Following its annual conference held in Dallas earlier this year, the Fatima Center began periodically posting videos of its presentations and sessions on YouTube.
On June 23, they posted a portion of the Q&A session wherein the panel was presented with the following questions:
- Has Pope Francis excommunicated himself?
- How can an apostate non-Catholic, Freemasonic, anti-pope perform the consecration of Russia?
- How can people get rid of a false Antichrist Pope?
- Would God allow a true pope to teach heresy and lead souls to Hell?
The emcee summarized the above as collectively asking: How do you solve a problem like Bergoglio?
Evidently, it was Chris Ferrara’s turn to provide the answer, but before he spoke, the emcee (with whom I am not familiar) felt compelled (or more likely was instructed) to clarify the Fatima Center’s official position on Jorge Bergoglio’s claim to the papacy:
The Fatima Center’s position on this issue is, uh, (mumble, mumble) that as a lay, uh, organization devoted to spreading the Fatima message, it is beyond our pay grade to try to determine whether Francis is the pope. And that in the absence of an authoritative determination to the contrary, will, we will continue to treat him as such.
Now, to be clear, I did not include the emcee’s stammering and stuttering in order to make fun of the man. Rather, I offer these details only to illustrate just how difficult it is for sincere Catholics to get the words, “Francis is the pope,” out of their mouth!
That said, the statement itself is informative in a number of ways. First and foremost, the opening sentence alone tells us that the Fatima Center (and those who hold the same position) recognizes that a legitimate question exists as to whether or not Francis is the pope.
Secondly, the emcee did his listeners a great service by providing the foundation upon which the entire Resist-the-Pope enterprise is constructed, namely, the supposition that laymen are unqualified to determine whether Francis is actually the Vicar of Christ.
Lastly, the conclusion – we will therefore treat him as such – serves to demonstrate that these people either do not know, or do not care to know, what it actually means for a Catholic to treat a man as pope. Simply saying “so-and-so is the pope” isn’t nearly enough; a demon will readily do that!
[For an in-depth treatment of this topic, see the following: The Traditionalist and the Pope: The Papacy as a Relation]
It also demonstrates how the consistent denial of objective reality (in this case, that Francis is an obstinate heretic) eventually impairs one’s ability to think and act rationally.
Think about it: As Catholic we understand that the mere possibility that persons the world over are being deceived by an anti-pope is no trifling matter; the consequences for humanity are grave. The “we can’t be sure, therefore, we will proceed as if he’s legit” approach is the exact opposite of how a sane person would react to any other serious, yet doubtful, situation.
For example, what rational person would assert, “There is evidence that my family’s doctor may be fraudulently posing as a licensed physician, but since no one in the family has a medical degree and cannot know for certain, we will continue to treat him as such.”
Given that “Christ and His Vicar constitute one only Head is the solemn teaching” of Catholic tradition (cf Pius XII, Mystici Corporis 40), how much more serious is the matter of a fake pope?
In any event, in this post, we will examine the presupposition upon which the Resist-the-Pope enterprise is constructed, namely, the notion that the laity are unqualified to determine whether or not Francis is the pope.
Moving on to Chris Ferrara’s answer, he begins by saying of the four questions posed, each of which was presumably submitted to the panel by conference attendees:
Well, all of those questions lie in the realm of theological speculation…
Actually, no, they do not.
For one, under discussion here is not a merely theoretical proposition, e.g., what if such and such should happen? Rather, the matter at hand concerns the person, the teachings, and the behavior of one Jorge Mario Bergoglio, all of which bear directly on his status, not only with regard to the papacy, but more fundamentally still his claim to membership in the Church.
Though the Captains of the Resist-the-Pope enterprise seem loathe to address this elephant in the room, this is where the discussion must begin. Assuming, of course, that one really does wish to attain clarity with respect to Francis and his claim to the papacy, it is the first, most logical, step in trying to solve a problem like Bergoglio.
Why? Because membership in the Church is absolutely necessary in order for one to possess the papal office, i.e., just as surely as Baptism is required for membership, so too is membership required for papacy. This, I am sure Chris would agree, is an utterly non-controversial statement.
