Thank you, Matthew.  I too absolutely loved his conferences a the Seminary.  They were captivating.  He gave a weekly talk to the entire seminary on Wednesday afternoons, before dinner, and we looked forward to these all week.

Hasn't Bp. Williamson signed Fr. Calderon's death warrant in the sspx?  By endorsing his book, it seems, Fr. C. will be history in the Society.

Where can I see when BP. Williamson will be in NY? I live in Ny and would love to attend a conference. 

You can't say

Resistance is to SSPX
as
Mainstream Media is to Trump

No, the MSM lies and slanders Trump. They hate him and all his followers (yes, over half of the country!) They hate him because he does what is good for America and he often thwarts and dials back their evil plans.

These are very good and informative conferences. I see that in the 4th conference, during the Q&A time, that the Bishop (although he believes Francis is the Pope)  is not dogmatic that Francis is Pope and admits that Benedict may still be Pope or that neither is Pope.

Agreed, except I would add that his opinion is reached without even considering the universal acceptance/dogmatic fact argument.

I spoke with him on the phone last week and raised precisely that point, to which he audibly “hmmmm’d” and said he would have to go back and check the manuals.

He then offered that the theologians could not have foreseen a crisis of this magnitude (an opinion rebutted by a quote someone supplied last week showing that in fact at least one had considered it).

So, if Bishop Williamson is going to go back to check the manuals, what he is going to find is that all the theologians are unanimous in their assertion that a universally accepted pope is a dogmatic fact.

And in that case, if Bishop Williamson’s tolerance of doubt is based on being uninformed of what the theologians teach, then I’m not sure how much weight his opinion on this topic ought to carry.

I’m neither saying that Francis’s papacy is, or is not, a dogmatic fact.  We earlier discussed/speculated that MAYBE there may be an intrinsic difference in the nature of the pre vs post-conciliar papacies, in that the former were not suspect of heresy, while the latter were/are.

What is certain (and this was quite a blow to me), is that Bishop Williamson says Archbishop Lefebvre certainly allowed/tolerated persons to privately entertain the possibility that the pope was not the pope (yet another blow to me), which implies the sede theory is -according to Lefebvre- at least theologically possible (though BW said Lefebvre believed it created more problems than it solved).

So, if Bishop Williamson’s position on the theological possibility rests upon the authority of Lefebvre having believed (at least at times) that sedevacantism was possible, then it is not an opinion founded upon nothing.

For me this was all quite a revelation, and I make no dogmatic statements on the subject anymore.

I think -at the moment- that I am inclined to believe that Lefebvre sometimes, in the heat of battle, when provoked by rank scandal and heresy, sometimes MAY have said things which he should not have, and was sometimes overly indignant (just as I can be, and as he admitted to Davies in the Apologia, Vol II, Ch. 40).

I THINK (but am not sure) that If this was the case (if, if, if!), I would still be inclined to say that the universally accepted pope remains a dogmatic fact, and that it is not possible for him not to be pope; that I would side with the unanimous consent of theologians over Lefebvre/Williamson if forced to, WHILE STILL ACKNOWLEDGING I COULD BE WRONG (eg., perhaps because of the intrinsic difference between the heretic pope’s vs their orthodox predecessors, etc).

I think I am learning, at least on this topic, not to form a solid opinion, and live with the uncertainty (despite my preference at the moment to continue to side with the theologians).

Many might disagree, and I am not sure they would be wrong.

The Universal Acceptance has only fully come to light more recently

This is not some recent development.  UA simply does not apply to this situation.

You try to pretend that S&S came up with some amazing new discovery in putting together a badly-flawed chapter on UA.

Right, +Williamson never has considered their legitimacy to be dogmatic fact ... nor did Archbishop Lefebvre.

Well, just for clarity, based on my phone conversation with Bishop Williamson on the subject, he appears not to have studied the matter.

So while his conclusion (ie., the technical possibility of sedevacantism) would logically suggest he had rejected the claims of universally accepted pope’s being dogmatic facts, it appears he reached the conclusion of the technical possibility of sedevacantism in reliance upon Archbishop Lefebvre’s occasional words that such was a possibility, and not because he thought the UA argument didn’t apply.

What would BW conclude if he refreshed his studies on the matter?

I dare not speculate.

But it would seem the real question should center around +Lefebvre (since +Williamson’s opinion is formed on reliance upon +Lefebvre’s private tolerance and occasional opinion regarding its possibility).

Interestingly, +Lefebvre did sometimes raise the universal consent argument (cited elsewhere), and at other times, make statements suggesting the sede possibility.

Were these flare-ups he later regretted, rather than actual changes of position (ie., words said in the heat of battle on occasions of grave scandal)?

That would seem reasonable, yet Bishop Williamson does not suggest that as an explanation.

I would like to converse with him more deeply on this point, to see if +Lefebvre’s tolerance was more sporadic/occasion-based, or sustained.