FROM: THE WAR IS NOW No.46, September 1998

May 19, 1988, a year after his letter on jurisdiction, Archbishop Lefebvre answered a correspondent: “ You have seized upon the radical solution in your judgment on the pope, and so, for you there is no longer a pope. It is a solution that simplifies the problems. As for us, we prefer to leave this judgment to God, and to act as if the pope were the Pope although we condemn his words, his writings, and his actions, which are those of a wicked shepherd. It is a more difficult solution but one which permits us to endeavor to have tradition restored to Rome.”

If only the SSPX leaders would speak and act as wise as the late Archbishop did!

Disobeying the pope undermines the authority of the pope.  It's like saying "the pope isn't the pope anymore, so I can ordain my own pocket bishops."

... or, or, like saying "I can disobey and vilify the Decrees of the Congregation of Sacred Rites and of the other Roman Congregations, making a instant rubricist-theologian-canonist out of myself whose tastes and pet theories are the 'theological opinions' all sedes and traditionalists are to adopt if they wish to call themselves 'traditional Catholics.'"  


... or, or, like saying "I can use the abolished Holy Week and look down upon everyone else who disagrees with me, because there is no Pope and therefore I am now the authority that the faithful ought to heed."


Let's not throw stones in a glass-house: the shards of shattered glass may cut us all...

[Edit: This is Hobbles. I forgot to click the box, again]

Quote from: Guest

Disobeying the pope undermines the authority of the pope.  It's like saying "the pope isn't the pope anymore, so I can ordain my own pocket bishops."

... or, or, like saying "I can disobey and vilify the Decrees of the Congregation of Sacred Rites and of the other Roman Congregations, making a instant rubricist-theologian-canonist out of myself whose tastes and pet theories are the 'theological opinions' all sedes and traditionalists are to adopt if they wish to call themselves 'traditional Catholics.'"  


... or, or, like saying "I can use the abolished Holy Week and look down upon everyone else who disagrees with me, because there is no Pope and therefore I am now the authority that the faithful ought to heed."


Let's not throw stones in a glass-house: the shards of shattered glass may cut us all...

... or like saying that the acephalous sedevacantist clergy have somehow formal Apostolic succession and jurisdiction that is not supplied by the Church herself in the individual instances in which the principles of epikeia would apply without exceeding the measure of prudence.

A noteworthy sedevacantist has just written:

THE JURISDICTION ISSUE HAS NOT BEEN SETTLED YET.  (THE MAJORITY SEEM TO BELIEVE THAT OUR CATHOLIC [TRADITIONAL] BISHOPS ONLY HAVE SUPPLIED JURISDICTION, BUT HAS THIS BEEN PROVEN?)

 

Yes, the "jurisdiction issue" has been settled: consult the theological manuals.

Furthermore, it is a fact that the sedevacantist acephalous clerics of the traditionalist movement have only supplied jurisdiction by their own assertion that the Apostolic See is vacant or usurped. Without the Roman Pontiff, none of these clerics can be said to have an Canonical office or mission, and they cannot claim formal Apostolic succession, nor habitual jurisdiction.

It is errors such as these that embarrass the sedevacantists all the more.

[Edit: This is Hobbles. I forgot to click the box again.]