic from noting that “God is omnipotent” is the opposite of “God is not omnipotent”.) Similarly, by knowing what the Church has always taught and knowing the conciliar church’s teaching, a Catholic cannot help but notice these teachings are often opposites.
To say that a Catholic is forbidden to notice this opposition would be simply to say that Catholics are forbidden to understand, and must simply memorize the sounds of words without understanding their meaning. In other words, Catholic Tradition judges the conciliar church’s teachings. Faithful Catholics merely notice this fact.
In contrast to our duty to measure all doctrines according to Catholic Tradition, Protestants wrongly set their own private judgment as the measure and rule of all faith. So a Protestant chooses what he wants to believe (i.e., either the new or the old teaching). But God chooses what Catholics must believe (Catholic Tradition) and we must measure everything according to this standard.

Catholics do not have a “cut off” date, after which they ignore papal teaching.

Because sedevacantists deny the post-conciliar popes’ authority as such, they ignore all papal words and deeds after the “cut off” date they choose based on when they (wrongly) decide that the Church last had a pope. Beginning on that date, they ignore what the pope says, regardless of what he says. This sedevacantists’ attitude is what makes them schismatic (at least materially). See Section 6 above.
The post-conciliar popes—like all popes—have the duty to teach the Faith. If the present pope were to teach doctrine with all of the conditions of ex cathedra infallibility (as set forth in Vatican I), then this teaching would be infallible.
Further, if a post-conciliar pope teaches without fulfilling the conditions for ex cathedra infallibility, then what he teaches might be wrong. Traditional Catholics would have to carefully consider what the pope taught, to measure the pope’s teaching according to Catholic Tradition. So Traditional Catholics (unlike sedevacantists) do not have a “cut off” date for papal teachings, after which they automatically ignore such teachings.
It is true that traditional Catholics approach a post-conciliar pope’s teaching with much greater wariness than they do the teaching of Pope St. Pius X. There is good reason for this wariness. It is not that a post-conciliar pope is not pope. But faithful Catholics approach his teachings warily, like a child would approach his own father who in the past has attempted to lead the child into sin. The father has not ceased to be the child’s father (with a father’s authority), but it is good and reasonable for the child to be more wary about his father who has attempted to lead the child into sin in the past, as compared to the lack of such reserve in the child who has a saintly father.
So a true Catholic does not refuse submission to the pope’s authority but must refuse to “obey” the pope’s abuse of his authority. If the pope is bad enough, it might appear that there is hardly anything in which the pope should be obeyed. In this way, there might be the superficial appearance that faithful Catholics and sedevacantists have the same position. But this appearance is wrong. Faithful Catholics do not forget the pope is their superior, even when they cannot follow what he teaches or does. By contrast, sedevacantists revolt against the pope’s authority as such, judge his interior culpability, and declare he is not Christ’s vicar. This contrast is the difference between Catholicism on the one hand, and revolution and (at least material) schism on the other hand.
We Catholics (and that child, in the above example) must hold ourselves ready to obey our superior whenever we can. So, e.g., if the bad father told the child to add an extra Hail Mary to his night prayers, the child must obey. Likewise, if a post-conciliar pope told us to begin abstaining from meat on an additional day of the week (e.g., Wednesday), we would have to obey.

Conclusion

Catholics must measure the pope’s words and deeds against the standard of Catholic Tradition. We must accept what conforms to Tradition and reject what conflicts with Tradition. Thus, sedevacantists are wrong that, just because Catholics recognize the authority of the pope, we must accept everything he says and does.

9. An Example of a Pope Teaching Heresy Before His Election and During His Reign

We know that it is (objectively) a mortal sin of rash judgment for a person to decide that the pope is a formal heretic (and thus is no longer the pope). See, Section 5 above. But although we recognize the pope’s authority, we know that we have a duty to resist his errors and the harm he causes. See, Section 7 above. We know it is possible for a pope to teach heresy if he is not speaking ex cathedra. (This is the whole reason Vatican I listed the conditions for the pope’s ex cathedra infallibility because, by fulfillment of those conditions, Catholics know that a particular papal teaching must be true and cannot be heresy.)
But a person could wonder if any pope before Vatican II ever really denied a doctrine of the Catholic Faith and publicly taught heresy—or had such possibility merely been theoretical? If such a pre-Vatican II pope did publicly teach heresy, then did that pope remain pope or did he somehow lose his papal office by teaching heresy? The answer is that prior popes have publicly taught heresy and did retain their papal office. The case of Pope John XXII (1316-34) is a useful example.
It is a dogma of the Catholic Faith that the saints see the Beatific Vision immediately after they die (and after they have been purged in Purgatory, if necessary). Council of Florence, Pope Eugene IV, Bull Laetentur coeli, 1439; Pope Benedict XII Benedictus Deus, 1336, Denz. #530-531.
Pope John XXII lived before this dogma was defined by the Church’s Extraordinary Magisterium. He publicly denied that the saints immediately see the Beatific Vision after they die, i.e., before the General Judgment. Catholic Encyclopedia, entry: “Pope John XXII”.