Now, it is certainly true that the topic of a pope potentially falling into heresy and what would transpire as a result has been speculated upon and debated by any number of eminent theologians past, chief among them Doctor of the Church, St. Robert Bellarmine. What many seem not to know, however, is that the heart of the matter concerned whether or not it was even possible.
Bellarmine himself did not believe it possible for a pope to fall into heresy at all, not even as a private person (that is, having nothing to do with the exercise of his office). He did, however, conclude for the sake of argument:
A Pope who is a manifest heretic, ceases in himself to be Pope and head, just as he ceases in himself to be a Christian and member of the body of the Church: whereby, he can be judged and punished by the Church. This is the opinion of all the ancient Fathers, who teach that manifest heretics immediately loses all jurisdiction.
NB: No speculation exists as to whether or not a heretic is a member of the Church. What’s more, Bellarmine’s commentary goes to show that membership is absolutely central to the present discussion. As his reference to “all of the ancient Fathers” plainly indicates, this particular matter is firmly rooted, not in the realm of speculation, but rather in the rich theological tradition of the Church. This being so, we’ll begin our examination in earnest with the understanding, upon which all credible Catholics agree:
Membership in the Church is absolutely necessary in order for one to have a legitimate claim to the papacy.
With this as our starting point, let’s reword the Fatima Center’s position on Francis (which is the Resist-the-Pope position in general), taking a first things first approach, as follows:
It is beyond the pay grade of mere laymen to determine whether or not a particular individual person is a member of the Church, rather, an authoritative determination is necessary.
No serious Catholic believes this to be true. The Church has never suggested that a person’s membership, or non-membership, in the Mystical Body of Christ is a matter reserved for experts or otherwise unknowable apart from an “authoritative determination.”
On the contrary, the Church has always taught that given the visible nature of Christ’s Mystical Body, membership therein is also visible, that is to say, it must be made externally manifest, and one of the ways in which it is made manifest is by profession of the true faith. This is the case on both a corporate level (the visible members considered as a whole) and an individual level.
While it may not be immediately obvious in all individual cases, membership (or not) most certainly is knowable, especially when the individual person in question has an extensive public record of professing on matters of faith.
As recently as 1943, Pope Pius XII reiterated Catholic doctrine on the matter:
Actually only those are to be included as members of the Church who have been baptized and profess the true faith, and who have not been so unfortunate as to separate themselves from the unity of the Body, or been excluded by legitimate authority for grave faults committed. (Mystici Coporis 22)
Let’s stop here for a moment. Note that separation of oneself from the Body and exclusion from the Body by legitimate authority are two distinct modes of severance from the Church. Note as well that the Holy Father does not mention heresy here. We’ll come back to this later. He continues:
“For in one spirit” says the Apostle, “were we all baptized into one Body, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether bond or free.” As therefore in the true Christian community there is only one Body, one Spirit, one Lord, and one Baptism, so there can be only one faith. (ibid.)
The Holy Father then makes clear that professing the true faith involves not just the membership of the Church as a whole, but also individual persons:
And therefore, if a man refuse to hear the Church, let him be considered – so the Lord commands – as a heathen and a publican. It follows that those who are divided in faith or government cannot be living in the unity of such a Body, nor can they be living the life of its one Divine Spirit. (ibid.)
Again, no mention of heresy. Further along in the text, underscoring the importance of professing the true faith, the Holy Father reiterates the point, but this time even more explicitly:
Now since its Founder willed this social body of Christ to be visible, the cooperation of all its members must also be externally manifest through their profession of the same faith… (ibid., article 69) [Emphasis added.]
NB: That which is externally manifest is observable, i.e., it is knowable and not merely speculative.
Would Chris Ferrara or any of the other esteemed members of the Fatima Center speakers’ panel be willing to proclaim that Jorge Bergoglio externally manifests and professes the true faith?
No, of course not. In fact, they (like all who ply the Resist-the-Pope trade) have no problem publicly proclaiming the exact opposite. For instance, speaking of Francis, Chris Ferrara boldly declared:
He must be exposed and condemned as a danger to the faith. He must be corrected in his errors. He must be rebuked the way St. Paul rebuked Peter when Peter refused to eat with the gentiles.
