Bishop Guérard des Lauriers proposed a 'thesis' to explain the crisis and why the post-conciliar claimants were not true popes. Fr Belmont's approach may differ from what you have heard elsewhere.
I'm one of the "simplists" Father refers to who considered the term "papa materialiter" nonsensical based on the universal inviolable metaphysical principle that it is form that gives existence, and matter cannot exist without form. The argument is this: Since authority is an essential part in the pope, as pope, in sensu reduplicativo, just as the soul is an essential part in man (contrary to Bp Sanborn's response to the objection that authority is accidental, he mixing it up with the pope, as man, in sensu specificativo), "papa" cannot be rightly predicated of Novus Ordo popes if they do not have authority, the form. For predicating in the concrete presupposes existence, and form, and any adverbial or adjectival qualifications are only modes of being.
I realise the "simplist's" objection is apt for the term "papa materialis" not "papa materialiter" ... I now concede as tenable, the term "papa materialiter" in the sense that Novus Ordo Popes, as the Thesis proponents explain, are more than merely pope-elects but have the addition of de facto possession of the office. Fr Hermont brilliantly qualifies that as a potential, not juridical, title, in the case of Novus Ordo Pope Francis.
However, I deny several principles upon which the Thesis is based and conclusions that follow from them.
...
1. Abstracting from the novelty of the principle of not receiving authority due to incompatible habitual intention, there's no precedent in Moral or Dogmatic Theology nor in Canon Law for judging validity based on habitual intention rather than a real actual personal intention which is only presumed present based on effects of the habitual intention. In Dogmatic and Moral Theology on the Scaraments, the intention referred to is definitely personal, and presumed present based on circumstances. Usually an explicit contrary intention is required to dissolve valid presumption, and not even the state of heresy is enough!
...
...
2. Even if we concede the absence of a supposedly required habitual intention, without a definitive judgment by the Church, there's no principle by which every Catholic today is obliged to conclude on its absence and consequent absence of papal authority. The Thesis, at best, leads to conceding the papacy de jure to the Novus Ordo popes and only gives justification to Catholics to licitly dissent from the authority based on weighty grounds of conscience. It provides no basis to conclude, at many proponents of the Thesis do, that the SSPX priest sins by saying a Mass in which the Novus Ordo popes are mentioned as popes, for they act correctly, if the Thesis is correct.
I like the argument Fr Dutertre makes - he's a proponent of the Thesis. Arguing loss of office from personal heresy, even though public or manifest, without ecclesiastical sentence, turns the Church into a mob where any small group of faithful can walk out on the parish priest during a sermon after declaring him a heretic and no longer parish priest due to loss of office. Some sedevacantists have even done worse, and applied the principle of loss of office by personal heresy without ecclesiastical sentence to pre-Vatican II Catholic popes.
But the Church's beautifully established juridical order cannot be reduced to such insanity. Fr Dutertre argues that if public/manifest heresy carries with it ipso facto loss of office like it does excommunication, Canon 2314 no. 2 would be nonsensical. This argument blew me away. Brilliant.
Fr Dutertre is incorrect about personal heresy. I'm sorry to hear that you were blown away by this argument - although no blown away enough to adopt the thesis itself.
This is precisely what I meant in the article though. Advocates like Fr Dutertre feel the need to rubbish and misrepresent perfectly good arguments in order to defend the thesis. As a result, people who don't know better accept their rubbishing and misrepresentation, whilst not being convinced by the arguments for their thesis. Their tactic keeps people recognising Bergoglio as pope.
Well, in addition, I found the sources Fr Dutertre provided very convincing, for proving, at least in some cases, including St Robert Bellarmine, that public/manifest heretic was understood to presuppose ecclesiastical determination as such.
Yes, but the trouble is, they're missing the point here.
Of course a declaration or ecclesiastical determination makes a persons heresy public "at least in some cases" as you say. But no-one was denying that.
Their argument is a failure of logic. It is obviously the case that someone suspected of heresy or who is a secret heretic doesn't become an open heretic until a declaration - *unless they themselves do something that makes it open.*
What we're denying - what they're claiming (marshalling faulty evidence) - is that the very notion of public or open heresy (and its concomitant effects) depends on a declaration. It doesn't. They're also making out that all heresy is occult or suspected until a declaration comes. It isn't.
