http://christorchaos.com/IfThisIsANoIWouldHateToSeeWhatYesLooksLike.htmIf This Is A "No," I'd Hate to See What "Yes" Looks Like
by Thomas A. Droleskey
Some traditionally-minded websites have attempted to keep their fingers on the "pulse" of the soap opera involving the leaders of the Society of Saint Pius X and the revolutionaries who comprise the counterfeit church of conciliarism. After three years of head-spinning contradictions and thoroughly predictable developments, I decided about a month ago that enough was quite enough of this madness. The conciliar revolutionaries are apostates. It is far past time for the clergy and the laity of the Society of Saint Pius X to recognize that apostates cannot hold office in the Catholic Church legitimately and that it is impossible for any true Successor of Saint Peter to contradict or put into question settled matters of the Holy Faith.
As I have explained before in many other articles on site, something unprecedented is happening. Either the See of Peter is vacant or God is permitting true popes to defect from the Faith while remaining members of the Catholic Church in good standing. The former is a canonical doctrine of the Catholic Church. The latter is impossible.
Some anti-sedevacantists argue viscerally that "God would never permit" there to be a period of papal vacancy lasting over fifty years now, noting that such a situation is without precedent and is in violation of the teaching of the [First] Vatican Council that Saint Peter will have perpetual successors to his throne (for a refutation of the latter argument, please see An Objection to Sedevacantism: 'Perpetual Successors' to Peter). This specious argument, however, means that it is possible for there to be a period of over fifty years wherein true popes can blaspheme God repeatedly by publicly esteeming the symbols of false religions, entering into places of false worship and treating the "ministers" of false religions as having a mission from God to serve and thus to save souls and of praising the nonexistent ability of false religions to contribute to the "building" of a "better" world that corresponds to the "dignity of man" in his quest for the "civilization of love." Where is the precedent for this? Where?
No one with a shred of intellectual honesty can assert that there is any precedent for one supposed "pope" after another doing and saying things that have been anathematized by the Catholic Church's true dogmatic councils, each of which was guided infallible by the Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, and/or been condemned by the Fathers of the Church and/or by our true popes.
There is no precedent, not even in the times of Arianism, for the sort of liturgical abominations that have stemmed from the liturgical abomination par excellence, the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service that is hideous in the sight of the Most Blessed Trinity.
There is no precedent for a "pope" to deny the very nature of dogmatic truth or to make it appear as though the Catholic Church does not have a mission to seek with urgency the conversion of all non-Catholics to the true Church, outside of which there is no salvation and without which there can be no true social order.
There is no precedent for a "pope" to deny the very nature of the Church by stating that non-Catholic Christians have a "partial" communion with her.
There is no precedent for a "pope" to enter into a тαℓмυdic ѕуηαgσgυє, a place that, like all other temples of false worship, belongs to the devil himself, and being treated as an inferior while listening to a demonic hymn that denies that the Messias has already come.
There is no precedent for a "pope" to enter into a Mohammedan mosque as he takes off his shoes so as to signify being in a "holy" place or of assuming the Mohammedan "prayer" position as he turns in the direction of Mecca at the behest of his Mohammedan host.
Never before has it been the case of the history of the Catholic Church that her officials have sent No true pope in the history of the Catholic Church authorized annual "Happy Diwali" or "Happy Vesakh" messages to be sent to adherents of two of the devil's false religions of the "Eastern" variety, Buddhism or Hinduism (see Have a Happy, Baal, Yes, Most Holy Trinity, No, One or the Other, On A Mission of Their Very Own and A Tale of Two Benedicts).
Never before has a true Successor of Saint Peter praised false religions as instruments for the "building of peace and understanding" in a "more just" world as the means to create a "civilization of love" in an effort to fight irreligion with some generic concept of "religion," a falsehood that was specifically mocked and rejected by Pope Pius XI in Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928:
Is it not right, it is often repeated, indeed, even consonant with duty, that all who invoke the name of Christ should abstain from mutual reproaches and at long last be united in mutual charity? Who would dare to say that he loved Christ, unless he worked with all his might to carry out the desires of Him, Who asked His Father that His disciples might be "one." And did not the same Christ will that His disciples should be marked out and distinguished from others by this characteristic, namely that they loved one another: "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one for another"? All Christians, they add, should be as "one": for then they would be much more powerful in driving out the pest of irreligion, which like a serpent daily creeps further and becomes more widely spread, and prepares to rob the Gospel of its strength. These things and others that class of men who are known as pan-Christians continually repeat and amplify; and these men, so far from being quite few and scattered, have increased to the dimensions of an entire class, and have grouped themselves into widely spread societies, most of which are directed by non-Catholics, although they are imbued with varying doctrines concerning the things of faith. This undertaking is so actively promoted as in many places to win for itself the adhesion of a number of citizens, and it even takes possession of the minds of very many Catholics and allures them with the hope of bringing about such a union as would be agreeable to the desires of Holy Mother Church, who has indeed nothing more at heart than to recall her erring sons and to lead them back to her bosom. But in reality beneath these enticing words and blandishments lies hid a most grave error, by which the foundations of the Catholic faith are completely destroyed. (Pope Pius XI, Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928.)
