Author Topic: Dogmatic Sedevacantists do not exist. (Read 4210 times)

Gregory I · « **on:** October 20, 2011, 01:44:52 AM »

There seems to be a trend for those who do not like the sedevacantist position, or find it to be erroneous to think that people like myself and others are somehow in this special class of "Dogmatic" sedevacantists.

First, such a position is utterly untenable. Sedevacantism cannot, nor will it ever be, a dogma. It is a word used to describe a state of affairs that belong to the temporal order: Sede Vacante. The Seat is vacant.

A sedevacant-ist is a person who contends, against the majority who say otherwise, that there is no Pope because the people who claim to be Pope are manifest, public and pertinacious heretics.

Sedevacant-ism is the actual contention itself.

Nor is it unheard of: I think most of us here have seen the theological writings and have seen the papal writings. The scenario of an heretical Pope being deposed ipso facto by his own public, manifest and notorious heresy is held by the vast majority of theologians who even posit the possibility.

Now, such a theological opinon CANNOT belong to the realm of dogma, because it is, itself, not part of the apostolic preaching, nor is it necessary to believe for salvation.

So why do we contend against those who deny it? Well, there are actually two arguments that often get jumbled and treated (incorrectly) as one:

1. The possiblity of a Pope being a public, manifest and notorious heretic,

2. The Historical reality of this having occured.

Now, first of all, even the SSPX'ers here, I would say at least half of them believe, theologically speaking that point 1 is at least possible.

I do not think the fact that the theologians teach it is possible is the issue: The issue is when we say: Look it happened. And other People say: no, it didn't. But that is not so much a question of theology as it is a question of history. The arguments are historical in nature: Did Paul VI do or say this? Wojtyla Do or say that? Did Benny do or say this? These are all actions that are clearly of an HISTORICAL nature.

A priori, I think most of us accept the theological possiblity of the thing itself: But there are some who contend the "popes" have not done such and such, but they actually make the point; for their argument hinges on the same proposition as ours: That he did NOT DO what we accuse him of doing. This of course presupposes that if he DID we would be right. This is a tacit admission to the theological point.

Therefore the difference is a matter of history and interpreting historical events:

Not DOGMA.

We all affirm the same dogmas. None of us are heretics. But we contend and strive for the truth of the sedevacantist position for the same reason a scholar contends for the accuracy of any other history: IT IS THE TRUTH. It is an objectively verifiable historical fact.

So abandon the misnomer DOGMATIC Sedevacantist and just call us Roman Catholics Who Contend the See is Vacant.

God bless you all,

Gregory I (Daniel).

ServusSpiritusSancti · « **Reply #1 on:** October 20, 2011, 09:15:33 AM »

There are sedes out there who believe sedevacantism is a dogma of some sort, like David Landry. Thus why I will not drop the dogmatic sedevacantist label because there are some of them out there. You aren't a dogmatic sede, nor is anyone else here for that matter except roscoe (even though he says there's no such thing as a sede LOL). But to clarify, when I address someone as a "dogmatic sedevacantist" it's only when that person says that everyone must be a sede to be part of the Church and blah blah blah.

Stephen Francis · « **Reply #2 on:** October 20, 2011, 03:02:28 PM »

One does not need to hold to the belief in invalid succession of the men after Pope Pius XII. It is easy enough to see that each of the men following him in their claims to the Papacy have been manifest heretics in their own right.

This is why I say in my signature that I don't need to be a sedevacantist. I don't have to swear by all of the contingencies and if/thens regarding succession, etc. It is enough for me that it has been made perfectly clear by God Almighty which men have been faithful and which have not.

Deo volente, soon we will have our Holy Father to return Rome to her visible and undeniable authority in the world as well as in the hearts of all of us who suffer these wicked usurpers.

Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us.

sedesvacans · « **Reply #3 on:** October 20, 2011, 11:16:14 PM »

This is a great topic.

I could never go to a mass that is una cuм Benedict XVI, because of the fact that the reason I am sedevacantist is because I believe he is a public, obstinate and stubborn heretic who is promoting Anti-Christ ideas and dogmas such as ecuмenism, modernism, indifferentism. I believe that with these ideas, he is trying to make a mockery of Christ's incarnation and passion.

No, sedevacantism is not a dogma, but anti-sedevacantism in these times is against all dogma.

sedesvacans · « **Reply #4 on:** October 20, 2011, 11:33:36 PM »

Quote from: Stephen Francis

One does not need to hold to the belief in invalid succession of the men after Pope Pius XII. It is easy enough to see that each of the men following him in their claims to the Papacy have been manifest heretics in their own right.