Here, Chris resorted to invoking one of the go-to, make-believe, precedents that are so often cited by protagonists of the Resist-the-Pope movement, namely, Paul’s rebuke of Peter for withdrawing from eating with the Gentiles (Cf Galatians 2).
One may wonder: What do Peter’s dining habits (not to make light of the matter) have to do with an alleged Roman Pontiff who routinely contradicts the true faith, teaching grave errors that lead souls to Hell under the guise of exercising papal authority?
Answer: Nothing.
Unfortunately, this isn’t the only time Chris felt compelled in the course of just four-minutes to claim recourse to a common yet absurdly irrelevant “precedent” that has nothing to do with the present situation, namely, the tale of Pope Honorius. Chris declared with confidence:
What we do know is that when the Pope says things that are contrary to the faith he must be opposed. Pope Honorius, for example, was first condemned for espousing the Monothelite heresy, there’s only one will in Christ. He was anathematized by a council later, was anathematized not for suppressing the heresy, for allowing it to spread. At one point, he issued a letter saying something to the effect of, ‘Oh, let us not fuss over whether there is one will or two wills in Christ, this is such a trivial matter.’ And so he fermented the heresy, he was anathematized, and the anathema was confirmed by a successor pope. And yet he’s still considered part of the line of valid papacies.
As someone who has had the pleasure of enjoying Chris Ferrara’s company in the past (and, God willing, once the smoke finally clears, hope to again), admired his intelligence, and still find him likable, I am disappointed by his commentary. His paraphrase of the contents of Pope Honorius’ letter is, at best, unjust, as is the allegation that he “espoused the Monothelite heresy.”
Moreover, Bergoglio does not merely “say things that are contrary to the faith,” he teaches them in his official capacity (whatever it may be) and imposes them via formal magisterial [sic] instruments (e.g., Apostolic Exhortations, Apostolic Letters, Encyclical Letters, Rescripts inserted into the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, etc.) as part of his authoritative papal [alleged] magisterium.
As for Honorius, the “letter” to which Chris refers is not, as the naïve might assume, any such official papal instrument. It was a private letter (not a teaching act of any kind) sent to an individual bishop, correspondence that wasn’t widely known until after Honorius’ death. Furthermore, it neither teaches nor defends the Monothelite heresy. Read properly, it simply affirms that there was no opposition between the will of Christ and the Divine will.
As it was, the letter’s wording was imprecise and thus open to exploitation by proponents of the Monothelite heresy, a devious and rebellious bunch to be sure. Nowhere did Pope Honorius suggest that Monothelitism was anything other than heresy, much less did he suggest that it concerned a “trivial matter.”
Nonetheless, the bishops at the Third Council of Constantinople, so fervent were they in their desire to safeguard the faith, wanted to condemn Honorius for heresy. The reigning pope, Leo II, however, would not approve of the charge and insisted that he be condemned instead for permitting “the immaculate faith to be subverted.”
Even Catholic Answers understands that the Honorius smear as repeated by Chris Ferrara is nothing more than a dishonest Protestant tactic for attacking the Roman Catholic Church and her doctrine on the papacy.
[Read the Catholic Answers article HERE.]
If the Honorius episode demonstrates anything it’s that the one true Church of Christ (as opposed to that evil society presently headquartered in the Vatican) responds with severity to the mere hint that heresy is being tolerated even locally, much less plainly taught universally.
As it is, Chris Ferrara, breaking ranks with many if not most of his fellow Resist-the-Pope stakeholders, isn’t quite convinced that Bergoglio is actually a heretic. He states:
…the issue is what is a heretic. A heretic is someone who obstinately and post-baptismally denies an article of Divine and Catholic faith – not any teaching of the Church, but an article of Divine and Catholic faith – and does so obstinately. Why do you establish obstinacy? You challenge him to retract his heresy and he refuses to retract it, which establishes that he knows that it’s heresy and doesn’t care.
Here, Chris floats a very important rhetorical question: Why do you establish obstinacy?