This is a ringing condemnation of everything that the false popes have said and done concerning their embrace of false ecuмenism and their engaging in the syncretism represented by "inter-religious prayer" services of varying kinds in all manner of places, Catholic and non-Catholic alike.
Even the late conciliar head of the Apostolic Signatura, Mario Francesco "Cardinal" Pompedda, recognized that sedevacantism is indeed a canonical doctrine of the Catholic Church:
It is true that the canonical doctrine states that the see would be vacant in the case of heresy. ... But in regard to all else, I think what is applicable is what judgment regulates human acts. And the act of will, namely a resignation or capacity to govern or not govern, is a human act. (Cardinal Says Pope Could Govern Even If Unable to Speak, Zenit, February 8, 2005.)
Various priests of the Society of Saint Pius X have spoken up very forcefully and courageously to denounce the heresies and apostasies of concilairism without coming to state publicly that conciliar revolutionaries are part of a counterfeit church, one that is an ape of the Catholic Church and whose officials are but forgettable figures in history even though each is a prefiguring of Antichrist. This most commendable. However, the belief that a public resistance to a true pope is necessary concedes that which the Catholic Church has never taught before, namely, that her true pontiffs can teach error when not proclaiming a doctrine infallibly, and is thus as harmful to the sensus Catholicus as the "new ecclesiology" of the conciliar revolutionaries themselves.
Keeping this mind, therefore, it is nevertheless useful to include here a "canonical warning" issued by Father Daniel Couture of the Society of Saint Pius X, which has no "canonical" status in the counterfeit church of conciliarism, to Father Francois Chazal because of the latter's forthright denunciations of conciliarism without, of course, coming to recognize the true state of the Church Militant in this time of apostasy and betrayal:
On 8 June 2012 a penal precept and a first canonical monition were issued, with the accord of the Superior General and his Council, in the hope that you would realize the gravity of the actions, declarations, and publications which have been the cause of grave scandal and great spiritual damage for our faithful and for our apostolate.
This docuмent was hand-delivered to you by Fr. Thomas Onoda on 9 June 2012. That very day you violated the interdiction of the penal precept by flying to Hong Kong, and then to Korea and to Japan, against explicit orders not to do so.
In Korea, on 10 June 2012, you preached a sermon called “What’s Next”, which you publicized in the Internet. This same docuмent, as well as your other docuмent “War On”, you have also subsequently distributed in Tanay and Baguio Mass centers, and you have displayed “What’s Next” in Our Lady of Victories Church, in Manila, on Sunday morning 22 July 2012. Two other docuмents of yours, “I accuse the Counsel” and “I Excuse the Council” have just been put on the Internet as well.
I am hereby issuing a second and final canonical monition according to can. 697 C.I.C. 1983/ can. 660 C.I.C. 1917, asking you to submit to the penal precept of 8 June 2012. If you violate its terms once more, the Superior General will institute penal proceedings leading to your dismissal from our Society for stubborn disobedience to legitimate orders in a grave matter and for grave scandal resulting for culpable behavior, according to can. 696 C.I.C. 1983/ can. 656 C.I.C. 1917, and to the particular law of the Society of St. Pius X (cf. General Chapter 2006, Cor Unum. 85; Modifications to the Statutes, 4).
You have already been notified of your right under the law to self-defense, including a canonical counsel. You have the right as well to present to the Superior General, in person or in writing, your defense against this second canonical monition and the proposed dismissal within fifteen days of receipt of this docuмent. All your communications and responses will be given due consideration in the process.
Given at Manila, July 31, 2012, Father Daniel Couture (Father Chazal- In Answer to the Second Canonical Monition.)
Father Chazal, whose First Friday Mass on December 6, 1982, at Saint Michael the Archangel Church in Farmingville, New York, was our first at chapel of the Society of Saint Pius X and who just eleven days later offered the Requiem Mass for our dear friend, the late Father Salvatore V. Franco, was defiant in the face of this meaningless letter:
Fr. Daniel Couture
In the presence of Fr. Michael Fortin
+Vienna, Virginia, 06 August 2012
Dear Father Couture,
The blade is now about to fall. You have kindly notified me that I may present a defense before the Superior General before that action is taken. I would be grateful to you if you would convey to him this – my last defense against the accusation of “stubborn disobedience” and “grave scandal”, resulting from “culpable behavior”.
There is no need for me to present again my case of evidence of a clear change of stance concerning Vatican II, now viewed as a fixable or bypassable Council; or the dangerous failure to denounce today’s “Magisterium”; or the desire to place the SSPX under the ongoing fornicating new Rome, not to mention the new possibilities of placing our houses under the local dioceses, as well as other practical surrenders.
Since May of this year, no attempt at resolving these differences has been successful, and no written refutation of the four docuмents “War On”, “What Next”, “I Excuse”, and “I Accuse” has been made thus far, isolating my arguments and evidence, and then refuting them.