Numerous canonists and theologians prior to the Roncalli Revolution held that Canon 188.4 applied ipso facto to a manifest, pertinatious heretic. In other words, the generally accepted position in the Church was that the manifest heresy was all the "declaration" needed. Any formal "declaration" was done to instruct the faithful that the individual was bad news.
This was the position of St. Francis de Sales, as well as St. Alphonsus Liguori as well.
Fr. Duterte referred me to a doctoral thesis in which the candidate argued that for 188.4 to apply, 1) the person had to formally leave the Church and formally enter a false sect, and 2) the Church had to recognize such an act...which is contrary to the statements of approved theologians on the matter..
This appears to be the foundational principle of sedeprivationism:
“The habitual intention to procure the good of the Church is a necessary condition (the ultimate disposition) for an elected pope to receive the communication of the pontifical authority, which makes him be with Jesus Christ, and hold the role of His Vicar on earth.”
Question: As I’ve never seen this intention mentioned anywhere amongst the criteria for valid popes, can someone point me toward a source which references this requirement?
It's novel, brilliant, yet does not logically provide the solution to preserving apostolicity of succession that has necessitated the novelty in the first place.
The whole beautiful edifice of the Thesis is destroyed by this objection:
Just as loss of office due to public/manifest personal heresy is not certain without at least an ecclesiastical sentence for heresy following Canon 2314 no. 2, certitude of absence of any required intention to obtain ecclesiastical authority requires ecclesiastical judgment and as such the consciences of all Catholics cannot be bound to make this conclusion. This makes Novus Ordo popes remain popes de jure and de facto, even if it's still possible they have no authority in reality.
Certitude of absence of authority does not require ecclesiastical judgment, because, in our case, if authority were admitted, at least two truths of faith would be denied: the indefectibility and the infallibility of the Church. All catholics are bound to the faith.
Fr Dutertre has said this, by the way. I strongly disagree with most of it. It badly mischaracterises the objection and those who make it, as well as the status of the thesis itself.
'The same distinction [matter and form in relation to the papacy] is accepted by St. Antoninus and Cardinal Cajetan. It is therefore false to claim, as many have done, that the Thesis is a novelty in applying these distinctions to the papacy.[1]
'Fn. 1. And even if, by hypothesis, no theologian had done it previously, this would not invalidate the Thesis merely for that reason. The science of theology has been developed over the centuries by theologians who have slowly deepened our understanding of the faith. Every step of this development, in that sense, could be accused of being a “novelty.” This attitude, found among some, of refusing to meditate upon and theologically analyze the present crisis is deeply alarming. It is contrary to the life of faith, which should permeate our whole life, and particularly our highest faculty, which is our intellect. Many Catholics want to find a “quote” from a previous theologian describing entirely our situation. There is none, other than the writings of Bishop Guérard des Lauriers. The present situation was never imagined even speculatively by any theologian prior to the Second Vatican Council. One should not therefore try to read the works of past theologians as if they were commenting on the present crisis in the Church. Such a reading would be to take them out of context. Rather, one should understand the universal principles perennially taught by the Church’s approved theologians, in order to apply them harmoniously to the present crisis. As Bp Guérard des Lauriers remarked: “Theology, at least sometimes, consists in thinking, and not merely in repeating.” In this presentation of the Thesis, however, we purposely make appeal to many approved theologians who have studied similar cases, to show that, if the Thesis cannot be entirely found, as a whole, in the speculations of past theologians, its principles, however, are common in traditional theology.'
Interesting. Concedes it is novel in a footnote after arguing it is not in the main body! Ha ha.
A principle as far-reaching as the impact of absence of a habitual intention in reception of ecclesiastical authority was never imagined by any Theologian in history even after so many simoniacal and nepotistic popes? Strange.
That was my impression. Seems like they’re trying to analogize a principle of sacramental theology (ie., formation of a contrary intention not to do what the Church does in the confection of a sacrament as an invalidating cause), and apply it to the pope question. That’s apples and oranges (like discussing the “validity” of conciliar canonizations).
I have read a few commentaries on heresy, which all revolve around the idea that "pertinacity" is clearly present when one persists in their heresy. You can tell one is pertinatious because they continue in their heresy. It's not really that hard.
The correct way to argue the sedevacantist position and avoid the pitfalls of the personal heresy argument is as proposed by Fr Okerulu:
1. The Novus Ordo Church that poses as the Catholic Church is a non-Catholic sect practising a new religion, based on the evil, erroneous, heretical and blasphemous doctrines and laws contained in Vatican II documents, catechisms, 1983 Code of Canon Law and their pronouncements in general.
