Decem, I will explain where I think you and I disagree.

In my opinion, you are not distinguishing between the true Church vs the counterfeit Church.

The true Church is "indefectible." That is the Catholic dogma. The people who make up the true Church are referred to as the "wheat," who will be collected by the angels and put into "the barn."

The Counterfeit of the Church, that institution composed of what St. Augustine and other called the "false brethren," is not "indefectible." They will definitely "defect" from the true Faith in the end times and follow the Antichrist to their own destruction. These people are the "tares" or the "cockle," which will be burned.

The word "Church" comes from the New Testament Greek word "ecclesia," meaning those who are "called out," as in called out of "the world." Metaphorically, the "Church" is also called the "mystical body of Christ."

The institution that we call "the Church" is made up of two parts: those who are truly members and the false members. Again, this is Augustine and others, not me.

Defection means that one deviates from the true Faith. The person who "defects" is a heretic or an apostate or a true schismatic. An institution cannot "defect." Individual people "defect" from the Faith. Defection requires acts of intellect and will. Only individual people have those faculties.

Therefore, the "indefectibility of the Church," in its dogmatic meaning derived from Jesus's "gates of Hell" comment, is true. But it is only applicable to the true believers, not the false members who posture as Catholics. And "indefectiblity" is not a thing that can be accomplished by in impersonal institution. It is the triumph of the true believers, the faithful remnant.

The purpose of the end times is to allow Satan to sift the Church so that the true wheat is separated from the false wheat through voluntary, individual decisions. The true wheat will choose to follow Our Lord's instructions and commandments. The false, the cockle, will follow the Antichrist in his contradictions of Our Lord's teachings.

Does this make sense? Have I misunderstood you? If so, I apologize.

Therefore, the "indefectibility of the Church," in its dogmatic meaning derived from Jesus's "gates of Hell" comment, is true.

Mt 16:18 And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

2 Cor. 10:4-5     4 For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty to God unto the pulling down of fortifications, destroying counsels,  5 And every height that exhalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every understanding unto the obedience of Christ;

Dan 7:21  I beheld, and lo, that horn made war against the saints, and prevailed over them,

Apoc. 11

 7 And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast, that ascendeth out of the abyss, shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.  8 And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city, which is called spiritually, Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord also was crucified.  9 And they of the tribes, and peoples, and tongues, and nations, shall see their bodies for three days and a half: and they shall not suffer their bodies to be laid in sepulchres.  10 And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry: and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt upon the earth. 11 And after three days and a half, the spirit of life from God entered into them. And they stood upon their feet, and great fear fell upon them that saw them.

Apoc. 13

 6 And he opened his mouth unto blasphemies against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven.  7 And 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.

Apoc. 5:9 And they sung a new canticle, saying: Thou art worthy, O Lord, to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; because thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God, in thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation.

1 Cor. 6:15-18 -

15 Know you not that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. 16 Or know you not, that he who is joined to a harlot, is made one body? For they shall be, saith he, two in one flesh.  17 But he who is joined to the Lord, is one spirit.  18 Fly fornication.

I'm not sure we disagree.

Of course I am talking about the institutional church, the church that unfortunately contains the hierarchs with the power of jurisdiction, the pope, the bishops over dioceses, etc. They have overrun and taken over the "temple."

I am not talking about the wheat, the elect, the "the church of the firstborn, who are written in the heavens." Heb. 12:23. God forbid; I would never.

I do not believe that verse has been dogmatically interpreted. Very few verses have been, and I do not think that among them.


Gates are defensive tools. The verse means that nothing will stop the God via the Institutional church from gathering the elect members of the "church of the firstborn." Nothing can prevent that. For example -


The sheep will be gathered, and the "gates of hell" cannot prevent it.

But Scripture clearly tells us that the institutional church will be overrun:


What does that mean, since none of Christ's sheep can be lost? It means the institutional church, which they must "flee from" in the Great Apostasy. Accord:



The "every tribe, and people, and tongue, and nation" is the institutional church of corrupt hierarchs sitting in the seat of the formerly faithful descendants of the apostles. Cf. the institutional Church, always comprised of wheat and tares, but overrun by the heresiarchs in the end times -


I think we agree, Angelus, as usual.