His answer, however, is incomplete insofar as it invites an even more important question, one that he doesn’t really answer: Why does it matter either way?
At this, our focus is drawn back to where it belongs: It matters because obstinacy (or the lack thereof) bears directly on that individual’s status vis-à-vis membership in the Catholic Church.
You see, unlike the person who is merely mistaken and stands corrected about what the Church teaches, the obstinate heretic who refuses correction is not a member of the Catholic Church of any rank, rather, that man has severed himself, of his own volition, from the Mystical Body of Christ.
So, is Jorge Bergoglio obstinate in his heresy?
Chris is under the mistaken impression that it’s impossible to establish obstinacy with any man who merely claims to be pope. [Bear in mind that the position under review here affirms that a legitimate question exists as to whether or not Francis is the pope, i.e., the only thing entirely certain is the claim, a sentiment shared by a steadily growing number of Catholics.] Ferrara states:
How do you do that [establish obstinacy] with Francis? Who’s going to provide the tribunal? No one can judge the First See. Even Martin Luther was given an opportunity to recant his heresies before the Bull of Excommunication was issued. But as to the pope, what they’re saying [those who insist that Bergoglio has lost the papal office due to heresy] is he should not even get the due process that you and I would get if we were accused of heresy. So, it’s an insoluble problem and a big waste of time to declare that the pope has lost his office. Quite simply, how do you know and how can you prove it?
There’s a lot here to digest. First of all, it simply isn’t the case that an official tribunal is necessary in order to establish obstinacy. Just moments earlier, in fact, Chris described how this is done: “You challenge him to retract his heresy and he refuses to retract it, which establishes that he knows that it’s heresy and doesn’t care.”
NEWSFLASH: Jorge Bergoglio has been publicly challenged in this manner more times than one can count by priests, bishops, cardinals, theologians, and well-formed laymen.
Evidently, another nasty side effect of consistently denying the obvious is that it impairs one’s memory. Chris seems to have forgotten that he was a signatory, along with numerous theologians and churchmen, of a so-called Correctio addressed to the “Holy Father” in 2017, wherein they “respectfully insist that Your Holiness publicly reject … seven heretical propositions” contained in Amoris Laetitia.
“These propositions,” the signers of the Correctio stated, “all contradict truths that are divinely revealed, and that Catholics must believe with the assent of divine faith.” This, of course, is the very definition of heresy.
Guess how Jorge responded: He refused to offer even a half-hearted, insincere retraction. That, my friends, is called obstinacy.
As Chris would no doubt point out upon being reminded of the Correctio, there is a disclaimer included in that text which reads:
We do not have the competence or the intention to address the canonical issue of heresy.
By “canonical issue,” this refers back to statements made previously in the Correctio regarding the “canonical crime of heresy,” which involves a process whereby one is “warned by competent ecclesiastical authority” to reaffirm the true faith.
As Chris presumably knows, there is no ecclesiastical authority competent to judge, much less convict, a true pope. We’ll address the idea of “warning” – or better stated “correcting” – a pope momentarily. HINT: No such authority is necessary.
So, in the absence a competent ecclesiastical authority to hold a pope’s feet to the fire, are we now stuck with what Chris calls “an insoluble problem,” namely, a problem like Bergoglio?
The good news is no, we are not.
Pope Pius XII (for one) makes plain the Church’s long held understanding that heresy, of its very nature, severs a man from the Church, i.e., by heresy a man ceases, on his own, to be a member:
For not every sin, however grave it may be, is such as of its own nature to sever a man from the Body of the Church, as does schism or heresy or apostasy. (Mystici Corporis 23)
Commenting on Mystici Corporis, the celebrated theologian Monsignor Joseph Fenton wrote:
Very definitely a person would cut himself off from the structure of the ecclesiastical Body if he entered into a state of public heresy or apostasy … The theological demonstration that backs up this thesis is still and always will be the “proof from reason” which St. Robert Bellarmine alleged in support of his teaching in the De ecclesia militante. (The American Ecclesiastical Review, July 1961)
NB: That public heresy of its own nature cuts a man off from the Church, by his own doing – that is, apart from any intervention on the part of ecclesial authorities – is not a matter of speculation, rather, it is well known via the theological tradition of the Church.