2. Those who adhere to the Novus Ordo as members are therefore non-Catholics, having publicly defected from the Catholic Faith. They are no different from Anglicans and all protestants and schismatics.
3. Per Canon Law referenced below, Catholics who have publicly defected from the Faith, all non-Catholics, all members of non-Catholic sects, *EVEN WITHOUT ANY DECLARATION,* are unable to hold offices in the Catholic Church, or if previously holding offices, automatically lose such offices.
- Canon 188 no. 4
- Canon 2314 no. 3
4. This obliges all Catholics to ignore the entire Novus Ordo hierarchy as a non-Catholic hierarchy, and makes Masses in which their prelates are mentioned EQUIVALENT to Masses in which the schismatic patriarch of Constantinople or the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury is mentioned.
5. Traditional Catholic clergy do not require abjuration of converts from the Novus Ordo Church because the absence of ecclesiastical condemnation makes them enjoy the presumption in the juridical order of being deceived rather than formally heretical and adhering to a non-Catholic religion, just as the Church does not require abjuration of members of non-Catholic sects who have reached the age of reason to commit mortal sin but not reached the age of puberty based on presumption of lack of formal adherence. cf Canon 2230.
6. The Church does not maintain a directory of non-Catholic sects nor does she always condemn each one by name. She does not consider it necessary because non-Catholic sects are manifestly so, practising a different religion with different creeds and rites. She does not necessarily declare public defection by individuals but rules to the contrary: that a public defection or mere giving one's name to a non-Catholic sect is notorious in itself to confirm loss of office. Fr Okerulu brilliantly argues that ecclesiastical condemnation does not constitute a non-Catholic sect as such. Non-Catholic sects are constituted by their rejection of the Catholic Faith and institution of new doctrines and rites.
7. EVERY TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC by experience knows the Novus Ordo is a different religion with false doctrines irreverent rites. But it's truly an organisation, acting as a moral body and universally recognised as such. Its decrees and judgments are formal acts of this body, this moral union, this organisation, this sect. It cannot not be called an organisation and its formal acts proceed from it as operations of a moral being. This organisation CANNOT be the Roman Catholic Church! The SSPX and Thesis adherents do not emphasise this conclusion completely founded in reality ONLY BECAUSE they think admitting it impacts the Apostolicity of the Roman Catholic Church. It absolutely doesn't.
See Fr Okerulu's article here. I think it requires some refinement but find the three core conclusions incontrovertible.
With respect to the good Fr Okerulu, I can't agree with n. 2, at least without a better idea of what is meant by 'adhere to the Novus Ordo.' I think it will turn on the facts. In my opinion, there are Catholics and non-Catholics in the Novus Ordo milieu.
Once you concede no. 1, everything else follows! I think we are in agreement with the following explanation.
Objectively, everyone who publicly regularly attends the rites of a non-Catholic sect is legally presumed a member of that sect, unless there are separate initiation rites for membership. Regular attendance implies formal adherence to the tenets and practices of the sect. This is the presumption in Canon Law. As usual, presumption yields to facts (cf MacKenzie).
Applying the principles to the Anglican Church or the Novus Ordo Church, anyone who regularly attends their religious services is presumed by that fact alone, in law, to be a member of that sect and incurs all the penalties associated with the defection.
However, presumption yields to facts. In fact, many members of the Novus Ordo Church are there because they think that's the Roman Catholic Church. The deception and their inculpable ignorance are facts that make their defection not perfectly formal. As such, they do not incur the associated censures nor do they require abjuration.
Fr Okerulu argues this is the case for the lay members of the Novus Ordo sect. However, this does not apply to Novus Ordo clergy and prelates like Abp Vigano, for they cannot claim inculpable ignorance being the leaders charged with the duty of propagating the evil sect, and would therefore have incurred the censures per Canon Law and require an abjuration.
So, in summary, I think:
1. Conservative Novus Ordo Catholics, members of the FSSP, SSPX and similar groups are members of this non-Catholic sect, but usually materially only. They are usually guilty of other serious sins against faith, but not necessarily of public defection. These are the people that made you disagree with no. 2. They truly are non-Catholics in the objective order, probably Catholics subjectively speaking.
