I also found the underlined part odd/off.  However, I *think* what he was referring to was the fact that Bellarmine actually never believed a true pope could fall into heresy.  That was his real position.  Then he went on to consider what would happen if one could fall into heresy (the 5 opinions).  I *think* it's just poorly worded/phrased, but I'm still not sure.

I actually didn't have an issue with the second part.


The Bellarmine section:

When Saint Robert Bellarmine hypothesized, as an academic study, the question of whether a Roman Pontiff could fall into heresy, he imagined a Pope who, while convinced that he continued to hold the Catholic faith, adhered materially or formally to one particular heresy, in a general context in which the social and ecclesial body remained Catholic.

 Bellarmine could never have imagined that an emissary of Fɾҽҽmαsσɳɾყ could go so far as to be elected pope with the purpose of demolishing the Church from within, usurping and abusing the very power of the papacy itself against the papacy. Nor could he have imagined that a hypothetical pope would surpass mere heresy and embrace all-out apostasy. No Doctor of the Church has ever contemplated the possibility of an apostate pope, or of an election falsified and manipulated by powers avowedly hostile to Christ, because such an enormity could only happen in a unique and extraordinary context such as that of the final persecution foretold by the Prophet Daniel and described by Saint Paul.

 Our Lord’s admonition videritis abominationem desolationis – when you shall see the abomination of desolation (Mt 24:15) – is to be understood as such precisely because of its absolute uniqueness and for the fact that everyone will see fulfilled – some with horror, some with satanic satisfaction – the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place: qui legit intelligat – let the one who reads understand (Mt 24:15).

However, it disappoints me that he appears to be saying "he's not the pope, we just don't have the authority to say it". He has never once called him 'Pope', so he is effectively declaring it anyway: 'Jorge Bergoglio', 'the tenant of St Martha'. But if we are not allowed to declare it, there is a reason: there needs to be a conviction of heresy (by a Council according to St Robert) before the declaration, formal heresy needs to be established. Whatever we might think the outcome of such a process may be, we may not presume, because, as Archbishop Lefebvre said, nothing is impossible with God. If we cannot declare he is Pope, then he is to be held as Pope and addressed with the respect due to that exalted office, however unworthy an occupant he may be.

He gives a whole stack of reasons why Pope Francis is not truly pope before saying this - the possibility that Benedict's resignation was not valid, lack of consent, involvement with the deep state and intention to destroy the Church. I do not see how all of this can be regarded as anything more than conjecture, not Catholic dogma on the papacy.

I do not see how all of this can be regarded as anything more than conjecture, not Catholic dogma on the papacy.

What Archbishop Vigano means is that we do not have the juridical authority to declare that Jorge Bergoglio is not pope and not that we cannot make a private judgment that he is not pope.

I agree, it must have been a slip of the tongue. Archbishop Vigano undoubtedly knows that you cannot hold formally to a particular heresy and continue to hold the Catholic Faith.

But why does he hold that saint Robert Bellarmine was only foreseeing the possibility of a pope holding one heresy and not a cesspool of heresies (modernism)? That is the bit that he makes up. Perhaps it is true, perhaps not.

We all know that St Robert Bellarmine personally held to the pious opinion of Pighius, that the Pope could not fall into heresy, because such seemed to him to be "in accord with the sweet dispositions of Divine Providence". However, he acknowledged that this was not the common opinion of the theologians and that is why - take note Yeti- he examines if and how an heretical Pope would lose office.

I find it hard to accept Archbishop Vigano's statement that St Robert could never have imagined that "an emissary of Freemasonary could go so far as to be elected pope with the purpose of demolishing the Church from within..." In my citation of Bellarmine above, he contemplates precisely "a pope who means to destroy the Church". This is a pope he is speaking of - wanting to destroy the Church. What Catholic would want to destroy the Church? He contemplates it to the extent that it would be permitted for Catholics to resist him even with force of arms! St Robert is contemplating a pope who wants to do something diabolical, freemasonic! And what is St Robert's solution? Even if he couldn't be removed, God would provide the remedy. Granted, St Robert does not mention apostasy, or heresy, but would they be implicit in "a pope who means to destroy the Church"? What do you think 2V?

Not only did he say that we had a right to express an option, +Vigano said we can be morally certain that Bergoglio is not the pope.  Here's from the transcript ... in context.

What we cannot be because we do not have the authority is to OFFICIALLY DECLARE him to be a non-pope.

Apocalypse 20

3 And he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should no more seduce the nations, till the thousand years be finished. And after that, he must be loosed a little time.

et misit eum in abyssum, et clausit, et signavit super illum ut non seducat amplius gentes, donec consummentur mille anni : et post haec oportet illum solvi modico tempore.

https://www.drbo.org/drl/chapter/73020.htm

“Incredibly, they boldly affirm that the Roman Pontiff and all the bishops, the priests and the people conjoined with him in the unity of faith and communion fell into heresy when they approved and professed the definitions of the Ecuмenical Vatican Council. Therefore they deny also the indefectibility of the Church and blasphemously declare that it has perished throughout the world and that its visible Head and the bishops have erred. They assert the necessity of restoring a legitimate episcopacy in the person of their pseudo-bishop, who has entered not by the gate but from elsewhere like a thief or robber and calls the damnation of Christ upon his head.”

According to you, all that the Old Catholic would have to say in response is, "not so, you, and the bishops in union with you, are heretics, and not part of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church - of which you are not - remains indefectible, and your defection from the faith is not attributable to the Church, which remains indefectible with us."


Until the late 20th Century and Sedevacantism, the idea that the pope and all the bishops in union with him would lose the faith would be unthinkable. Catholics believed, like Pius IX, that the Holy Ghost would not have permitted such a total and radical usurpation of the hierarchy. That is the protection of indefectibility identified, and referred to, by Pius IX in Etsi Multi: that there could not be such a radical usurpation of the hierarchy such that it becomes a total seat of pestilence, such that it could be taken over by Satan. A bishop here or there, or even possibly a heretic pope, who would be opposed by legitimate bishops who were successors to the apostles - even if that nightmare was a possibility, that would not destroy indefectibility as understood.  But indefectibility, as understood by Pius IX, would not be compatible with such a total usurpation.

You morph this into a circular, tautological argument swirling around terminology: the pope and all the bishops in union with him in the Catholic Church cannot be heretics, and so if they are heretics, they aren't the pope and the bishops of the Catholic Church. That's a total evasion of Pius IX's point: if the pope and the all Catholic bishops in union with him joined to issue heresy in an ecuмenical council, the Church would have defected. Period. The Old Catholics could not, and you can not, evade that point by saying, "but the pope and all the bishops who did so were not Catholic."

But that is what you are doing. You are evading the "crux" of the argument: the Holy Ghost would not allow that to happen, i.e.,  that any "person" sitting in the seat of Peter could have all the "persons" possessing Catholic sees or bishoprics joining him in union to do such a thing.