I would think, in the interest of your cause, that it would be better for you to do so now; otherwise, you might show the world that your best argument is the guillotine. As a result, many priests of the Society who clearly agree with what I have said in the four docuмents, will be left without doctrinal protection against what you view as a “great scandal” and thus be further encouraged to disagree with Menzingen as I will stand as a punished witness to a yet unrefuted stance.
But the sole “War On” docuмent alone, some say, contains 33 arguments, and the whole case rests essentially on the fact that modernist Rome and its actions are still deeply steeped in heresy.
That is why I have lost all expectation that you would issue such a refutation, which in turn opens another question: Is the publication of such a dissenting line from the party line of Menzingen, in all possible forms – pulpit, print, speech, internet, beard, red sash, etc. – a “great scandal” and a “great damage” and a grave disobedience to the Society?
The answer to such a question is yours, because you know so well that our founder did much more than I do. He dared to stand against Popes, Councils, Bishops worldwide and theologians.
Therefore my condemnation will make sense if the content of these four public docuмents is erroneous, and I do believe that I was always glad to obey my superiors until this crisis.
Lastly, I would like to complete my defense with Our Lady. To this day, I still do not understand how the piety of our faithful towards Her was chosen as an instrument for the reconciliation plans. And is there an awareness that the man who will process the reconciliation plans is the prefect of the CDF, a man notorious for his denial of Mother Mary’s virginity? I have heard from the Horse’s Mouth (the First Assistant) that we cannot build our plans on a miraculous triumph of Our Lady above the institution of the Papacy; I remember that Benedict XVI is the most recent chief plotter of the burial of the message of Fatima, and, in the end, instead of Our Lady choosing the time and nature of Her Triumph, we will tell Her what the circuмstances are that She must follow and supposedly this is how the papacy will convert.
Indeed, if you choose to deny me proper trial and examination, I shall rejoice at the fall of the blade.
Reverenter ac devote,
In Iesu et Maria,
Francois Chazal+ (Father Chazal- In Answer to the Second Canonical Monition.)
If the as-yet-to-be publicly-released official response of the leaders of the Society of Saint Pius X to the conciliar church's so-called Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's response to Bishop Bernard Fellay's response to the revisions proposed to the "doctrinal preamble" that he was handed eleven months ago now is a "no," I would hate to see what a "yes" looks like. After all, if it's a "no," my good, few and mostly freeloading readers (come on, take a joke, lighten up; I'm stating the truth but condemning no one in the process even though we do need assistance at this time, all right?), why transfer Bishops Bernard Tissier de Mallerais and Alfonso Galaretta? Why threaten to expel men such as Father Chazal who are simply repeating Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre's own condemnations of concilairism? It's because the forthcoming answer of the Society of Saint Pius X to the conciliar revolutionaries will be a heavily nuance "not now," not "no."
What is being threatened against Father Chazal continues some of the most laughable scenes that has played out recently as the leaders of the Society of Saint Pius X and their mouthpieces who run various websites, including Rorate Caeli, term those within the Society of Saint Pius X who oppose "reconciliation" with the counterfeit church of conciliarism as "rebels" against their "lawful superiors." What sanctimonious hypocrisy. What hubris.
Let me get this straight. The leaders in the Society of Saint Pius X who rebelled against the theological and doctrinal rebels of the conciliar church who rebelled against God and His Holy Church in the first place are said to constitute "lawful authorities" who can compel "obedience" from others who, if they disagree with various decisions, must be termed as "rebels" in their own right and then expelled from a religious community that has no official "canonical" standing in what its leaders believe is the Catholic Church. Got all that?
Illogic and hypocrisy are not the sole purview of the conciliar revolutionaries. Those who suffer from Romanitas and hold their tongues in what they protest is a "discreet silence" as the man they consider to be the "pope" gives "joint blessings" with the non-ordained "clergy" of Protestant sects and enters into their false temples, being content as well to enter into тαℓмυdic ѕуηαgσgυєs to be treated as a inferior while hymns are played that express a longing for the "coming" of a Saviour Who has already come to redeem us and will come again in glory to judge and the living and the dead. Silence about these outrages, Rorate Caeli?
Go tell that to Pope Saint Leo the Great:
But it is vain for them to adopt the name of catholic, as they do not oppose these blasphemies: they must believe them, if they can listen so patiently to such words. (Pope Saint Leo the Great, Epistle XIV, To Anastasius, Bishop of Thessalonica, St. Leo the Great | Letters 1-59 )
Gallicanism Must Go, Catholicism Must Guide and Prevail
Taking nothing away the late Archbishop Lefebvre's courage in opposing conciliarism and suffering sanctions and public scorn for doing so, the "founding principles" that have served as the basis upon which the Society of Saint Pius X continues to "resist but recognize" one false claimant to the See of Saint Peter after another is false, being but a contemporary expression of the position embraced by the illegal Synod of Pistoia and that was mocked by Bishop Emile Bougaud in the Nineteenth Century in no uncertain terms. It is not to defame the memory of Archbishop Lefebvre or to denigrate his courage to state that he was not infallibly guided by God the Holy Ghost. He was wrong. As I noted a few months ago, We Must Abide By Truth, Not By Persons, not even courageous prelates when they are wrong.