2. The members of the Novus Ordo hierarchy with pre-Vatican II seminary formation and valid orders who hold and teach the Novus Ordo religion are in public defection from the Catholic Faith simpliciter. These are the subject of this article. Being in public defection from the faith, juridical infamy is complete, no further ecclesiastical action is required. They are barred from holding offices in the Roman Catholic Church.
3. Canon Law itself miraculously has a solution for us!!! Future Catholics centuries after us will commend us for having acted without defiance of ecclesiastical discipline.
You have a footnote stating your doubts regarding the possibility of the apostolicity of the Church being wholly in potency, such that the Church would be rendered potentially apostolic.
1. There are two aspects to apostolicity: apostolicity of doctrine and apostolicity of succession. Apostolicity of doctrine remains preserved today, really and wholly. So even in the scenario of there being no bishops with ordinary jurisdiction, apostolicity as a mark of the Church remains fully active under one aspect and so the Church would still not be reduced to being merely potentially apostolic.
2. It's a fact today that there are no Roman Catholic bishops with ordinary jurisdiction. As such, that aspect of the mark of the Church, apostolicity of succession, is in fact, only in potency. How can an aspect of a mark be in potency? It does not seem to be a new phenomenon.
3. The catholicity of the Church has as its aspect, apart from the nature of the Church being universal and acceptable to all men, actually being "not circumscribed within the limits of any one kingdom, nor confined to the members of any one society of men, but embracing within the amplitude of her love, all mankind, whether barbarians or Scythians, slaves or freemen, male or female." This aspect of the catholicity of the Church is also in potency almost as it was in the early ages of the Church.
4. The sanctity of the Church has two aspects: the sanctity of the means of salvation she offers to all men, and the actual holiness of her members. It's not hard to see how this latter aspect could be reduced to a potential aspect.
5. Pope Pius XII repeated multiple times that jurisdiction passes to bishops through the pope (Mystici Corporis, Ad Apostolorum Principis, and Ad Sinarum Gentem). This simplifies the solution to today's crisis: the Church elects a pope, Christ communicates to him supreme universal ordinary jurisdiction, and he confers ordinary jurisdiction on any designated bishops. There's no need for all the novelty of a non-Catholic sect "materially" retaining an aspect of one of the marks of the Most Holy and Spotless Bride of Christ! That's the other extreme, with Conclavism being on the one end. The solution lies in the middle!
6. The same way there was true unbroken papal succession after the 13th century 33-month papal interregnum, there'll be true unbroken succession after a 100-year interregnum if God so wills.
7. The beauty of platforms like yours is it'll get the correct ideas to the right audience. Traditional Catholic bishops are yet to realise the whole Church awaits them to unanimously designate the next pope. They may get more serious in 2051 after Cardinal Karen McNuggets has ascended the Novus Ordo Papacy as Novus Ordo Pope Susan.
Two points I wished to make as a comment after reading this post are probably much better (or at least more succinctly) articulated in the following comment made by John Daly (enumeration mine):
"[1] There is in any event no need to recur to the materialiter-formaliter vocabulary to enunciate what the thesis holds ... It is more important to seize what a man believes and wants to communicate than to get bogged down in questions of semantics — hence, though I think it regrettable, I have nothing more to say here about the technical Guerardian vocabulary and I shall not be using it again in these notes. [2] I add however that the Cassiciacum thesis is also innocent of the charge of claiming that matter can exist without form. Matter cannot exist without form, but the matter of a particular entity can certainly exist without the due form of that entity, in which case the entity itself is not present."
I see it now. The analogy with sin and heresy is hard to understand at face value by just understanding the normal definition of the concepts.
Father's explanation helped me simplify the analogy this way to clarify where the similarities and differences are:
1. Sinning only materially is committing an actual sin but without actual guilt in the subject.
2. Professing heresy only materially is profesing actual heresy but without actual guilt in the subject.
3. Being a pope materially (as the proponents explain) is taking actual possession of the papal office peacefully without actual authority residing in the subject (pope in fact, but not legally, yet alone holding the title to legally being pope).
...
...
Similarities:
Absence of the formal part in the subject
Differences:
1. Order of operation vs order of faculty
2. Real/actual sin/heresy, in actu, vs apparent faculty, only in potency
Ok … what are you supposed to do with this?
Perhaps it is a stepping stone for the poorly named R&R crowd to the right path?
I'm happy to have read this.
