Quote from: Gregory I

But the problem is that unanimous acceptance by the people renders all discrepancies null.

There is something to your point above.  That has been legitimately described as a way we can generally discern if I remember correctly.  But he has not been unanimously accepted.  

Was it Augustine who said something like

"The truth is still true even if no one believes it."  

Regardless the majority or all the people cannot make the truth false by not believing it.  

Here is food for thought:

Of all sede positions, the one most impressive for its thoroughness to ME is Sedeprivationism, or, the Cassiciacuм thesis.

The reason for this is that it makes true distinctions between form and matter. We have the MATTER of a Pope, a Pope-Elect, but because of his heresy, he is not formally pope. TO become pope, he needs to publically repent, then he would be the pope. The same with every bishop.

Why is this view necessary? Primarily because of the lack of LEGAL and CANONICAL punishment of the heretics. Also, because the Church needs a way to continue her papacy. The cardinals could validly elect a pope, because election is an act of designation, not jurisdiction. The man elected in each instance would strictly speaking be a pope-elect, not an anti-pope, because there is no one to be anti.

Is there any precedent for this in the lives of the saints? Actually, yes.

in the 5th century when dealing with Nestorius, there was a saint named Hypatius, a priest. Now, Hypatius' bishop was under Patriarch Nestorius. When Nestorius began to preach his heresy, Hypatius went to the Church, took out the diptychs (lists of bishops commemorated) and erased the name of Nestorius. When his bishop found out, he was furious and commanded him to explain himself. St. Hypatius said, "From the time I heard he said unworthy things against the Lord, I erased his name, for he is NOT a bishop!" Hypatius' bishop said he would suspend him for this, and Hypatius told him he was willing to suffer everything. TO go ahead and do it.

Now, it is also a fact that Pope St. Celestine decreed against Nestorius that he had lost his ability to function as a bishop (i.e. his jurisdiction) from the moment that he began to spout his heresy. So Hypatius was actually justified.

But note, he did not condemn his bishop! His bishop was EQUALLY justified in waiting for a final judgment to come from Rome and the councils of Alexandria and Ephesus. The reality of the situation is that, though Nestorius may have spiritually forfeited his jurisdiction, nevertheless, HE was in the seat of Constantinople, not anyone else. And so, for that reason, St. Cyril of Alexandria refers to him as Patriarch and brother in the lord, even while correcting his heresy until the time he was condemned by the Ecuмenical Council of Alexandria and then Ephesus in 431.

So this teaches us that heretics can materially occupy episcopal seats AND yet not have the spiritual reality of jurisdiction. They have the matter, but have lost the form.

So the question is: If my bishop/pope appears to be a manifest heretic, what happens to my diocese between the time he says/does heretical things, and is legally condemned?

And here is where we get into an issue I have never seen ANY sede of any stripe address:

Supplied Jurisdiction. In the case of say, a heretical bishop appointing a priest to say mass at a parish, is that priest able to legitimately hear your confessions if his bishop is a heretic and has no jurisdiction?

Yes. Through the simple fact that canon law teaches that the law itself supplies jurisdiction to situations deemed "Legal Common Error."

This is a matter of legal fiction. For example, say you have a priest be excommunicated from his diocese, legitimately. He goes and sets up a chapel and designates it a Catholic Church. The very FACT that he has created a situation where he COULD be mistaken for a legitimate catholic priest and parish in ITSELF grants supplied jurisdiction. EVEN if everybody there knows he was excommunicated. The situation in itself is a matter of supplied jurisdiction.

Now, imagine this, in a time of crisis NOW within the church on a universal level. Suddenly, we actually have some rays of hope here.

1. If the Popes are heretics, and the Chair of Peter is formally vacant, yet materially there is a pope-elect designated by cardinals (all of whom also could be designated as such by the supplied jurisdiction of the church in reference to the Popes choosing of them!). So first of all, we have a man who COULD become the pope, if he would but choose to convert and repudiate his errors.

2. Because of the Supplied Jurisdiction of the Church in a time of emergency, and the entirety of the church functioning under the principle of Legal Common Error, it is possible that the Pope-Elect could be functioning with supplied jurisdiction in the designation of bishops to their sees, and then downward.

3. This means that, apart from questions of sacramental validity, we could actually have a set of compromised popes and bishops yet able to still provide a functioning church.

4. In that case, the confusion between the RnR camp, the Sedes, and SedePrivs would be understandable, but not dogmatic. In fact, none could in principle be considered schismatic from the Church. And it explains false canonizations and all this theological whimsy!

Thoughts?

Thoughts:
One can see some appeal to the Cassiciacuм thesis in that it - partially anyway - makes something of an attempt to address the surrounding issues of the Sede Vacante finding itself, which is more than all the best-known absolute sedevacantists have done, but that is not by any means the only way to address the surrounding issues and not the best now, by far.

As to the Bishop Nestorius episode, acceptance of whatever punishment does not imply acceptance of that person still claiming authority.  If he had real authority he would have the power to excommunicate, but this power was quite evidently lost as far as Hypatius was concerned, as evidenced by his removal of Nestorius from the diptychs (effectively branding him as being totally outside the Church).  However, In those days a bishop also frequently possessed a rather considerable political (secular) power, and Nestorius most certainly could (as a politically recognized official) inflict some serious harm on Hypatius, which he simply welcomed the same as any martyr accepting whatever (secular) punishments as some pagan emperor or prelate could impose on a Christian merely for having the Faith.

It is therefore a grave misreading of the episode to attribute anything of a "Materialiter/Formaliter" interpretation to Hypatius' attitude towards Nestorius.  As one who had become a clear and formal heretic, he had no further spiritual authority in the Church, but as a secular power he certainly retained the ability to send persons after one who would then render that one some harm.

I suppose one could have considered Nestorius a "material" bishop owing to his irremediable possession of the power of Orders, but ecclesiastically speaking his formerly possessed Power of Jurisdiction had become positively nil and his See empty, and so indeed Hypatius saw it.  That Eulalius did not see it, and especially the fact that when the Pope and Council officially marked his removal and set about providing a new bishop, he and they made no condemnation of either Hypatius nor Eulalius despite their different responses to the circuмstance.  Both courses were therefore acceptable, as neither had accepted his heresies, one rejecting both the heresies and their author, the other rejecting only the heresies themselves.  Only those who had accepted the heresies of Nestorius were asked to recant or repent, and put out of the Church if they refused to recant or repent.

Many had mistakenly followed Nestorius' heresies in good faith, or merely out of a misplaced obedience, and gladly distanced themselves from the error once the ecclesial direction to do so was clear (these are like conservative Novus Ordo believers today who would gladly return to the Catholic Faith once it should be clear to them that the Church so indeed requires of them, absolving them of any supposed allegiance to the heretics).  But there were also those who refused to recant or repent but preferred to leave the Church with Nestorius the heretic, equivalent to some few who pretend to be conservative Novus Ordo believers today as would not tolerate an actual return to Catholic ways, and also those who make no pretense of being conservative at all.