This is why I say in my signature that I don't need to be a sedevacantist. I don't have to swear by all of the contingencies and if/thens regarding succession, etc. It is enough for me that it has been made perfectly clear by God Almighty which men have been faithful and which have not.

Deo volente, soon we will have our Holy Father to return Rome to her visible and undeniable authority in the world as well as in the hearts of all of us who suffer these wicked usurpers.

Immaculate Heart of Mary, triumph soon.

Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us.

Wait, do I need to swear by contingencies and if/thens regarding succession?

I thought merely seeing that these men's claims to the papacy when they are manifest heretics and thus not Catholic and therefore, not popes, was sedevacantism.

roscoe · « **Reply #5 on:** October 21, 2011, 12:11:23 AM »

There is no such thing as 'sede vacantism'.

Charles · « **Reply #6 on:** October 21, 2011, 12:26:00 AM »

So what are Catholics who do not believe we've had a valid pope for over 50 years called roscoe ?

Raoul76 · « **Reply #7 on:** October 21, 2011, 01:31:48 AM »

You don't think it's something akin to a dogma that a public, manifest heretic can't be Pope? While it may not have been explicitly defined, isn't it Pharisacal to brush it aside on that basis? It's more like common sense than like a dogma, I'll grant you. So maybe the SSPX is not so much heretical as just irrational; and it really is.

Because if a manifest heretic who teaches soul-damning error to the universal Church can be Pope, the Church makes no sense; it's like saying that God can lie. How would we ever know the truth in those circuмstances? The only way would be to appoint a de facto Pope to sift the sayings of the nominal Pope. That is what SSPX has done, the head of the SSPX is in reality, for those who are in SSPX, a de facto Pope, who is looked to the way that Catholics should only look to the Pope. Because if he can tell us when to listen to the Pope and when not to, if he has veto power over the Pope, what does that make him? That's right, kids -- bigger than the Pope, more powerful than the Pope, ergo, the de facto Pope.

Then there are others in SSPX who just deny that they are heretics, as you go on to say ( excellent post by the way ). That is even more irrational.

Quote

A priori, I think most of us accept the theological possiblity of the thing itself: But there are some who contend the "popes" have not done such and such, but they actually make the point; for their argument hinges on the same proposition as ours: That he did NOT DO what we accuse him of doing.

And to try to prove their point, they have to deny the evidence of their own eyes. It reminds me of that line from A Day at the Races with Groucho Marx. He is dressed up as a doctor, pretending to be a doctor, but with bare hairy legs sticking out of his lab coat, looking like a madman, etc. Someone comes in and isn't quite sure they trust him, for obvious reasons. Groucho keeps telling him he's a doctor, and when it's still not working, he says "Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?" Genius line that so accurately describes the superstitious, hoaxed, scared-of-their-own-shadow masses: "Oooh, we might go to hell if we say the obvious non-Catholic who they show on TV is not a Pope." Even if you were WRONG, God does not work like that; if you are sincerely wrong, you wouldn't go to hell for being a sede. I said it before and I'll keep saying it, despite our age of technology and the information superhighway, we are more superstitious and less able to think clearly than illiterate medieval peasants with common sense.

Gregory I · « **Reply #8 on:** October 21, 2011, 02:28:24 AM »

Quote from: Raoul76

You don't think it's something akin to a dogma that a public, manifest heretic can't be Pope? While it may not have been explicitly defined, isn't it Pharisacal to brush it aside on that basis? It's more like common sense than like a dogma, I'll grant you. So maybe the SSPX is not so much heretical as just irrational; and it really is.

Because if a manifest heretic who teaches soul-damning error to the universal Church can be Pope, the Church makes no sense; it's like saying that God can lie. How would we ever know the truth in those circuмstances? The only way would be to appoint a de facto Pope to sift the sayings of the nominal Pope. That is what SSPX has done, the head of the SSPX is in reality, for those who are in SSPX, a de facto Pope, who is looked to the way that Catholics should only look to the Pope. Because if he can tell us when to listen to the Pope and when not to, if he has veto power over the Pope, what does that make him? That's right, kids -- bigger than the Pope, more powerful than the Pope, ergo, the de facto Pope.

Then there are others in SSPX who just deny that they are heretics, as you go on to say ( excellent post by the way ). That is even more irrational.

Quote
A priori, I think most of us accept the theological possiblity of the thing itself: But there are some who contend the "popes" have not done such and such, but they actually make the point; for their argument hinges on the same proposition as ours: That he did NOT DO what we accuse him of doing.