I'm one of the "simplists" Father refers to who considered the term "papa materialiter" nonsensical based on the universal inviolable metaphysical principle that it is form that gives existence, and matter cannot exist without form. The argument is this: Since authority is an essential part in the pope, as pope, in sensu reduplicativo, just as the soul is an essential part in man (contrary to Bp Sanborn's response to the objection that authority is accidental, he mixing it up with the pope, as man, in sensu specificativo), "papa" cannot be rightly predicated of Novus Ordo popes if they do not have authority, the form. For predicating in the concrete presupposes existence, and form, and any adverbial or adjectival qualifications are only modes of being.
I realise the "simplist's" objection is apt for the term "papa materialis" not "papa materialiter" ... I now concede as tenable, the term "papa materialiter" in the sense that Novus Ordo Popes, as the Thesis proponents explain, are more than merely pope-elects but have the addition of de facto possession of the office. Fr Hermont brilliantly qualifies that as a potential, not juridical, title, in the case of Novus Ordo Pope Francis.
However, I deny several principles upon which the Thesis is based and conclusions that follow from them.
...
1. Abstracting from the novelty of the principle of not receiving authority due to incompatible habitual intention, there's no precedent in Moral or Dogmatic Theology nor in Canon Law for judging validity based on habitual intention rather than a real actual personal intention which is only presumed present based on effects of the habitual intention. In Dogmatic and Moral Theology on the Scaraments, the intention referred to is definitely personal, and presumed present based on circumstances. Usually an explicit contrary intention is required to dissolve valid presumption, and not even the state of heresy is enough!
...
...
2. Even if we concede the absence of a supposedly required habitual intention, without a definitive judgment by the Church, there's no principle by which every Catholic today is obliged to conclude on its absence and consequent absence of papal authority. The Thesis, at best, leads to conceding the papacy de jure to the Novus Ordo popes and only gives justification to Catholics to licitly dissent from the authority based on weighty grounds of conscience. It provides no basis to conclude, at many proponents of the Thesis do, that the SSPX priest sins by saying a Mass in which the Novus Ordo popes are mentioned as popes, for they act correctly, if the Thesis is correct.
Many advocates seem to think that the bar they set for personal heresy is artificially high.
I like the argument Fr Dutertre makes - he's a proponent of the Thesis. Arguing loss of office from personal heresy, even though public or manifest, without ecclesiastical sentence, turns the Church into a mob where any small group of faithful can walk out on the parish priest during a sermon after declaring him a heretic and no longer parish priest due to loss of office. Some sedevacantists have even done worse, and applied the principle of loss of office by personal heresy without ecclesiastical sentence to pre-Vatican II Catholic popes.
But the Church's beautifully established juridical order cannot be reduced to such insanity. Fr Dutertre argues that if public/manifest heresy carries with it ipso facto loss of office like it does excommunication, Canon 2314 no. 2 would be nonsensical. This argument blew me away. Brilliant.
Fr Dutertre is incorrect about personal heresy. I'm sorry to hear that you were blown away by this argument - although no blown away enough to adopt the thesis itself.
This is precisely what I meant in the article though. Advocates like Fr Dutertre feel the need to rubbish and misrepresent perfectly good arguments in order to defend the thesis. As a result, people who don't know better accept their rubbishing and misrepresentation, whilst not being convinced by the arguments for their thesis. Their tactic keeps people recognising Bergoglio as pope.
Well, in addition, I found the sources Fr Dutertre provided very convincing, for proving, at least in some cases, including St Robert Bellarmine, that public/manifest heretic was understood to presuppose ecclesiastical determination as such.
Yes, but the trouble is, they're missing the point here.
Of course a declaration or ecclesiastical determination makes a persons heresy public "at least in some cases" as you say. But no-one was denying that.
Their argument is a failure of logic. It is obviously the case that someone suspected of heresy or who is a secret heretic doesn't become an open heretic until a declaration - *unless they themselves do something that makes it open.*
What we're denying - what they're claiming (marshalling faulty evidence) - is that the very notion of public or open heresy (and its concomitant effects) depends on a declaration. It doesn't. They're also making out that all heresy is occult or suspected until a declaration comes. It isn't.
Numerous canonists and theologians prior to the Roncalli Revolution held that Canon 188.4 applied ipso facto to a manifest, pertinatious heretic. In other words, the generally accepted position in the Church was that the manifest heresy was all the "declaration" needed. Any formal "declaration" was done to instruct the faithful that the individual was bad news.
This was the position of St. Francis de Sales, as well as St. Alphonsus Liguori as well.