Here, for a reminder for newer readers, is Pope Pius VI's condemnation of the propositions advanced by the Synod of Pistoia that are identical to the position of the Society of Saint Pius X, followed by Bishop Bougaud's condemnation of the precise theological position concerning the papacy that the Society of Saint Pius X has taken from its inception:
6. The doctrine of the synod by which it professes that "it is convinced that a bishop has received from Christ all necessary rights for the good government of his diocese," just as if for the good government of each diocese higher ordinances dealing either with faith and morals, or with general discipline, are not necessary, the right of which belongs to the supreme Pontiffs and the General Councils for the universal Church,—schismatic, at least erroneous.
7. Likewise, in this, that it encourages a bishop "to pursue zealously a more perfect constitution of ecclesiastical discipline," and this "against all contrary customs, exemptions, reservations which are opposed to the good order of the diocese, for the greater glory of God and for the greater edification of the faithful"; in that it supposes that a bishop has the right by his own judgment and will to decree and decide contrary to customs, exemptions, reservations, whether they prevail in the universal Church or even in each province, without the consent or the intervention of a higher hierarchic power, by which these customs, etc., have been introduced or approved and have the force of law,—leading to schism and subversion of hierarchic rule, erroneous.
8. Likewise, in that it says it is convinced that "the rights of a bishop received from Jesus Christ for the government of the Church cannot be altered nor hindered, and, when it has happened that the exercise of these rights has been interrupted for any reason whatsoever, a bishop can always and should return to his original rights, as often as the greater good of his church demands it"; in the fact that it intimates that the exercise of episcopal rights can be hindered and coerced by no higher power, whenever a bishop shall judge that it does not further the greater good of his church,—leading to schism, and to subversion of hierarchic government, erroneous. (Pope Pius VI, Auctorem Fidei, August 28, 1794.)
The violent attacks of Protestantism against the Papacy, its calumnies and so manifest, the odious caricatures it scattered abroad, had undoubtedly inspired France with horror; nevertheless the sad impressions remained. In such accusations all, perhaps, was not false. Mistrust was excited., and instead of drawing closer to the insulted and outraged Papacy, France stood on her guard against it. In vain did Fenelon, who felt the danger, write in his treatise on the "Power of the Pope," and, to remind France of her sublime mission and true role in the world, compose his "History of Charlemagne." In vain did Bossuet majestically rise in the midst of that agitated assembly of 1682, convened to dictate laws to the Holy See, and there, in most touching accents, give vent to professions of fidelity and devotedness toward the Chair of St. Peter. We already notice in his discourse mention no longer made of the "Sovereign Pontiff." The "Holy See," the "Chair of St. Peter," the "Roman Church," were alone alluded to. First and alas! too manifest signs of coldness in the eyes of him who knew the nature and character of France! Others might obey through duty, might allow themselves to be governed by principle--France, never! She must be ruled by an individual, she must love him that governs her, else she can never obey.
These weaknesses should at least have been hidden in the shadow of the sanctuary, to await the time in which some sincere and honest solution of the misunderstanding could be given. But no! parliaments took hold of it, national vanity was identified with it. A strange spectacle was now seen. A people the most Catholic in the world; kings who called themselves the Eldest Sons of the Church and who were really such at heart; grave and profoundly Christian magistrates, bishops, and priests, though in the depths of their heart attached to Catholic unity,--all barricading themselves against the head of the Church; all digging trenches and building ramparts, that his words might not reach the Faithful before being handled and examined, and the laics convinced that they contained nothing false, hostile or dangerous. (Right Reverend Emile Bougaud, The Life of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque. Published in 1890 by Benziger Brothers. Re-printed by TAN Books and Publishers, 1990, pp. 24-29.)
Pope Pius IX included the following condemnation of the view that Catholics are bound to accept only those things that are declared infallibly by Holy Mother Church and are thus free to question or sift through other teachings, which is what the members of the Society of Saint Pius X has done with the decrees of the "Second" Vatican Council and the statements of the postconciliar "popes":
22. The obligation by which Catholic teachers and authors are strictly bound is confined to those things only which are proposed to universal belief as dogmas of faith by the infallible judgment of the Church. -- Letter to the Archbishop of Munich, "Tuas libenter," Dec. 21, 1863. (Proposition condemned by Pope Pius IX, The Syllabus of Errors, December 8, 1864; see also two appendices below, reprised from five days ago to drive home the point that no one can sift through the words of a true pope to "determine" their orthodoxy as popes cannot err on matters of Faith and Morals.
Pope Pius XII explained in Humani Generis, August 12, 1950, that Catholics to believe in the binding nature of the teaching contained in papal encyclical letters, meaning, of course, that we are not free to "pick and choose" what we "like" about encyclical letters:
20. Nor must it be thought that what is expounded in Encyclical Letters does not of itself demand consent, since in writing such Letters the Popes do not exercise the supreme power of their Teaching Authority. For these matters are taught with the ordinary teaching authority, of which it is true to say: "He who heareth you, heareth me";[3] and generally what is expounded and inculcated in Encyclical Letters already for other reasons appertains to Catholic doctrine. But if the Supreme Pontiffs in their official docuмents purposely pass judgment on a matter up to that time under dispute, it is obvious that that matter, according to the mind and will of the Pontiffs, cannot be any longer considered a question open to discussion among theologians. (Pope Pius XII, Humani Generis, August 12, 1950; please see the Appendix A below for Alfred Cardinal Ottaviani's own critique of the Modernist effort to disparage the binding nature of the Church's teaching concerning religious liberty and the separation of Church and State, followed by Monsignor Joseph Clifford Fenton's own treatise on the matter in the appendix below.)
