I was merely using the term "suspect" of heresy as an illustration of the fact that actions that might be construed as having heretical intent do not of themselves rise to the level of heresy ... as an illustration of the mind of the Church on the principle here. I am not saying that the pope is subject to canonical penalties.
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Well, I don't even think
that can be said with any confidence. The Church's mind, as evidenced by these canons, seems to be one of order and hierarchy, not one of skepticism toward whether or not someone who acts like a heretic
is. The purpose of the canons is procedural, but consider that C. 188 §4 tells us that public defection from the Catholic faith is tacit resignation of an office (
not a penalty) without any need for process or declaration. Commentators explain that such defection does not even require the formal adherence to a non-Catholic sect (e.g., inscribing one's name into the membership roster of, say, the Missouri Synod Luther Church). That being the case, the Church's mind first and foremost recognizes as a fact of both law and reality that those whose actions subscribe to a foreign faith simply
do not belong, and she says that they are without, and that they lose all of their offices, and that this all happens
without any need for process or declaration, and it isn't even a
penalty as this operation occurs under the canons that deal with the nature and possession of offices. And in truth it isn't really even a legal operation so much as it is the incorporation of the divine and natural law into the canons, and an acknowledgment of what even the earliest Church knew beyond any doubt: those who have severed themselves from the visible unity of
faith that is the Church do not in any way, shape, or form belong to or in her.
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I think that those who are committed sedeplenists-- or "sededoubtists"-- should consider that their arguments now and over the last few years have been reduced not to actually arguing that the conciliar claimants are Catholic, but that we can't
know whether or not they are, and/or
if we can, we can't
say or
acknowledge whether or not they are.
Topic: Yes, I'm going to judge Sedevacantism here like I'm above it all (Read 126091 times)