In any case, everyone in that room listening to Chris Ferrara knows that Francis has been corrected and challenged many times, and the result has always been the same, he refuses to retract his heresy. It is stunning, therefore, that he seems to be suggesting that Bergoglio hasn’t been “given an opportunity to recant his heresies.”
As for the suggestion that a Bull of Excommunication is necessary in order for a man to be severed from the Church due to heresy, in addition to the above, Divine Revelation itself indicates otherwise.
But though we, or an Angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema. As we said before, so I say now again: If any one preach to you a gospel, besides that which you have received, let him be anathema. (Galatians 1:8-9)
In his famous Biblical commentary, Fr. George Leo Haydock states of these verses:
The terrible sentence awarded by St. Paul bears equally strong against modern as against ancient innovators in religion.
Bear in mind that St. Paul was writing to the faithful of the “churches of Galatia” (cf verse 2). He does not instruct them to report false preachers to him that a formal procedure may be set in motion, rather he tells them that offenders against the true faith are anathema, that is, they are excluded from the Body of the Church.
In continuity with this, we read in Matthew’s Gospel (cited in Mystici Corporis 22 by Pius XII):
But if thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and reprove him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother. But if he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. And if he will not hear them: tell the Church. And if he will not hear the Church, let him be to thee as the heathen and the publican. (Matthew 18:15-17)
Here, we have a Biblical exhortation concerning how either correction may be secured, or obstinacy established. About this passage, Haydock comments:
This not only shews the order of fraternal correction, but also every man’s duty in submitting to the judgment of the Church. There cannot be a plainer condemnation of those who make particular creeds and will not submit the articles of their belief to the judgment of the authority appointed by Christ. (Haydock)
I can hear the rejoinder now: Yes, but how can one “tell the Church” on a pope? He can’t be judged!
To be perfectly clear, “listening to the Church” and “the judgment of the authority” refers to the teaching of the Sacred Magisterium to which it is every man’s duty to submit, even if that man be the pope. Bergoglio has been reproved by numerous churchmen, up to and including cardinals, speaking for the Church, reminding him of his duty to submit, not to them, but to the Church’s Magisterial authority.
Indeed, how often have the captains of the Resist-the-Pope movement, including Chris Ferrara, done likewise?
It is perfectly clear to every thinking person that Jorge Bergoglio has been sufficiently challenged to demonstrate, beyond any doubt whatsoever, his obstinacy.
What has been said thus far about heresy is useful as far as it goes, and yet, a closer look at Mystici Corporis reveals that the external manifestation and profession of the true faith that is necessary for membership in the Church is not limited to avoiding that which fits the strict, formal definition of heresy.
In other words, while Mystici Corporis confirms that heresy severs a man from the Church of its own nature, it does not suggest that one is otherwise free to openly reject all manner of Catholic doctrine without fear of relinquishing his claim to membership, provided only that his denials do not concern “truths that are divinely revealed, and that Catholics must believe with the assent of divine faith.”
The “true faith” includes far more than just divinely revealed truths. For example, it also includes other “Catholic truths,” which Fr. Ludwig Ott describes as follows:
Those doctrines and truths defined by the Church not as immediately revealed but as intrinsically connected with the truths of Revelation so that their denial would undermine the revealed truths are called Catholic Truths (veritates catholicae) or Ecclesiastical Teachings (doctrinae ecclesiasticac) to distinguish them from the Divine Truths or Divine Doctrines of Revelation. (see Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma)
The bottom line is rather simple:
Jorge Bergoglio has openly contradicted all manner of doctrines that are constituents of the “true faith.” From the heretical properly so called, to things gravely erroneous and everywhere in between, in the face of numerous appeals and corrections, he has made no bones whatsoever about his obstinacy.
Would Chris Ferrara or any of his co-laborers in the Resist-the-Pope movement be willing to argue in favor of Bergoglio’s claim to membership in the Church?
C’mon, Chris. Bergoglio needs a good Catholic defense attorney to plead his case. Will you take it?