The whole foundation of the Society of Saint Pius X's "resistance" to the "Second" Vatican Council and the "magisterium" of the conciliar "popes" is false and without any justification in Catholic teaching. True popes must be obeyed. The whole "dance" between the Society of Saint Pius X and the conciliar officials has been and continues to be an exercise in falsehood as the Society has sought to oppose with the "new ecclesiology" of with conciliarists with a false ecclesiology of its very own. None of this is from God. Fighting the falsehoods of conciliarism with the falsehood of Gallicanism of the Society of Saint Pius X can produce nothing other than chaos. Behold the chaos in which the Society of Saint Pius X finds itself at this time.
Giovanni Montini/Paul VI made it very clear at the close of the "Second" Vatican Council on December 8, 1965, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, that the decisions on the council had to be religiously observed by Catholics:
APOSTOLIC BRIEF "IN SPIRITU SANCTO' FOR THE CLOSING OF THE COUNCIL - DECEMBER 8, 1965, read at the closing ceremonies of Dec. 8 by Archbishop Pericle Felici, general secretary of the council.
The Second Vatican Ecuмenical Council, assembled in the Holy Spirit and under the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom we have declared Mother of the Church, and of St. Joseph, her glorious spouse, and of the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul, must be numbered without doubt among the greatest events of the Church. In fact it was the largest in the number of Fathers who came to the seat of Peter from every part of the world, even from those places where the hierarchy has been very recently established. It was the richest because of the questions which for four sessions have been discussed carefully and profoundly. And last of all it was the most opportune, because, bearing in mind the necessities of the present day, above all it sought to meet the pastoral needs and, nourishing the flame of charity, it has made a great effort to reach not only the Christians still separated from communion with the Holy See, but also the whole human family.
At last all which regards the holy ecuмenical council has, with the help of God, been accomplished and all the constitutions, decrees, declarations and votes have been approved by the deliberation of the synod and promulgated by us. Therefore we decided to close for all intents and purposes, with our apostolic authority, this same ecuмenical council called by our predecessor, Pope John XXIII, which opened October 11, 1962, and which was continued by us after his death.
We decided moreover that all that has been established synodally is to be religiously observed by all the faithful, for the glory of God and the dignity of the Church and for the tranquillity and peace of all men. We have approved and established these things, decreeing that the present letters are and remain stable and valid, and are to have legal effectiveness, so that they be disseminated and obtain full and complete effect, and so that they may be fully convalidated by those whom they concern or may concern now and in the future; and so that, as it be judged and described, all efforts contrary to these things by whomever or whatever authority, knowingly or in ignorance be invalid and worthless from now on.
Given in Rome at St. Peter's, under the [seal of the] ring of the fisherman, Dec. 8, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the year 1965, the third year of our pontificate. (APOSTOLIC BRIEF - IN SPIRITU SANCTO.)
Religiously observed? How can one who says he finds "mistakes" in the "Second" Vatican Council, particularly in Dignitatis Humanae (the Decree on Religious Liberty), be said to have religiously observed its decrees? He cannot.
It is also offensive to pious ears for those in the Society of Saint Pius X to keep insisting, correctly, it should be noted, that there are errors in the docuмents of the "Second" Vatican Council while continuing to insist that that council did the work of the Catholic Church, which was not the case. The Catholic Church makes no term with error. She is the spotless, virginal Mystical Spouse of her Divine Bridegroom and Invisible Head, Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Here is what our true popes have told us:
As for the rest, We greatly deplore the fact that, where the ravings of human reason extend, there is somebody who studies new things and strives to know more than is necessary, against the advice of the apostle. There you will find someone who is overconfident in seeking the truth outside the Catholic Church, in which it can be found without even a light tarnish of error. Therefore, the Church is called, and is indeed, a pillar and foundation of truth. You correctly understand, venerable brothers, that We speak here also of that erroneous philosophical system which was recently brought in and is clearly to be condemned. This system, which comes from the contemptible and unrestrained desire for innovation, does not seek truth where it stands in the received and holy apostolic inheritance. Rather, other empty doctrines, futile and uncertain doctrines not approved by the Church, are adopted. Only the most conceited men wrongly think that these teachings can sustain and support that truth. (Pope Gregory XVI, Singulari Nos, May 25, 1834.)