Fr. Duterte referred me to a doctoral thesis in which the candidate argued that for 188.4 to apply, 1) the person had to formally leave the Church and formally enter a false sect, and 2) the Church had to recognize such an act...which is contrary to the statements of approved theologians on the matter..
This appears to be the foundational principle of sedeprivationism:
“The habitual intention to procure the good of the Church is a necessary condition (the ultimate disposition) for an elected pope to receive the communication of the pontifical authority, which makes him be with Jesus Christ, and hold the role of His Vicar on earth.”
Question: As I’ve never seen this intention mentioned anywhere amongst the criteria for valid popes, can someone point me toward a source which references this requirement?
There is none. It's an argument from reason.
It's novel, brilliant, yet does not logically provide the solution to preserving apostolicity of succession that has necessitated the novelty in the first place.
The whole beautiful edifice of the Thesis is destroyed by this objection:
Just as loss of office due to public/manifest personal heresy is not certain without at least an ecclesiastical sentence for heresy following Canon 2314 no. 2, certitude of absence of any required intention to obtain ecclesiastical authority requires ecclesiastical judgment and as such the consciences of all Catholics cannot be bound to make this conclusion. This makes Novus Ordo popes remain popes de jure and de facto, even if it's still possible they have no authority in reality.
Certitude of absence of authority does not require ecclesiastical judgment, because, in our case, if authority were admitted, at least two truths of faith would be denied: the indefectibility and the infallibility of the Church. All catholics are bound to the faith.
Yes, it is.
Fr Dutertre has said this, by the way. I strongly disagree with most of it. It badly mischaracterises the objection and those who make it, as well as the status of the thesis itself.
'The same distinction [matter and form in relation to the papacy] is accepted by St. Antoninus and Cardinal Cajetan. It is therefore false to claim, as many have done, that the Thesis is a novelty in applying these distinctions to the papacy.[1]
'Fn. 1. And even if, by hypothesis, no theologian had done it previously, this would not invalidate the Thesis merely for that reason. The science of theology has been developed over the centuries by theologians who have slowly deepened our understanding of the faith. Every step of this development, in that sense, could be accused of being a “novelty.” This attitude, found among some, of refusing to meditate upon and theologically analyze the present crisis is deeply alarming. It is contrary to the life of faith, which should permeate our whole life, and particularly our highest faculty, which is our intellect. Many Catholics want to find a “quote” from a previous theologian describing entirely our situation. There is none, other than the writings of Bishop Guérard des Lauriers. The present situation was never imagined even speculatively by any theologian prior to the Second Vatican Council. One should not therefore try to read the works of past theologians as if they were commenting on the present crisis in the Church. Such a reading would be to take them out of context. Rather, one should understand the universal principles perennially taught by the Church’s approved theologians, in order to apply them harmoniously to the present crisis. As Bp Guérard des Lauriers remarked: “Theology, at least sometimes, consists in thinking, and not merely in repeating.” In this presentation of the Thesis, however, we purposely make appeal to many approved theologians who have studied similar cases, to show that, if the Thesis cannot be entirely found, as a whole, in the speculations of past theologians, its principles, however, are common in traditional theology.'
https://thethesis.us/chapter-x/
Interesting. Concedes it is novel in a footnote after arguing it is not in the main body! Ha ha.
A principle as far-reaching as the impact of absence of a habitual intention in reception of ecclesiastical authority was never imagined by any Theologian in history even after so many simoniacal and nepotistic popes? Strange.
To be fair to them, I think they are referring specifically to a positive contrary intention.
That was my impression. Seems like they’re trying to analogize a principle of sacramental theology (ie., formation of a contrary intention not to do what the Church does in the confection of a sacrament as an invalidating cause), and apply it to the pope question. That’s apples and oranges (like discussing the “validity” of conciliar canonizations).
Perhaps. On the other hand, it applies to marriage also in the sense of the contract, not just the sacrament. It may be a principle of reason.
But regardless, I strongly object to the idea that we can't know pertinacity but we can know objective intention. This seems arbitrary to me.
I have read a few commentaries on heresy, which all revolve around the idea that "pertinacity" is clearly present when one persists in their heresy. You can tell one is pertinatious because they continue in their heresy. It's not really that hard.
