Whether a Pope can fall into Heresy as a Private Person?
by Saint Robert Cardinal Bellarmine, S.J.
Bishop, Confessor, Doctor of the Church
Canonized by Pope Pius XI in 1930
Declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius XI in 1931
Feast Day: May 13
Translated from the original Latin by Mr. Ryan Grant used with permission
Chapter VI: On the Pope as a Particular Person
The fourth proposition. It is probable and may piously be believed that not only as ‘Pope’ can the Supreme Pontiff not err, but he cannot be a heretic even as a particular person by pertinaciously believing something false against the faith.… READ MORE
The Question of Authority:
“Who are YOU to say who is a Heretic?”
It happens all the time when discussing Sedevacantism or related topics, especially with people in the recognize-and-resist camp, like adherents of the Society of St. Pius X or the Fraternity of St. Peter: Whenever the other side is out of arguments, the objection will be made that the sedevacantist has no authority to say what he is saying — for example, to determine who is a heretic, or to say whether a particular theological conclusion is indeed correct — as though it required an act of authority to discern whether a man is a Catholic or a heretic, or as though Catholic teaching were only to be held in theory but never allowed to be applied in practice to a concrete situation.… READ MORE
On June 6, The Remnant published a blog post written by its chief rhetorician, Christopher Ferrara, with the amusing title, “The Undertaker Pope: A Brief Study of an Infallibly Politically Correct Pontificate”. The retired American lawyer takes Francis to the woodshed for his most recent outrageous, erroneous, and sometimes downright ridiculous statements and actions, of which Ferrara provides the following summary:
Francis’s warm relations with socialist dictators;
his lauding of pro-abortion and pro-“gay” politicians;
his abuse of the papal office as a platform for globalist enviornmentalism (thus advantaging the same transnational corporations he professes to deplore);
his refusal to intervene in opposition to the legalization of “gay marriage” because “the Pope belongs to everybody, he cannot enter the concrete, domestic politics of a country.
“If Satan would contrive to hinder a papal election, the Church would suffer great travail.”
In 1956, Fr. Herman Bernard Kramer published a work called The Book of Destiny, which is an explanation of the Apocalypse, the last book of the Holy Bible (otherwise known as the book of Revelation).
In Apocalypse 12:1-5, we read:
And a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars: And being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be delivered.
So you just stumbled upon this web site and are wondering what in the world this is all about? Then this page is for you!
What’s going on? Why this odd web site?
To make a long story short: What is today known as Roman Catholicism is in fact not the Roman Catholicism of the past. You can verify this for yourself just by looking at Church history, and virtually all disinterested historians will confirm this. The big rupture occurred at the Second Vatican Council, a gathering of all Catholic bishops called in 1959 by the newly-elected “Pope John XXIII”.… READ MORE
Amoris Laetitia and the Coming Schism:
Retrospect and Prospect
Shortly before the Synod on the Family of 2014 — the first of the two mini-councils, whose final result was the toxic exhortation Amoris Laetitia — we put the question before our readers: How long until schism?
After this initial post, we followed up now and again to report on various happenings that indicated that indeed a serious rupture within the Vatican II Sect was beginning to take shape:
On April 8, 2016, the very day the Vatican released Francis’ post-synodal exhortation that has effectively permitted public sinners to approach the Novus Ordo sacraments without requiring conversion first, the reputable German Vaticanist Andreas Englisch warned that a schism with Benedict XVI as Antipope, although he believed it to be unlikely, could not be ruled out:
Earlier in 2014, and even as early as December of 2013, we had already detected the beginnings of a schism in a phenomenon we decided to label “Resignationism”, a position taken by a number of Novus Ordos and Semi-Traditionalists who believe that Benedict XVI’s resignation on February 11, 2013, was made under duress and was therefore, per Novus Ordo Church law, invalid.
SSPX’s Fr. Schmidberger makes Case for Union with Rome
Former SSPX Superior General, Fr. Schmidberger, with the current one, Bp. Fellay
The Spanish-speaking “Resistance-SSPX” web site Non Possumus has published an internal letter of Fr. Franz Schmidberger, formerly the Superior General of the Society of St. Pius X (1982-94) and currently the head of the SSPX seminary in Zaitzkofen (Germany), in which he lays out the case for full canonical recognition by Modernist Rome under “Pope” Francis and responds to various objections.
The three-page letter, dated February 19, 2016, is entitled Überlegungen zur Kirche und der Stellung der Priesterbruderschaft St.
Looks like everything is going according to plan. Just as we predicted, as Francis opens a huge door for the “divorced-and-remarried” — unfortunately, it’s the door to hell — he is likewise being very “merciful” to the Lefebvrist Society of St. Pius X. Gotta keep those traditionalists happy in the face of such a big whopper as the “Apostolic Exhortation” just released.