All of those who have "fled" the Apostate Whore, the false institutional Church of heresiarchs, Sedes under independent bishops, SSPX, Resistance, home aloners, contain many obviously among the "church of the firstborn." Indeed, I allow that there are Catholics in the NO who are largely ignorant of these more arcane issues, who look to the Cross for their redemption and simply "repent, and believe the gospel."

But the Corporate, Institutional church is gone, has become the Whore, having merged with the world so that it is "one flesh" with it, ignoring among other Scriptures -


I do not think we disagree.

Well, yes, we are largely in agreement.

Where we disagree a bit is regarding the institutional church, which as an entity indeed "defects." The "two witnesses" lie "dead" on the streets of the
"great city":

Apoc. 11:8  And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city, which is called spiritually, Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord also was crucified.

Our Lord was crucified in Jerusalem, the place of the Temple, the center of external, corporate worship in the Old Covenant. That is a group, or institutional,not an individual, entity. Of course individuals "defect" but the prophecy concerns a "mass" of individuals gathered in an apostate entity. It is the institutional church of the Vatican at Rome in the New Covenant. That is the "temple" that the "son of perdition" reigns in during the Great Apostasy. The institution defects.

You call it "counterfeit," and, yes, in the sense of being false, apostate, etc. But it is what the institutional church has become, as prophesied.

The prophecy conflicts with what the manualists and theologians have said about the Institutional church, and hence the great confusion. Their description of Indefectibility doesn't square with the circle of fact. One can knee jerk say this is heretical, like Ladislaus, but it is what it is. Facts, and truth - and God's will and plan - do not bend to manualists and theologians, or wishful thinking, and cannot be evaded.

Well, yes, we are largely in agreement.

Where we disagree a bit is regarding the institutional church, which as an entity indeed "defects." The "two witnesses" lie "dead" on the streets of the
"great city":

Apoc. 11:8  And their bodies shall lie in the streets of the great city, which is called spiritually, Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord also was crucified.

Our Lord was crucified in Jerusalem, the place of the Temple, the center of external, corporate worship in the Old Covenant. That is a group, or institutional,not an individual, entity. Of course individuals "defect" but the prophecy concerns a "mass" of individuals gathered in an apostate entity. It is the institutional church of the Vatican at Rome in the New Covenant. That is the "temple" that the "son of perdition" reigns in during the Great Apostasy. The institution defects.

You call it "counterfeit," and, yes, in the sense of being false, apostate, etc. But it is what the institutional church has become, as prophesied.

The prophecy conflicts with what the manualists and theologians have said about the Institutional church, and hence the great confusion. Their description of Indefectibility doesn't square with the circle of fact. One can knee jerk say this is heretical, like Ladislaus, but it is what it is. Facts, and truth - and God's will and plan - do not bend to manualists and theologians, or wishful thinking, and cannot be evaded.

Okay DR. I'm not sure how much we disagree. Let me explain my position again.

1. Following St. Augustine, I believe that "the Church," in the "wayfaring state" in this world is bi-partite: it is a mixture of the citizens of the Heavenly City and of the citizens of the Earthly City. This "wayfaring" Church includes the people and all of the visible, institutional aspects necessary to thrive in "the world." But the institution in this world is a means to the end, not the end itself. Eternal life in Paradise is the ultimate goal for the "citizens of the Heavenly City."

2. The entire Church, the institution in the wayfaring state, does not defect. Otherwise, no one would be saved in the end times. Rather, the part of the wayfaring Church that is, what Augustine calls, the false brethren, the "citizens of the earthly city," are the ones who defect. Why? Because they were never really Catholic anyway. They just pretended to be Catholic for marriage or cultural reasons. When the going gets tough, the "false brethren" defect.

3. The end times "Counterfeit Church" is the body of "false brethren" within the SAME institution as the body of "the true Catholics." Augustine refers to the Parable of the Cockle as a figure of this. But Augustine makes it clear than even in his time, the Church had this same bi-partite character. It is not just an end times phenomenon.

