Deo gratias!
Ending Cognitive Dissonance:
Another Recognize-and-Resist Blogger becomes Sedevacantist
Cognitive dissonance can be defined as “the mental discomfort (psychological stress) experienced by a person who holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values” (Wikipedia).
On July 10, 2016, we posted the article “The Trouble with Jorge: Semi-Trads at the Breaking Point”. After providing some papal quotes on the traditional Catholic doctrine on the Magisterium and the Papacy, we observed: “The cognitive dissonance involved in perhaps professing these truths externally — as the semi-trads might very well do — while at the same time thinking, acting, and speaking in contrary fashion is beginning to push people over the edge.”
In April of the following year, we published the essay “Anything but Sedevacantism! Analysis of a curious Phenomenon”. There, too, we spoke about the same subject: “We have seen that the Papacy has consequences. So does a denial of the Papacy. The cognitive dissonance of a ‘practical sedevacantism’ [proposed by Steve Skojec] will be coming home to roost.”
And finally, we again brought up the issue in the July 25, 2017 post “The Stumbling Block of the Papacy: Why Bergoglio doesn’t fit”.
We were all the more hopeful, therefore, when we noticed a new post on a recognize-and-resist blog the other day that was entitled, “Ending Cognitive Dissonance”, written by one Jonathan Byrd. The site’s name is Traditional Catholic Priest.
And indeed, we were not disappointed. The blogger in question (shown on the left) is a layman “with a wife, 10 kids, 4 cats and a dog”, as his profile says. He had already been convinced that Francis was a false pope, but he thought Benedict XVI was the true Pope instead. In other words, he held the position we have dubbed “Resignationism”, due to doubts about the validity of the resignation of Benedict XVI in 2013.
Byrd wrote his post to outline the evidence — the data and the reasoning — that have led him to understand that the only way to be a true traditional Catholic — one who actually believes what the Church traditionally taught, especially about the Papacy — is to dump Francis and the entire Vatican II religion. In other words, he has taken the difficult but necessary step to becoming what is typically called a sedevacantist. Mr. Byrd, congratulations!
We would like to encourage all to read his post in full. What follows below are some of the highlights (bold print and italics in original):
These reasons are all objective – all based on the teachings of the church, the doctors of the church the popes, etc. In short, all identify exactly what Francis is without the need or worry about what Benedict “meant” when he “resigned”.
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We can know from the above a few things that have held constant:
Christ will always be with His Church
The Church is a teaching Church
The Pope has the power to loose and bind and that he who hears Peter hears Christ.
This is what the Church has always held from the very beginning.
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Our souls were so important to Christ He offered up His life for us in the most brutal way imaginable so do you really think a God made Man who suffered this much for our salvation wasn’t going to make the Faith and consequently our Salvation objectively easy to comprehend?
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The spotless bride of Christ – Our holy Mother – The Church hasn’t left us without recourse. Our Father was well aware of the situation all Catholics would be in today so He provided, through the Church, the solutions to end our cognitive dissonance.
The way forward – the way to Truth – is to look back. We look back to what the Church has taught.
We don’t bring our intellectual criticism – our thoughts, our opinions, our blogs, our blog followers, our livelihood, our comforts, our friends, our “mother and brethren” into this equation.
We can know The Truth and as a Catholic, we have a duty to seek it out at all cost as it is the Pearl of Great price and then give our assent to that Truth no matter what the cost is to us.
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Our Holy religion teaches us that our Holy Mother the Church is the pure spotless bride of Christ. This church can only give us Bread – she can’t give us stones. She can be trusted in all matters because Christ promised “he who hears you hears ME.”
We look around at what we see around us occurring in the world and in what we know as the church and all we see is heresy – stones being fed to us – someone – something – that can’t be trusted if you want to keep the faith.
I recently had a conversation with a priest friend of mine and I asked him about teaching what the church currently teaches and he told me “if I did that I would go to hell.”
This about sums up the current state of affairs in the church and at the same time provides the cognitive dissonance that we all feel.
The problem with the above is it directly contradicts what the church has always taught about the Magisterium of the Church, the honor, respect and obedience we owe to Her and to the Pope, and it doesn’t square at all with the Church Fathers, Doctors and Theologians.
Because of this apparent contradiction we have tried to explain why this could be the case. The problem is, while trying to explain this away – we have done harm to the Faith.
How so?
We did the very things that the modernist have done – namely- we have twisted words to suit new meanings.
We want to cling to this idea that all is well when we know full well it isn’t. This dissonance has spawn so many theories, arguments, and innumerable bloggers making a living off of trying to explain this dissonance. The problem is this hasn’t helped.
If this was the answer we would have figured it out sometime before the last 60 years. Instead of spending all of this energy trying to understand how a heretic calling himself pope francis could be the pope – we failed to be Catholic.
In fact, we have lost what it means to be Catholic by explaining away the faith to justify how people like Francis can all themselves Catholic. Think about this for a moment.
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I can go on and on showing the changes but we are all aware of them. They have been talked about ad nauseam for the last 60 years yet no one seems any closer to the answer.
But maybe, just maybe, they do know the answer and that answer shakes them to the core of their being.
That answer is what keeps them up at night because they know if they ever truly accept it – it would mean being an outcast.
They know they would have to come outside the camp, take up their cross and proceed to the inevitable crucifixion and that would cost them too much……
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I converted nearly 10 years ago and I was firmly in the Recognize and Resist camp from the very beginning.
Coming from my protestant background – that never sat well with me. I just left “Protesting the Church” to join a church so I could continue protesting….
That doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.
Its extremely illogical and extremely NOT Catholic.
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One thing that we have to always keep at the forefront of our mind is that we can’t twist facts to make it come to the conclusion we want. We simply have to state the facts and see where it leads and this is what is going to be outlined below.
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The person that is the Pope must first be Catholic and if he isn’t Catholic then he isn’t the pope. 1+1=2…ain’t that hard to understand.
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The Conclusion is very simple
If you accept Francis is the pope then you must accept communion for adulterers, you must accept allowing communion for protestants, you must accept LGBT novelties, you must accept the novus ordo mass, the new rites, the “cult of man”, Ecumenism, that the Roman Catholic Church is just one of many that lead to heaven, That error has rights, and all of the other profanations you see around you because it is from the pope and the magisterium and Vatican II……
If the above is abhorrent to you…
If you would rather die a thousand deaths than to give your consent to such abdominal practices…
Then welcome to Sedevacantism….
Welcome indeed! Again, the full post is really worth reading and can be found here:
It is wonderful to see that another soul has allowed God’s grace to prevail, despite the tireless efforts of our opponents to fight Sedevacantism tooth and nail.
Rejoice, fellow-sedevacantists, for another good man has seen the light and followed it wheresoever it led, no matter the consequences! Let us “make merry and be glad, for this [our] brother was dead and is come to life again; he was lost, and is found” (Lk 15:32)! Pray for Jonathan Byrd and his family, that they will persevere to the end, and that there may be many more like them.
Our Lady, Queen of the Rosary, pray for us.
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