Here is an older article I found a couple days ago and read, I found it to be a good read.  Even if you do not accept Mr Daly's conclusion of sede vacante, I think it worth the read because he explains clearly at the beginning just what sedevacante is and what it is not.  Here is the introduction:



“The Impossible Crisis”  © 2009 John S. Daly

 

First published in The Four Marks as a series beginning in April 2009. “The Impossible Crisis” was first presented as a talk by John Daly at a seminar in Rome, New York in 2002.

 

Reverend Father, ladies and gentlemen,

 

This conference is dedicated to setting out the arguments in favour of sedevacantism. Before starting, I should like to make sure that we all know what sedevacantism is, and what it is not.  Sedevacantism is the belief that the Holy See is vacant.  If you believe that the Catholic Church today has no pope —no true, valid and legitimate successor of St Peter— you are a sedevacantist; otherwise, you’re not.

I stress that sedevacantism is not a movement.  There are sedevacantists who go only to the Mass of sedevacantist priests; there are others who go elsewhere, and others again who don’t go to Mass at all.  Likewise, of course, there are persons who go to the Mass of sedevacantist priests without being themselves sedevacantists.  So sedevacantism is not about who you associate with, just as it is not about whether you think that women should wear pants, or your view on chemtrails, or Archbishop Thuc’s dental state— it is about whether or not you recognise John-Paul II as visible head of Christ’s Church.

And since it is a belief, not a movement, sedevacantism does not as such have any goals or exercise any proper activity.  If you have come here today in the hope of hearing us talk about the most effective way of restoring Catholic order, or increasing the number of traditional Catholics, or getting more subscribers to traditional reviews,  you’re going to be disappointed.  The scope of the two talks you are going to hear is not about whether sedevacantism is useful.  It is limited to whether sedevacantism is true.  And if it is true that John-Paul II is not the Vicar of Christ, that truth is going to go on being obstinately true whether we like it or not and quite irrespective of what we do about it. A prominent Remnant writer recently said that sedevacantism is going to kill the traditionalist movement.  That’s not true, but more importantly, it’s not relevant.  Not if you love truth.

There are many facts that are little known and very inconvenient, but they don’t stop being facts.  If you discover a tumorous lump in your armpit, or you notice that your monthly expenditure is exceeding your income, or there is a strange noise and odour coming from your car engine when you drive…you don’t normally consider whether cancer, bankruptcy or a cracked cylinder block are desirable or popular: you want to know the truth, however inconvenient.  And the truth will be based on evidence.  In the case of Catholic truth, it will be based on what the Church tells us through her teachings, her laws, her theologians, etc.

The word sedevacantist is of course a neologism – a word invented in the late 70s.  It is a convenient label just like the word traditionalist – outsiders always make up convenient labels to identify groups, and these labels often stick.  What matters is getting behind the label and understanding what it means.  Here is a test: if you have correctly understood what the word sedevacantist means, you will realise that every time the pope dies, the entire Catholic world is sedevacantist.  And if you’re not yet a sedevacantist, then you’re a sede-occupantist.  It’s one or the other.

And of course sedevacantism has nothing to do with rejecting the papacy. We accept all popes, but we don’t think Karol Wojtyla is one.  And we base that conviction on the teaching and laws of the Catholic Church.

Today you are going to hear two talks about sedevacantism and each of them presents a different basic argument, because there are two fundamentally different ways of proving that John-Paul II is not pope. I want them to be clearly distinguished in your minds.  [Editor: A greatly expanded version of the other talk given by John Lane, is found on page 5, which continues from last month.]

Suppose someone offers you a solid gold ring, but in fact it is a fake.  There are two possible ways of showing that it is a fake.  The first is to show that it does not possess some feature that gold must have – its specific gravity or its reaction with nitric acid.  The second is to show that it is in fact something else, quite different from gold and incompatible with being gold.  For instance, you pass a magnet over the item and it leaps up and sticks to the magnet.  You know at once that you have iron, and therefore not solid gold.

In looking at John-Paul, Mr Lane will be arguing that he is a public heretic and that a public heretic cannot in any circuмstances be pope.  He will pass the magnet of heresy over Karol Wojtyla, and Karol Wojtyla will jump up and stick to it, showing himself to be base, ferrous and prone to rust.  I have nothing more to say about that argument, which Mr Lane will present to you with great competence.

My task is not to show that Karol Wojtyla is a heretic.  It is not even to enquire at all into the cause of why he isn’t pope.  It is simply to show that a true pope is protected by the Holy Ghost from doing what KW does, and that KW therefore cannot be pope.

My doing so will also entail considerable discussion of the religious body that Karol Wojtyla heads: the body that has called itself the Conciliar Church.  I intend to show that this church also displays an essential incompatibility with Catholicism – that it has officially and formally adopted doctrines, morals, laws and ceremonies that the Catholic Church not only should not, but also could not adopt.

So let me put my argument in a nutshell.



Here is the link to continue reading: http://www.thefourmarks.com/articles.htm

Quote from: John Daly

sedevacantism is...about whether or not you recognise John-Paul II [Francis] as visible head of Christ’s Church.