4. So, the "two witnesses" are "citizens of the heavenly city" while living on earth. Why? Because they love heavenly things more than earthly things. They are willing to die for the Faith. The persecutors who "kill" the two witnesses are the "false brethren," who are the majority of institutional Catholics, but who are just posers, "cockle" who try to remake the ordered garden (what the Church was intended to be) into a chaotic mess. The "son of perdition," the Antichirst, is a cockle plant, posing as a wheat plant, who tells the other cockle to rise up and strangle the wheat. They can do this successfully because heretics have been nurtured in the institutional wayfaring Church for decades, instead of being cast out.

5. So, to conclude, the entire institutional, wayfaring Church, if understood in its members, has not defected and will never defect. But, rather, the overwhelming majority of the institution with almost the entire hierarchy will defect. But, in the end times, they don't defect and leave the premises to become "Anglican" or "Lutheran." The defectors claim the Roman Catholic Church as their own, renewed by Synodality. They are squatters. Jesus then has to return to cast them into hell and remake Paradise for the part of the wayfaring Church that did not defect, the faithful remnant.

Please let me know, again, where we differ.

Rev 12:14

And to the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, G5117 where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent.


Mat 24:15

When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, G5117 (whoso readeth, let him understand:)

I think the difference between us is mostly semantic, subtle differences in the meaning and use the terms, such as "institutional," but we  should continue the dialogue as I think we both sharpen our understandings thereby.

The shepherd being struck, the sheep are "scattered." Zech. 13:7. This scattering can be witnessed today: those united in faith but separated, Sedes, Resistance, SSPX, etc. There is no organized structure; their union is not "institutional" or organizational, but by doctrine or faith.

These sheep were indeed formally part of an institution called the Catholic Church; they existed within the institution,  with,  as you say, "tares" among them in the kingdom. This is no longer the case. To the extent there are the elect within the NO, their election is no longer institutional in any sense, as the institution has been abandoned by the other elect sheep with whom they remain united in faith. Again, the union of the sheep now is doctrinal, in Christ by the Spirit, and not organizational or institutional,  as they are disparate and scattered, and not united in a single organized institution, as formally.

If you want to call this union of the faithful the Catholic Church,  and identify the Catholic Church with the "church of the firstborn," fine,  but as you yourself concede, within that Catholic Church were individuals who were not Christ's Sheep, who were not in fact true members of the "church of the firstborn."

The fact that the institution is not coextensive with the "church of the firstborn" is now made clear by history and circuмstance. The institution was used indeed used by God for the spread of the Gospel and the gathering of the wheat; it was the external representation or figure of the "church of the firstborn," but the institution was NOT strictly speaking the "church of the firstborn."

We know this now because the "church of the firstborn" still exists on earth, members of it on this forum, discussing and sharing the faith of Christ, but not united in an organized body, an institution with spiritual authority over each of the members. Your "bishop" has no authority over me, even if we were in the same geographical location,  even if we were next door to each other. I could worship God in a different Catholic Church in the same city as you, with a different organizational structure.

The Novus Ordites, however, are in an institution under a central, organized authority, the institution we all - or our families - were members of. That institution has defected.

The "true church" was found in the institution formerly, but no longer. Just as the elect were found in Jeruslam/Israel, but after Christ's advent and the "calling out" from that defected institution, it was no longer.

Again,  I think we agree. This is just a different use and understanding of some of the tags or terms used to describe the current experience.

1 And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and it was said to me: Arise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar and them that adore therein.
Et datus est mihi calamus similis virgae, et dictum est mihi : Surge, et metire templum Dei, et altare, et adorantes in eo :

2 But the court, which is without the temple, cast out, and measure it not: because it is given unto the Gentiles, and the holy city they shall tread under foot two and forty months:
atrium autem, quod est foris templum, ejice foras, et ne metiaris illud : quoniam datum est gentibus, et civitatem sanctam calcabunt mensibus quadraginta duobus :