Before Pope John XXII became pope, he wrote a book publicly denying this doctrine of the Catholic Faith (viz., that the saints see the Beatific Vision immediately after they die (and after they have been purged in Purgatory, if necessary). Id. Instead, he taught the opposite heresy. Id. Yet both before and after this doctrine was defined, the Church has always recognized the validity of Pope John XXII’s election as pope. Id.; see also, the Annuario Pontificio editions 1939, 1942 & 1959. In other words, his public teaching of this heresy did not prevent his election as pope.
During Pope John XXII’s papal reign, he caused a great commotion by denying this same doctrine of the Catholic Faith on several occasions and again publicly teaching the opposite heresy. Catholic Encyclopedia, entry: “Pope John XXII”. Yet he reigned as pope until his death. Id.; see also, the Annuario Pontificio editions 1939, 1942 & 1959.
We know that any dogma which was defined by the Church’s Extraordinary Magisterium was already true and was always a doctrine of the Faith, even before the dogma was defined. In other words, the Church’s extraordinary definition does not “make” a doctrine true (and part of the Faith).
An extraordinary definition of a doctrine of Faith merely gives certitude to anyone in doubt concerning a truth which was already a doctrine of the Catholic Faith. This is why the First Vatican Council declared: the Holy Ghost was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by His revelation, make known some new doctrine. Vatican I, Session 4, ch.4 (emphasis added).
Thus, we know that the dogma Pope John XXII denied was always true and was a doctrine of the Faith at the time he denied this doctrine.
When the Church gives an extraordinary definition of a truth of Faith, the doctrine is not thereby made “more true” than it was before then. However, it is less likely that Catholics (including the pope) could deny the doctrine without knowing they are denying something they are required to believe in order to be Catholic. The Church’s extraordinary definition of a dogma gives Catholic teachers a strong tool to convince doubters and gives ecclesiastical superiors a powerful tool to judge in the external forum whether it is likely they will succeed in correcting a subordinate who denies the particular doctrine of the Faith. See, Section 5 above.
However, a Catholic might possibly deny a dogma (defined by the Church) without becoming a formal heretic. For example, suppose this Catholic denies the doctrine because he has the philosophical confusion causing him to believe that truth changes and that the dogma had been true but is no longer true. This is the error Pope St. Pius X ascribes to modernists. Id.
As shown in Section 5 above, we must judge things and statements objectively without giving any “benefit of the doubt”. Id. Thus, in the case of Pope John XXII, we judge his error objectively and know he taught heresy and denied a doctrine which has always been part of the Catholic Faith.
But we would commit the sin of rash judgment if we judge that Pope John XXII is subjectively (i.e., interiorly) culpable for teaching this heresy and conclude that Pope John XXII “knew better” and had the sin of heresy on his soul. Id. To avoid rash judgment, we must judge his subjective (i.e., interior) culpability for teaching heresy in the best possible light (if we judge his culpability at all) and so we do not conclude that he was a formal heretic and that he ceased to be Catholic and ceased to be pope. Id. In fact, despite publicly promoting heresy, the Church identifies him as the pope reigning from 1316 till his death in 1334. See, the Annuario Pontificio editions 1939, 1942 & 1959.
In other words, we should say about Pope John XXII what the Catholic Encyclopedia says about Pope Honorius (a different pope who committed serious doctrinal error): He was a heretic, not in intention [i.e., knowingly, subjectively or formally], but in fact [i.e., objectively and materially]. Catholic Encyclopedia, article: “Pope Honorius” (bracketed comments added).
As scandalous as it was for Pope John XXII to publicly teach heresy, he was elected pope and reigned as pope while professing this heresy. In contrast to what is really known about Pope John XXII, if (hypothetically) he had actually known that the doctrine he denied was one he was required to believe in order to be Catholic, then his denial would have caused him to cease to be Catholic. See, Section 5 above.
But Pope John XXII never admitted that he denied a doctrine he knew he was required to believe in order to be Catholic. So if we judge him at all, we judge he was pope and was a material heretic (and not a formal heretic). Id.
Likewise, the post-conciliar popes have never admitted that they denied any doctrine that they knew they were required to believe at that time in order to be Catholic. So if we judge them at all, we judge that each was pope in his turn and not a formal heretic.

10. A Man Need not be Consecrated a Bishop or Ordained a Priest to be a Valid Pope

An Explanation How the Catholic Church Continues to Possess A Full Hierarchy even in these Times of Great Apostasy Against the Sedevacantist Argument that only a Valid Bishop Can Be Pope because He is Bishop of Rome