Just as Christianity cannot penetrate into the soul without making it better, so it cannot enter into public life without establishing order. With the idea of a God Who governs all, Who is infinitely Wise, Good, and Just, the idea of duty seizes upon the consciences of men. It assuages sorrow, it calms hatred, it engenders heroes. If it has transformed pagan society--and that transformation was a veritable resurrection--for barbarism disappeared in proportion as Christianity extended its sway, so, after the terrible shocks which unbelief has given to the world in our days, it will be able to put that world again on the true road, and bring back to order the States and peoples of modern times. But the return of Christianity will not be efficacious and complete if it does not restore the world to a sincere love of the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. In the Catholic Church Christianity is Incarnate. It identifies Itself with that perfect, spiritual, and, in its own order, sovereign society, which is the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ and which has for Its visible head the Roman Pontiff, successor of the Prince of the Apostles. It is the continuation of the mission of the Savior, the daughter and the heiress of His Redemption. It has preached the Gospel, and has defended it at the price of Its blood, and strong in the Divine assistance and of that immortality which has been promised it, It makes no terms with error but remains faithful to the commands which it has received, to carry the doctrine of Jesus Christ to the uttermost limits of the world and to the end of time, and to protect it in its inviolable integrity. Legitimate dispenser of the teachings of the Gospel it does not reveal itself only as the consoler and Redeemer of souls, but It is still more the internal source of justice and charity, and the propagator as well as the guardian of true liberty, and of that equality which alone is possible here below. In applying the doctrine of its Divine Founder, It maintains a wise equilibrium and marks the true limits between the rights and privileges of society. The equality which it proclaims does not destroy the distinction between the different social classes. It keeps them intact, as nature itself demands, in order to oppose the anarchy of reason emancipated from Faith, and abandoned to its own devices. The liberty which it gives in no wise conflicts with the rights of truth, because those rights are superior to the demands of liberty. Not does it infringe upon the rights of justice, because those rights are superior to the claims of mere numbers or power. Nor does it assail the rights of God because they are superior to the rights of humanity. (Pope Leo XIII, A Review of His Pontificate, March 19, 1902.)
For the teaching authority of the Church, which in the divine wisdom was constituted on earth in order that revealed doctrines might remain intact for ever, and that they might be brought with ease and security to the knowledge of men, and which is daily exercised through the Roman Pontiff and the Bishops who are in communion with him, has also the office of defining, when it sees fit, any truth with solemn rites and decrees, whenever this is necessary either to oppose the errors or the attacks of heretics, or more clearly and in greater detail to stamp the minds of the faithful with the articles of sacred doctrine which have been explained. (Pope Pius XI, Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928.)
Please note that Pope Gregory XVI wrote that the truth can be found in the Catholic Church without "even a slight tarnish of error."
Please note that Pope Leo XIII stressed that the Catholic Church "makes no terms with error but remains faithful to the command which it has received, to carry the doctrine of Jesus Christ to the uttermost limits of the world and to the end of time, and to protect it in its inviolable integrity."
Please note that that Pope Pius XI explained that the Catholic Church brings forth her teaching "with ease and security to the knowledge of men."
Anyone who says that this has been done by the counterfeit church of conciliarism, which has made its "reconciliation" with the false principles of Modernity that leave no room for the confessionally Catholic civil state and the Social Reign of Christ the King, is not thinking too clearly (and that is as about as charitably as I can put the matter). If the conciliar church has brought forth its teaching "with ease and security to the knowledge of men," why, as noted earlier in this article, is there such disagreement even between the "progressive" conciliarists and "conservative" conciliarists concerning the proper "interpretation" of the "Second" Vatican Council and its aftermath? Or does this depend upon what one means by "ease and security"?
Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., explained in but one sentence the simple fact those steeped in error cannot have any part in the Catholic Church:
There is a fatal instinct in error, which leads it to hate the Truth; and the true Church, by its unchangeableness, is a perpetual reproach to them that refuse to be her children. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year, commentary on the life of Saint Fidelis of Sigmaringen.)
The counterfeit church of conciliarism is not the Catholic Church.
Spend time in prayer before the Real Presence of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour if this is possible where you live.
Keep praying as many Rosaries each day as your state-in-life permits. Offer everything up to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Know this and know it well: the Immaculate Heart of Mary will triumph in the end!
Appendix
Monsignor Joseph Clinton Fenton on the Binding Nature of Papal Declarations
(As Extracted From a Previous Article)
The late Monsignor Joseph Clifford Fenton, who had taught my own late seminary professor, Father John Joseph "Jackie Boy" at Saint Bernard's Seminary in Rochester, New York, in the late-1930s, wrote a superb explication of the teaching authority of encyclical letters a year before Humani Generis, and I thank Mr. Jerry Meng, the author of Joseph Ratzinger Is Not the Pope, for providing me with information about Father Fenton's material, which appeared in the American Ecclesiastical Review, that I had read several years ago but had faded into the deeper recesses of my memory in the meantime. Thank you, Mr. Meng. To Father Fenton:
It would manifestly be a very serious fault on the part of a Catholic writer or teacher in this field, acting on his own authority, to set aside or to ignore any of the outstanding doctrinal pronouncements of the Rerum novarum or the Quadragesimo anno, regardless of how unfashionable these docuмents be in a particular locality or at a particular time. It would, however, be a much graver sin on the part of such a teacher to pass over or to discountenance a considerable section of the teachings contained in these labor encyclicals. In exactly the same way and for precisely the same reason it would be seriously wrong to contravene any outstanding individual pronouncement in the encyclicals dealing with the relations between Church and State, and much worse to ignore or disregard all of the teachings or a great portion of the teachings on this topic contained in the letters of Pius IX and Leo XIII.