And to try to prove their point, they have to deny the evidence of their own eyes. It reminds me of that line from A Day at the Races with Groucho Marx. He is dressed up as a doctor, pretending to be a doctor, but with bare hairy legs sticking out of his lab coat, looking like a madman, etc. Someone comes in and isn't quite sure they trust him, for obvious reasons. Groucho keeps telling him he's a doctor, and when it's still not working, he says "Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?" Genius line that so accurately describes the superstitious, hoaxed, scared-of-their-own-shadow masses: "Oooh, we might go to hell if we say the obvious non-Catholic who they show on TV is not a Pope." Even if you were WRONG, God does not work like that; if you are sincerely wrong, you wouldn't go to hell for being a sede. I said it before and I'll keep saying it, despite our age of technology and the information superhighway, we are more superstitious and less able to think clearly than illiterate medieval peasants with common sense.

My point Raoul was simply that sedevacantism is a temporal movement in a unique and particular moment of history. The THEOLOGY of it is founded on Dogma, don't get me wrong. But it cannot be APPLIED dogmatically in this sense: To assert That Benedict is the Pope is more an error of fact than dogma. Such an assertion contradicts no teaching of the church: For those who make the assertion simultaneously believe him to not be heretical, unless of course you are SSPX and then it gets complicated.

My main point was that there is no person who can say the denial of sedevacantism constitutes a denial of Catholic doctrine: Because the denial is not based on the denial of theology, but on disagreement as to the FACT of its application here and now.

It's a purely temporal and historical dispute, unless you actually believe in the FACE of the vast majority of theologians that a public and manifest heretic can be Pope. Then you would have problem, because the faithful are obliged to hold to the unanimous teaching (which can be a morall unanimity, and not univocal) of approved theologians.

Nevertheless, roscoe has a point that this teaching, while based on dogma, does not constitute "sedevacantism." That is the name of a movement that applies this theology to real-world applicable situations.

Nishant · « **Reply #9 on:** October 22, 2011, 07:49:26 AM »

Sedevacantism is a theological possibility, but there is a difference in saying, "Everyone is bound to reject the Papal claimant who appears to have fallen into heresy" from "Anyone may reject a Papal claimant who appears to have done so". I think the first can be called "dogmatic sedevacantism" because sometimes it is treated as if it were a dogma, as if it were, properly so called, an object of divine and Catholic faith necessary for salvation, and concepts like culpability and invincible ignorance are likewise applied to it as well.

Hobbledehoy · « **Reply #10 on:** October 22, 2011, 08:51:25 AM »

Quote from: Gregory I

My point Raoul was simply that sedevacantism is a temporal movement in a unique and particular moment of history. The THEOLOGY of it is founded on Dogma, don't get me wrong. But it cannot be APPLIED dogmatically in this sense: To assert That Benedict is the Pope is more an error of fact than dogma. Such an assertion contradicts no teaching of the church: For those who make the assertion simultaneously believe him to not be heretical, unless of course you are SSPX and then it gets complicated.

My main point was that there is no person who can say the denial of sedevacantism constitutes a denial of Catholic doctrine: Because the denial is not based on the denial of theology, but on disagreement as to the FACT of its application here and now.

It's a purely temporal and historical dispute, unless you actually believe in the FACE of the vast majority of theologians that a public and manifest heretic can be Pope. Then you would have problem, because the faithful are obliged to hold to the unanimous teaching (which can be a morall unanimity, and not univocal) of approved theologians.

Nevertheless, roscoe has a point that this teaching, while based on dogma, does not constitute "sedevacantism." That is the name of a movement that applies this theology to real-world applicable situations.

This and what Nishant2011 wrote is exactly the reason why I am disturbed by sedevacantists who treat their theological position as if it were a political party.

No one sedevacantist can oblige individual consciences to his position, when even the sedevacantist clergy cannot do that since they have no jurisdiction at all. All they have is supplied jurisdiction in the very acts in which the Church supplies such jurisdiction, but it is not habitual.

I think the sedevacantists should stop behaving like they have what their clergy can never claim without either embarrassing themselves or committing gross aberrations and even errors proximate to heresy (at least in the practical order, because positing Ordinary Jurisdiction without the Roman Pontiff seems to me too much like an error against the Vatican Council's definition of Papal primacy).

Anyways, these are my points of view. I have no jurisdiction, so you can dismiss them at will

Gregory I · « **Reply #11 on:** October 22, 2011, 11:04:17 AM »

Quote from: Nishant2011

Sedevacantism is a theological possibility, but there is a difference in saying, "Everyone is bound to reject the Papal claimant who appears to have fallen into heresy" from "Anyone may reject a Papal claimant who appears to have done so". I think the first can be called "dogmatic sedevacantism" because sometimes it is treated as if it were a dogma, as if it were, properly so called, an object of divine and Catholic faith necessary for salvation, and concepts like culpability and invincible ignorance are likewise applied to it as well.

