THE QUESTION OF THE PAPACY TODAY
by
Rev. Fr. Robert McKenna O.P.
The Decretals (early Canon Law): Let no mortal have the presumption to accuse the pope of fault unless he departs from the faith (I, 40, 6 Canon SI PAPA)
Pope Innocent III 1200 A.D.): The faith is necessary for me to such an extent that, having God as my only judge in other sins, I could however be judged by the Church for sins I might commit in matters of faith. (Billot, Tract. de Eccl. Christi, I, P. 610)
Pope Paul IV (1559 A.D. Bull "Cum ex apostolatus"): If ever at any time it appears that ... the Roman Pontiff has deviated from the Catholic faith or fallen into some heresy before assuming the papacy, the assumption, done even with the unanimous consent of all the Cardinals, stands null, invalid, and void; nor can it be said to become valid, or be held in any way legitimate, or be thought to give to such ones any power of administering either spiritual or temporal matters, but everything said, done, and administered by them lacks all force and confers absolutely no authority or right on anyone;
and let such ones by that very fact (eo ipso) and without any declaration required be deprived of all dignity, place, honor, title, authority, office, and power.
Canon Law (1917): If any disciplinary law which has been in force until now is not contained in the Code either explicitly or implicitly, it must be said to have lost all force, unless found in the approved liturgical books or belongs to divine law wether positive or natural. (6,6)
In doubt whether any prescript of the canons disagrees with the former law, the former is to be maintained. (6,4)
In doubt, the revocation of pre-existing law is not presumed, but later laws are to be drawn (trahendae) to the earlier ones and reconciled with these as far as possible.(23)
St. Robert Bellarmine: The fifth opinion (regarding a heretical pope) therefore is true: a pope who is a manifest heretic by that fact (per se) ceases to be pope and head, just as he by that fact ceases to be a Christian (sic) and a member of the body of the Church; wherefore he can be judged and punished by the Church. This is the judgment of all the early fathers, who teach that manifest heretics immediately lose all jurisdiction. (De Romano Pontifice, C. XXX)
John 3,18: He who does not believe is already judged.
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John Paul II:
"The duty of respecting the faith of every person is at one and the same time correlative to the natural and civil right of liberty of conscience and religion." (24.2.1980)
Pope Gregory XVI:
From this poisoned source of indifferentism flows that false and absurd, or rather extravagant, maxim that liberty of conscience should be established and guaranted to each man - a most contagious error.
John Paul II:
"The Holy Spirit deigns to use other Churches as a means of salvation." (16.10.1979)
IV Lateran General Council 1215 A.D.:
One is the universal Church of the faithful outside which no one at all is saved. (Denz. 430)
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