On April 10, 2016, the SSPX Superior General, Bishop Bernard Fellay, announced during a sermon (full audio here) in Puy-en-Velay (France) that “Pope” Francis had told him at a recent meeting in the Vatican that he would extend the faculties he had given the SSPX to hear confessions validly, beyond the “Jubilee Year of Mercy”, which ends on November 20 of this year.… READ MORE
“Papal” Biographer:
Schism with Benedict XVI as Anti-Pope is Possible
Journalist and biographer Andreas Englisch in Cologne on Oct. 31, 2018
(image: dpa picture alliance / Alamy Stock Photo)
Francis’ post-synodal exhortation Amoris Laetitia has caused the predicted chaos among conservative adherents of the Vatican II religion, although a few are still in denial. Approximately 18 hours since its official release, plenty of summaries, commentaries, and reactions continue to pour in. We are chronicling the meltdown and present the most explosive quotes from the wordy document in the following two links:
Meanwhile, the German intellectual review Merkur has published an interview with one of the country’s leading “papal” biographers and Vatican journalists, Andreas Englisch.… READ MORE
Full Coverage: Release of Post-Synodal Exhortation on the Family, Amoris Laetitia, and Chronicling its Aftermath
The big day has come and gone, and it is nothing short of panic and chaos all over! Welcome to our full coverage of the release and presentation of “Pope” Francis’ “Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation” Amoris Laetitia (“The Joy of Love”). Novus Ordo Watch is pleased to be the official Amoris Laetitia Chaos Watch Headquarters: We are providing you with all the information you need to understand what’s going on with this much-anticipated document. Let’s go!
“Pope” Francis meets with SSPX Superior General, Bishop Fellay
The Press Office of the “Holy See” has confirmed a newspaper report of an unannounced meeting that took place between “Pope Francis” and the Superior General of the Society of Saint Pius X, Bishop Bernard Fellay, on Saturday, April 2, at Vatican City. The Italian paper Il Foglio broke the story, quoting sources who said the meeting “was positive” and “understanding is good” between Fellay and Francis, whom Fellay had called “a genuine Modernist” in 2013.
According to Il Foglio, the discussions between the “Pope” and the Lefebvrian SSPX are moving towards a personal prelature model similar to that under which Opus Dei operates.
Bishop Williamson consecrates Fr. Tomás de Aquino a Bishop for Resistance Group
The newly-consecrated Bishop Tomas de Aquino, OSB Image Source: Non Possumus Blog
In an effort to expand the group of clerics that left the Society of St. Pius X in recent years because the SSPX wasn’t SSPX enough for them anymore, Bishop Richard Williamson — himself expelled from the SSPX in 2012 — consecrated another bishop, this time, Fr. Tomas de Aquino, OSB. The episcopal consecration took place as scheduled on March 19, 2016, in Nova Friburgo, Brazil, near Rio de Janeiro.
The Impossibility of Judging or Deposing a True Pope
He judges all and is judged by no one: the Pope
Accepting the Vatican II Sect as the Catholic Church has consequences. So does believing that Jorge Bergoglio is the Vicar of Christ despite being a public apostate: If he is a valid Pope, then there is no power on earth that can undo his papacy. If he is truly the successor of St. Peter, then he can resign voluntarily, but no one can take the pontificate from him.
This clear truth does not sit well with many in the “Recognize-and-Resist” (aka “Semi-Traditionalist”) camp, now that Francis is so obviously a non-Catholic and so clearly doing grave damage to Catholicism.
SSPX Bishop Alfonso de Galarreta Warns of Agreement with Rome
On Sunday, January 17, 2016, Bp. Alfonso de Galarreta of the Society of St. Pius X gave a conference at the St. Vincent de Paul priory in Bailly, France. A short summary of the talk has been posted at the French news portal Médias-Presse-Info. We are happy to provide an exclusive English translation:
For Bishop de Galarreta, it is not to be desired that an agreement between Rome and the SSPX should happen
"In fact, according to the common teaching of the Doctors it was God’s design that the Blessed Virgin Mary, apparently absent from the public life of Jesus, should assist Him when He was dying nailed to the Cross. Mary suffered and, as it were, nearly died with her suffering Son; https://x.com/NovusOrdoWatch/status/1985825608501231752/photo/1
Leo XIV's brother: We have different political positions - https://english.katholisch.de/artikel/65441-pope-leos-brother-we-have-different-political-positions
NOT SATIRE: "At the end of November, the Vatican intends to publish a document on the subject of monogamy. This was announced by Armando Matteo, Secretary of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, on Tuesday in Rome. The note is entitled 'You and me. In Praise of Monogamy'
Eric Sammons is busy explaining to his viewers what to think about this new document, Mater Populi Fidelis. Looks like my live chat question about why his opinion matters if Leo XIV is Pope, has already been deleted or blocked. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADHXGPQPmmQ https://x.com/NovusOrdoWatch/status/1985803649847534019/photo/1
Here we go already. A 'Walmart Thomist' who converted from Anglicanism a mere 4 years ago is presuming to effectively judge a doctrinal document from the (supposed) Apostolic See, telling others they ought not to assent to this or that alleged error in it. According to
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