I make no judgments regarding persons, why do you?
Of course, you do make judgments regarding persons. You have judged Benedict 16 to be pope. Simply agreeing with others who agree with you does not make you non-judgmental on the issue. As the old saying says, "Not to decide is to decide."
At one time, when there was no controversy, few people had to make any judgment on the issue. Now that there is a controversy, once one has been confronted with the question, one necessarily must answer it for himself. But one cannot claim that he has not made any judgment.
Now you're equivocating on the term
judgment. I judged the Catholic faith to be true, yet once I received it, I make no judgment regarding its contents. When you accept the judgment of someone else, you either submit or you do not submit to said judgment. To claim that it is an indifferent matter as to whether one judges a dogmatic fact is to confound two entirely different categories of thought; it is to essentially nullify the function of authority. As a matter of fact, you are not presented with the question, rather you present yourself with the question and attempt to make a judgment, acting as if whether the Pope has fallen from office, as if you have the competence to make such a judgment. And as I have pointed out, you simply cannot restrict the question to the Pope alone, your denials notwithstanding. You have entered into a dangerous territory based upon specious reasoning. I do not think that you have sufficiently thought it through regarding its implications and how one might test it against Catholic dogma. For example, by what mechanism, or based upon what coherent reason will you accept a future claimant to the See of Peter? Since you, in principle, recognize no authority where it legally exists, from whence will this body arise that will elect a new Pope? By what criteria will you judge them to assert this juridical decision? If no one can do it now, when will it come about? If not now, why not? Has something essential been taken away from the Church that it cannot properly function? Will you require other Catholics to make the same judgment? Accept your own peculiar criteria? Or are you presuming upon a future miracle that will infuse necessary knowledge of such things? How can a Catholic simply be a Catholic while it is expected of him to rely upon such uncertain foundations, when the knowledge he possesses is mere opinion, when he will be required to receive the same miraculous knowledge as other Catholics at the same time and in the same respect?
No my friend, you have erred in your judgment, you have not taken all things sufficiently into account in making your determination. It makes "sense" to you based on your very limited knowledge and that pure subjectivism.
The restoration of the Church will come about only through recognized jurdisiction. Any else is tantamount to requiring Catholics to venture uncertain opinions or rely upon miracles.
And regarding this notion that the Church can be reduced to a small flock, no one disputes this. But this same flock will retain all the essential characteristics of the true Church of Jesus Christ, something which all the traditionalist Bishops, Priests and laymen combined simply do not yet possess.
One day they will and the Church
will be reduced when authority is finally exercised and anathemas begin to ring out from Rome once again, but I'm afraid you have jumped the gun and consequently are in grave danger of erring. History is filled with errors in the "opposite" direction. Do not be victim to the tendencies of fallen nature. And do not be surpised that the greatest crisis in the Church is obscure and difficult to understand -- it is a great mystery.
May I suggest that you refrain from trying to "figure it out" and simply practice the traditional faith to the best of your abilities.
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