The correct way to argue the sedevacantist position and avoid the pitfalls of the personal heresy argument is as proposed by Fr Okerulu:
1. The Novus Ordo Church that poses as the Catholic Church is a non-Catholic sect practising a new religion, based on the evil, erroneous, heretical and blasphemous doctrines and laws contained in Vatican II documents, catechisms, 1983 Code of Canon Law and their pronouncements in general.
2. Those who adhere to the Novus Ordo as members are therefore non-Catholics, having publicly defected from the Catholic Faith. They are no different from Anglicans and all protestants and schismatics.
3. Per Canon Law referenced below, Catholics who have publicly defected from the Faith, all non-Catholics, all members of non-Catholic sects, *EVEN WITHOUT ANY DECLARATION,* are unable to hold offices in the Catholic Church, or if previously holding offices, automatically lose such offices.
- Canon 188 no. 4
- Canon 2314 no. 3
4. This obliges all Catholics to ignore the entire Novus Ordo hierarchy as a non-Catholic hierarchy, and makes Masses in which their prelates are mentioned EQUIVALENT to Masses in which the schismatic patriarch of Constantinople or the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury is mentioned.
5. Traditional Catholic clergy do not require abjuration of converts from the Novus Ordo Church because the absence of ecclesiastical condemnation makes them enjoy the presumption in the juridical order of being deceived rather than formally heretical and adhering to a non-Catholic religion, just as the Church does not require abjuration of members of non-Catholic sects who have reached the age of reason to commit mortal sin but not reached the age of puberty based on presumption of lack of formal adherence. cf Canon 2230.
6. The Church does not maintain a directory of non-Catholic sects nor does she always condemn each one by name. She does not consider it necessary because non-Catholic sects are manifestly so, practising a different religion with different creeds and rites. She does not necessarily declare public defection by individuals but rules to the contrary: that a public defection or mere giving one's name to a non-Catholic sect is notorious in itself to confirm loss of office. Fr Okerulu brilliantly argues that ecclesiastical condemnation does not constitute a non-Catholic sect as such. Non-Catholic sects are constituted by their rejection of the Catholic Faith and institution of new doctrines and rites.
7. EVERY TRADITIONAL CATHOLIC by experience knows the Novus Ordo is a different religion with false doctrines irreverent rites. But it's truly an organisation, acting as a moral body and universally recognised as such. Its decrees and judgments are formal acts of this body, this moral union, this organisation, this sect. It cannot not be called an organisation and its formal acts proceed from it as operations of a moral being. This organisation CANNOT be the Roman Catholic Church! The SSPX and Thesis adherents do not emphasise this conclusion completely founded in reality ONLY BECAUSE they think admitting it impacts the Apostolicity of the Roman Catholic Church. It absolutely doesn't.
See Fr Okerulu's article here. I think it requires some refinement but find the three core conclusions incontrovertible.
https://www.strcnigeria.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/A-Defense-of-the-Theological-Sedevacantist-Position.pdf
With respect to the good Fr Okerulu, I can't agree with n. 2, at least without a better idea of what is meant by 'adhere to the Novus Ordo.' I think it will turn on the facts. In my opinion, there are Catholics and non-Catholics in the Novus Ordo milieu.
Once you concede no. 1, everything else follows! I think we are in agreement with the following explanation.
Objectively, everyone who publicly regularly attends the rites of a non-Catholic sect is legally presumed a member of that sect, unless there are separate initiation rites for membership. Regular attendance implies formal adherence to the tenets and practices of the sect. This is the presumption in Canon Law. As usual, presumption yields to facts (cf MacKenzie).
Applying the principles to the Anglican Church or the Novus Ordo Church, anyone who regularly attends their religious services is presumed by that fact alone, in law, to be a member of that sect and incurs all the penalties associated with the defection.
However, presumption yields to facts. In fact, many members of the Novus Ordo Church are there because they think that's the Roman Catholic Church. The deception and their inculpable ignorance are facts that make their defection not perfectly formal. As such, they do not incur the associated censures nor do they require abjuration.
Fr Okerulu argues this is the case for the lay members of the Novus Ordo sect. However, this does not apply to Novus Ordo clergy and prelates like Abp Vigano, for they cannot claim inculpable ignorance being the leaders charged with the duty of propagating the evil sect, and would therefore have incurred the censures per Canon Law and require an abjuration.
So, in summary, I think:
1. Conservative Novus Ordo Catholics, members of the FSSP, SSPX and similar groups are members of this non-Catholic sect, but usually materially only. They are usually guilty of other serious sins against faith, but not necessarily of public defection. These are the people that made you disagree with no. 2. They truly are non-Catholics in the objective order, probably Catholics subjectively speaking.