It is, of course, possible that the Church might come to modify its stand on some detail of teaching presented as non-infallible matter in a papal encyclical. The nature of the auctoritas providentiae doctrinalis within the Church is such, however, that this fallibility extends to questions of relatively minute detail or of particular application. The body of doctrine on the rights and duties of labor, on the Church and State, or on any other subject treated extensively in a series of papal letters directed to and normative for the entire Church militant could not be radically or completely erroneous. The infallible security Christ wills that His disciples should enjoy within His Church is utterly incompatible with such a possibility. (Doctrinal authority of Papal Encyclicals.)
To wit, Pope Saint Pius X wrote the following about the falsehood represented by the separation of Church and State:
That the State must be separated from the Church is a thesis absolutely false, a most pernicious error. . . . Hence the Roman Pontiffs have never ceased, as circuмstances required, to refute and condemn the doctrine of the separation of Church and State. (Pope Saint Pius X, Vehementer Nos, February 11, 1906.)
Gee, I wonder who has spent a great deal of the past seventy-three months endorsing this false thesis: Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, that's who. This cannot be. It is impossible for a true Roman Pontiff to contradict another on a matter that is part of the Deposit of Faith that Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ entrusted to His Catholic Church for Its eternal safekeeping and infallible explication.
Some glib commentators might protest that not every papal statement demands our assent, that we can "sift" through what a true pope says. This is false, which is one of the reasons why true popes never spoke in interviews as they knew that their words, which were carefully chosen and vetted by theological advisers (yes, the rendering of this word as "advisors" is also accepted usage), carried the weight of their papal office, that the faithful weren't and could not be expected to make unnecessary distinctions between "official" and "unofficial" words and deeds, which was the whole point of Words and Actions Without Consequences.
Monsignor Fenton elaborated on this point when applying the teaching stated by Pope Pius XII in Humani Generis to the authority of papal allocutions:
Despite the fact that there is nothing like an adequate treatment of the papal allocutions in existing theological literature, every priest, and particularly every professor of sacred theology, should know whether and under what circuмstances these allocutions addressed by the Sovereign Pontiffs to private groups are to be regarded as authoritative, as actual expressions of the Roman Pontiff's ordinary magisterium. And, especially because of the tendency towards an unhealthy minimism current in this country and elsewhere in the world today, they should also know how doctrine is to be set forth in the allocutions and the other vehicles of the Holy Father's ordinary magisterium if it is to be accepted as authoritative. The present brief paper will attempt to consider and to answer these questions.
The first question to be considered is this: Can a speech addressed by the Roman Pontiff to a private group, a group which cannot in any sense be taken as representing either the Roman Church or the universal Church, contain doctrinal teaching authoritative for the universal Church?
The clear and unequivocal answer to this question is contained in the Holy Father's encyclical letter Humani generis, issued Aug. 12, 1950. According to this docuмent: "if, in their 'Acta' the Supreme Pontiffs take care to render a decision on a point that has hitherto been controverted, it is obvious to all that this point, according to the mind and will of these same Pontiffs, can no longer be regarded as a question theologians may freely debate among themselves."[6]
Thus, in the teaching of the Humani generis, any doctrinal decision made by the Pope and included in his "Acta" are authoritative. Now many of the allocutions made by the Sovereign Pontiff to private groups are included in the "Acta" of the Sovereign Pontiff himself, as a section of the Acta apostolicae sedis. Hence, any doctrinal decision made in one of these allocutions that is published in the Holy Father's "Acta" is authoritative and binding on all the members of the universal Church.
There is, according to the words of the Humani generis, an authoritative doctrinal decision whenever the Roman Pontiffs, in their "Acta," "de re hactenus controversa data opera sententiam ferunt." When this condition is fulfilled, even in an allocution originally delivered to a private group, but subsequently published as part of the Holy Father's "Acta," an authoritative doctrinal judgment has been proposed to the universal Church. All of those within the Church are obliged, under penalty of serious sin, to accept this decision. . . .
Now the questions may arise: is there any particular form which the Roman Pontiff is obliged to follow in setting forth a doctrinal decision in either the positive or the negative manner? Does the Pope have to state specifically and explicitly that he intends to issue a doctrinal decision on this particular point? Is it at all necessary that he should refer explicitly to the fact that there has hitherto been a debate among theologians on the question he is going to decide?
There is certainly nothing in the divinely established constitutional law of the Catholic Church which would in any way justify an affirmative response to any of these inquiries. The Holy Father's doctrinal authority stems from the tremendous responsibility Our Lord laid upon him in St. Peter, whose successor he is. Our Lord charged the Prince of the Apostles, and through him, all of his successors until the end of time, with the commission of feeding, of acting as a shepherd for, of taking care of, His lambs and His sheep.[7] Included in that responsibility was the obligation, and, of course, the power, to confirm the faith of his fellow Christians.