No - it's the belief that the Holy See if vacant. You can reject these pretenders without affirming a state of Sede Vacante.

This either or scenario needs to be dropped.

Does "Vacante" have to be taken literally?  If a public heretic or a none-Pope for any reason sits upon it is it not "vacant" of a valid Pope?  

I always took Sede Vacante simply to mean there is no Pope.  

For starters, read the thread -  Nine reasons to dump the term "Sedevacantism".

Saying that the Church is in a state of sedevacante, is not the same as saying "sedevacantism."  I hate the term, but sometimes use it for shorthand in quotes so as not to make it an identifying point, against the teaching of Pope Benedict XV.

Unfortunately, this term is now associated with the position that there is no Pope.  Btw, I have read the article long ago, it's on GM website.

Now, what proof do you have that we are not in a state of sedevacante.  

It goes further than to say: "This cannot be the Pope".

If all the conciliar Popes have been anti-Popes then where is the validity of the current roman clergy?. This is because the cardinals would be invalid too since anti-popes have been appointing them. Only Bishops can lawfully appoint clergy, and if there were no valid popes, there are no bishops with jurisdiction, therefore no lawful priests after a 50 year old sede vacante.

Also, the realistic impracticality of determining a pope’s formal heresy, coupled with the fact that nobody has the competence either to declare his condemnation, or to depose him, is proof of the speculative nature of the sedevacantist position.

Have a little Faith, might it be that Enoch and Elijah will come back and restore the Church.  

Not to worry it won't be that unicorn you expected.  

"Thy Kingdom come Thy Will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven."

Following the sedevacantist logic, all the sacraments dispensed by Post-Vatican 2 clergy (Novus Ordo & Traditional) would be invalid.

How can they be valid if they are dispensed by priests that are themselves invalid given that they were ordained by bishops that were appointed by anti-Popes, and therefore, also invalid?

Are the learned and well versed sedevacantists really aware of the possible implications of their claim? This is not to be taken lightly. Millions of people baptized in the Novus Ordo would not even be validly baptized. Millions of Catholics even in the traditional world would not be really eating Jesus in the Sacrifice of the Mass because these masses would also be invalid, celebrated by invalid priests appointed by invalid bishops appointed by false popes . If this is not so, and the sedevacantist claims that this is a only a harmless personal opinion, then the sedevacantist is clearly ignorant of the Catholic dogma of Apostolic Succession and its necessity for valid dispensation of Sacraments.

 

Quote from: Ambrose

Hermenegild wrote:

Quote

What proof do you have that we are? ...that is really the question

Well, for starters the current major claimant is a heretic.

All other claimants do not rule the diocese of Rome, and their claims are ridiculous.

There is some evidence to support the claim of Cardinal Siri either in 1958 or 1963, but that line of thinking is weak, as he publicly submitted himself to Paul VI and John Paul II.  Either way, he is long deceased.

Are you arguing that we have a hidden Pope somewhere, who has a legitimate claim (some or at least one member of the Roman Clergy adhere to him)?  If so, I am all ears.

Your points are not proof. I can't see how you can't rule out the last possibility.

I haven't ruled it out, I asked you to tell me what you've got!

Quote from: Ambrose

Quote from: Cantarella

Following the sedevacantist logic, all the sacraments dispensed by Post-Vatican 2 clergy (Novus Ordo & Traditional) would be invalid.

How can they be valid if they are dispensed by priests that are themselves invalid given that they were ordained by bishops that were appointed by anti-Popes, and therefore, also invalid?

Are the learned and well versed sedevacantists really aware of the possible implications of their claim? This is not to be taken lightly. Millions of people baptized in the Novus Ordo would not even be validly baptized. Millions of Catholics even in the traditional world would not be really eating Jesus in the Sacrifice of the Mass because these masses would also be invalid, celebrated by invalid priests appointed by invalid bishops appointed by false popes . If this is not so, and the sedevacantist claims that this is a only a harmless personal opinion, then the sedevacantist is clearly ignorant of the Catholic dogma of Apostolic Succession and its necessity for valid dispensation of Sacraments.

 

You should read our claims carefully rather than attribute things to us.

This is the opportunity to clarify.

Catholics know that there is a hierarchical order to everything, so the question is:

Is a cardinal/bishop/priest valid even when he has been appointed by an anti-pope?.

Yes / No

Please support the claim.

Are you referring to the validity of orders or to their lawfulness of their appointment?

What's to present? Are you certain the Holy See vacant?

At this point in time, I am certain, but it remains a provisional position, meaning that if new evidence arises, I will look at it.

If you have got something to present which could show that there has been a pope in hiding, I am all ears.  It would certainly make things easier if it were true, but I have not seen read anything yet that even begins to convince me of this position.

Some think that St. John the Evangelist never died and is still walking the earth,  Is it possible?  Yes it is, but at this point in time I have not seen anything in the way of evidence to form any position about it.  

There are all sorts of possibilities that we may never have envisioned, but for the time being, I can only rely on the knowable facts that currently exist.