Well, I would have to say that no one lay individual is an authentic interpreter of either canon law or the unanimous teaching othe Church approved theologians. We are private interpreters. But that does not mean we cannot CERTAINLY KNOW that the theological position espoused by the majority of church theologians applies to such and such a situation. Perhaps my view is unique: But I would not oblige other people to hold to sedevacantism on the basis of the THEOLOGY being a part of revelation declared by the church as such (Ecclesiastical dogma). Rather, my incentive for and motive for desiring to convince other people as to the truth of the sedevacantist theological position is that, simply put, it can be historically demonstrated. For example, there is historical precedent for clerics wanting to call a council to depose a Pope for private Heresy (Savonorola and Alexander VI). In the past, the clerics of Rome have stripped a pontiff of his Pontifical title on the basis of suspected heresy (Pope Liberius) and elected another (Anti/Pope Felix). When Nestorius, the Patriarch of Constantinople first preached heresy, the Council of Ephesus declared that from the moment of his preaching, he ceased to have a ministry in the church.

There are various historical precedents that indicate the Church's attitude toward heretical leaders: They have no ministry from the instant the publically and notoriously manifest heresy. The theologians of the Church teach this almost unanimously. So on this basis, I strive to demonstrate the historical FACT of Precedent, and the Historical FACT of its current application to those who can be shown to be Public manifest and notorious heretics: Either through private teaching that is widely disseminated, or through acts that give witness to heresy.

We cannot deny that these actions fall within the parameters envisioned by the theologians of the church, and that other prelates in the past, including Popes, have been deposed for far less (Liberius and the Arians and the Creed, etc.).

Matthew · « **Reply #12 on:** October 22, 2011, 12:08:01 PM »

Quote from: SpiritusSanctus

There are sedes out there who believe sedevacantism is a dogma of some sort, like David Landry. Thus why I will not drop the dogmatic sedevacantist label because there are some of them out there. You aren't a dogmatic sede, nor is anyone else here for that matter except roscoe (even though he says there's no such thing as a sede LOL). But to clarify, when I address someone as a "dogmatic sedevacantist" it's only when that person says that everyone must be a sede to be part of the Church and blah blah blah.

Yes, this is my position as well.

Gregory I, you're not a dogmatic sedevacantist, which is why you're welcome here. Likewise all the other sedevacantists on here (of which there is no shortage!)
But you haven't been on CathInfo very long. Long-time members have seen several so-called "dogmatic sedevacantists". They do exist, sorry to say. Sad but true.

They literally consider it to be a dogma, and that anyone who denies that dogma does not possess sanctifying grace (being a heretic), and is matter for conversion.

Nishant · « **Reply #13 on:** October 22, 2011, 01:06:30 PM »

Gregory, I think Liberius actually remained Pope and Felix was the Anti-Pope, according to most theologians who studied the issue and even perhaps official Church lists. That being said, I think St.Robert Bellarmine's comments on it are illumininating, for he says the opposite also applies.

He says what Raoul said, that men are not bound to read hearts, and even if they are wrong, in being sedevacantists, as it would seem those who attempted to declare Pope Liberius deposed were, God would not hold that alone against them.

Of course, even as someone who does believe there is a Pope, I grant the common teaching of theologians on this point, that a Pope cannot be a manifest heretic. However, I still think a future ecclesiastical court will have to decide the question, for all faithful Catholic Christians to have the necessary certainty we need in such a matter.

Obviously, even if the good God, in His mercy, will choose to forgive us, we must still act in accordance with known truth. But I think, frankly, it is hard, to be sure about this, either way or the other. I've tried. Now, I prefer to leave it to God, and devote myself to prayer and the spiritual life. If at all I'm wrong, and it is God's will for me to know the truth in this matter, I trust that in any case prayer will help me in coming to that knowledge more than theology alone.

LordPhan · « **Reply #14 on:** October 22, 2011, 09:22:45 PM »

Quote from: sedesvacans

This is a great topic.

I could never go to a mass that is una cuм Benedict XVI, because of the fact that the reason I am sedevacantist is because I believe he is a public, obstinate and stubborn heretic who is promoting Anti-Christ ideas and dogmas such as ecuмenism, modernism, indifferentism. I believe that with these ideas, he is trying to make a mockery of Christ's incarnation and passion.

No, sedevacantism is not a dogma, but anti-sedevacantism in these times is against all dogma.

This is a schismatic act.