2. The members of the Novus Ordo hierarchy with pre-Vatican II seminary formation and valid orders who hold and teach the Novus Ordo religion are in public defection from the Catholic Faith simpliciter. These are the subject of this article. Being in public defection from the faith, juridical infamy is complete, no further ecclesiastical action is required. They are barred from holding offices in the Roman Catholic Church.
3. Canon Law itself miraculously has a solution for us!!! Future Catholics centuries after us will commend us for having acted without defiance of ecclesiastical discipline.
@SDW
You have a footnote stating your doubts regarding the possibility of the apostolicity of the Church being wholly in potency, such that the Church would be rendered potentially apostolic.
1. There are two aspects to apostolicity: apostolicity of doctrine and apostolicity of succession. Apostolicity of doctrine remains preserved today, really and wholly. So even in the scenario of there being no bishops with ordinary jurisdiction, apostolicity as a mark of the Church remains fully active under one aspect and so the Church would still not be reduced to being merely potentially apostolic.
2. It's a fact today that there are no Roman Catholic bishops with ordinary jurisdiction. As such, that aspect of the mark of the Church, apostolicity of succession, is in fact, only in potency. How can an aspect of a mark be in potency? It does not seem to be a new phenomenon.
3. The catholicity of the Church has as its aspect, apart from the nature of the Church being universal and acceptable to all men, actually being "not circumscribed within the limits of any one kingdom, nor confined to the members of any one society of men, but embracing within the amplitude of her love, all mankind, whether barbarians or Scythians, slaves or freemen, male or female." This aspect of the catholicity of the Church is also in potency almost as it was in the early ages of the Church.
4. The sanctity of the Church has two aspects: the sanctity of the means of salvation she offers to all men, and the actual holiness of her members. It's not hard to see how this latter aspect could be reduced to a potential aspect.
5. Pope Pius XII repeated multiple times that jurisdiction passes to bishops through the pope (Mystici Corporis, Ad Apostolorum Principis, and Ad Sinarum Gentem). This simplifies the solution to today's crisis: the Church elects a pope, Christ communicates to him supreme universal ordinary jurisdiction, and he confers ordinary jurisdiction on any designated bishops. There's no need for all the novelty of a non-Catholic sect "materially" retaining an aspect of one of the marks of the Most Holy and Spotless Bride of Christ! That's the other extreme, with Conclavism being on the one end. The solution lies in the middle!
6. The same way there was true unbroken papal succession after the 13th century 33-month papal interregnum, there'll be true unbroken succession after a 100-year interregnum if God so wills.
7. The beauty of platforms like yours is it'll get the correct ideas to the right audience. Traditional Catholic bishops are yet to realise the whole Church awaits them to unanimously designate the next pope. They may get more serious in 2051 after Cardinal Karen McNuggets has ascended the Novus Ordo Papacy as Novus Ordo Pope Susan.
Two points I wished to make as a comment after reading this post are probably much better (or at least more succinctly) articulated in the following comment made by John Daly (enumeration mine):
"[1] There is in any event no need to recur to the materialiter-formaliter vocabulary to enunciate what the thesis holds ... It is more important to seize what a man believes and wants to communicate than to get bogged down in questions of semantics — hence, though I think it regrettable, I have nothing more to say here about the technical Guerardian vocabulary and I shall not be using it again in these notes. [2] I add however that the Cassiciacum thesis is also innocent of the charge of claiming that matter can exist without form. Matter cannot exist without form, but the matter of a particular entity can certainly exist without the due form of that entity, in which case the entity itself is not present."
I see it now. The analogy with sin and heresy is hard to understand at face value by just understanding the normal definition of the concepts.
Father's explanation helped me simplify the analogy this way to clarify where the similarities and differences are:
1. Sinning only materially is committing an actual sin but without actual guilt in the subject.
2. Professing heresy only materially is profesing actual heresy but without actual guilt in the subject.
3. Being a pope materially (as the proponents explain) is taking actual possession of the papal office peacefully without actual authority residing in the subject (pope in fact, but not legally, yet alone holding the title to legally being pope).
...
...
Similarities:
Absence of the formal part in the subject
Differences:
1. Order of operation vs order of faculty
2. Real/actual sin/heresy, in actu, vs apparent faculty, only in potency