And the Lord said: "Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and thou, being once converted, confirm thy brethren."[8]
St. Peter had, and has in his successor, the duty and the power to confirm his brethren in their faith, to take care of their doctrinal needs. Included in his responsibility is an obvious obligation to select and to employ the means he judges most effective and apt for the accomplishment of the end God has commissioned him to attain. And in this era, when the printed word possesses a manifest primacy in the field of the dissemination of ideas, the Sovereign Pontiffs have chosen to bring their authoritative teaching, the doctrine in which they accomplish the work of instruction God has commanded them to do, to the people of Christ through the medium of the printed word in the published "Acta."
The Humani generis reminds us that the doctrinal decisions set forth in the Holy Father's "Acta" manifestly are authoritative "according to the mind and will" of the Pontiffs who have issued these decisions. Thus, wherever there is a doctrinal judgment expressed in the "Acta" of a Sovereign Pontiff, it is clear that the Pontiff understands that decision to be authoritative and wills that it be so.
Now when the Pope, in his "Acta," sets forth as a part of Catholic doctrine or as a genuine teaching of the Catholic Church some thesis which has hitherto been opposed, even legitimately, in the schools of sacred theology, he is manifestly making a doctrinal decision. This certainly holds true even when, in making his statement, the Pope does not explicitly assert that he is issuing a doctrinal judgment and, of course, even when he does not refer to the existence of a controversy or debate on the subject among theologians up until the time of his own pronouncement. All that is necessary is that this teaching, hitherto opposed in the theological schools, be now set forth as the teaching of the Sovereign Pontiff, or as "doctrina catholica."
Private theologians have no right whatsoever to establish what they believe to be the conditions under which the teaching presented in the "Acta" of the Roman Pontiff may be accepted as authoritative. This is, on the contrary, the duty and the prerogative of the Roman Pontiff himself. The present Holy Father has exercised that right and has done his duty in stating clearly that any doctrinal decision which the Bishop of Rome has taken the trouble to make and insert into his "Acta" is to be received as genuinely authoritative.
In line with the teaching of the Humani generis, then, it seems unquestionably clear that any doctrinal decision expressed by the Sovereign Pontiff in the course of an allocution delivered to a private group is to be accepted as authoritative when and if that allocution is published by the Sovereign Pontiff as a part of his own "Acta." Now we must consider this final question: What obligation is incuмbent upon a Catholic by reason of an authoritative doctrinal decision made by the Sovereign Pontiff and communicated to the universal Church in this manner?
The text of the Humani generis itself supplies us with a minimum answer. This is found in the sentence we have already quoted: "And if, in their 'Acta,' the Supreme Pontiffs take care to render a decision on a point that has hitherto been controverted, it is obvious to all that this point, according to the mind and will of these same Pontiffs, can no longer be regarded as a question theologians may freely debate among themselves."
Theologians legitimately discuss and dispute among themselves doctrinal questions which the authoritative magisterium of the Catholic Church has not as yet resolved. Once that magisterium has expressed a decision and communicated that decision to the Church universal, the first and the most obvious result of its declaration must be the cessation of debate on the point it has decided. A man definitely is not acting and could not act as a theologian, as a teacher of Catholic truth, by disputing against a decision made by the competent doctrinal authority of the Mystical Body of Christ on earth.
In line with the teaching of the Humani generis, then, it seems unquestionably clear that any doctrinal decision expressed by the Sovereign Pontiff in the course of an allocution delivered to a private group is to be accepted as authoritative when and if that allocution is published by the Sovereign Pontiff as a part of his own "Acta." Now we must consider this final question: What obligation is incuмbent upon a Catholic by reason of an authoritative doctrinal decision made by the Sovereign Pontiff and communicated to the universal Church in this manner? (The doctrinal Authority of Papal allocutions.)
The crashing sound you hear in the background is the whole facade of the false ecclesiology of the "resist but recognize" movement that has been propagated in the past forty years as the "answer" to "resisting" the decrees of the "Second" Vatican Council and the "encyclical" letters and statements and allocutions of the conciliar "popes" crumbling right to the ground.
The rejections, for example, of the clear and consistent Catholic condemnation of religious liberty and separation of Church and State while endorsing the sort of false ecuмenism condemned by Pope Pius XI in Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928, and while propagating the "new ecclesiology" of the "new theology" that is a public and manifest rejection of the very nature of the Church as summarized by Pope Pius XII in Mystici Corporis, June 29, 1943, are no mere acts of "modification" of past papal statements as they are applied in the world today. They are a wholesale rejection of Catholic truth, which is why they have been shrouded in a cloud of ambiguity and paradox as to deceive many of the elect.
Perhaps Professors de Mattei, Introvigne and Rhonmeier ought to familiarize themselves with the true scholarship of Alfred Cardinal Ottaviani and Monsignor Joseph Clifford Fenton.
Any questions, ladies and gentlemen in the Society of Saint Pius X? Any questions?
Topic: If This Is A "No," Id Hate to See What "Yes" Looks Like (Read 3457 times)