Many insist there can be no resolution of the unity crisis in the present-day Church because true Catholics are no longer a perceptible, identifiable body. Yet to say this is to reject God’s will and make a mockery of His Sacrifice on the Cross.

"As He hung on the Cross, Christ Jesus not only appeased the justice of His Eternal Father, which had been violated, but…won for us…an ineffable flow of graces. It was impossible for Him of Himself to impart these graces to mankind directly, but He willed to do so only through a visible Church made up of men. The Word of God willed to make use of our nature…(The Mystical Body) must be an unbroken unity…something definite and perceptible," (all Pius XII quotes following are taken from Mystici Corporis unless the contrary is stated).

Here Pius XII quoted Pope Leo XIII’s Satis Cognitum, where his predecessor taught: "The Church is visible because She is a body." To this Pius XII adds:

"But a body requires a multiplicity of members," and in the Church, "members do not live for themselves alone, but also help their fellows. All work in mutual collaboration to perfect and build up this Body."

The Pope then goes to the heart of the errors being spread even in his day concerning the true nature of the Church, condemning those who sound very much like many of the Traditionalists in this era.

"(Those who believe the Church to be) "invisible, intangible, ‘pneumatological’, by which many Christian communities, though they differ from one another in faith are united by an invisible bond, ERR IN A MATTER OF DIVINE TRUTH."

Indeed, who among the Traditionalists or ecumenists, for that matter, believe, as every Catholic must, each and every truth taught by the Apostolic and Roman Church without exception? Certainly not those who refuse to acknowledge the absolute necessity for a pope, for these contradict all that Pius XII expounds on the subject.

"We must not think He (Christ) rules in a hidden or extraordinary manner. On the contrary, Our Divine Redeemer also governs His Mystical Body in a visible and normal way through His Vicar on earth…He trusted to the Chief of the Apostles the visible government of the entire community He had founded…Christ and His Vicar constitute ONE HEAD ONLY…(This) is the solemn teaching of Pope Boniface VIII…in ‘Unam Sanctam.’ And his successors have never failed to repeat the same."

Here Pius XII only reiterates the teaching of the Council of Trent, contained in the Catechism of the same name. In the section where this catechism treats of the four marks we read: "Should anyone object that the Church is content with one Head and one Spouse, Jesus Christ, and requires no other, the answer is obvious…Christ (is) not only the author of all the Sacraments, but their invisible minister. He placed over the Church a man to be His Vicar and the minister of His power. A VISIBLE CHURCH REQUIRES A VISIBLE HEAD…"

But Pius is not finished crushing this odious error. The next chilling doctrinal pronouncement he utters speaks sternly and directly — even prophetically — to all those who flout their (doctrinal) independence and scorn unity. "They therefore walk in the path of dangerous error who believe that they can accept Christ as the head of the Church while not adhering loyally to His Vicar on earth. They have taken away the visible head, broken the visible bonds of unity, and left the Mystical Body of the Redeemer so obscured and so maimed that those who are seeking the haven of eternal salvation can neither see it nor find it."

The theologian Van Noort wrote: "The Church in any given age is and remains numerically the same society as that planted by the apostles… A moral body, despite the fact that it constantly undergoes change and renovation in its personnel, remains numerically the same moral body so long as it retains the same social structure and the same authority. This should be clear from the fact that corporations like General Motors, or RCA Victor, or nations like the United States, France, or Switzerland, remain the same corporate or political entities, and are represented before national or international tribunals as the same moral body even though there is vast fluctuation in their personnel. Please note the word, numerically; the same society. A mere specific likeness would never satisfy the requirement of apostolicity.

"Just for the sake of argument - even though it cannot actually happen - let us conjure up some church which would bear a merely specific likeness to Christ's Church; a church which would be like it in all respects except numerical identity. Imagine, now, that the Church planted by the apostles has perished utterly. Imagine, whether you make it the year 600, 1500, or 3000, that all its members have deserted," (and all those ipso facto excommunicated for heresy, apostasy or schism have deserted the Church). "Imagine, furthermore, that out of this totally crumpled society a fresh and vigorous society springs up and then, after a time, is remodeled perfectly to meet the blueprints of the ancient but now perished apostolic structure. Such a process would never yield a church that was genuinely apostolic, that is, numerically one and the same society which actually existed under the apostles' personal rule. There would be a brand new society, studiously copied from a model long since extinct. The new church might be a decent imitation. It might be a caricature. One thing it definitely would not be is apostolic. "

Are Traditional priests and bishops successors of the Apostles?
A lengthy study of this question reveals that Traditional priests and bishops created by Ngo-Dinh-Thuc or Lefebvre never became clerics and cannot minister licitly to the faithful without committing sacrilege and cooperating in mortal sin. A study is now underway to prove the invalidity of these false ministers. To read the document proving Traditionalists incapable of celebrating the Mass or administering the Sacraments, see http://www.vaticaninexile.com/Decrees/IllegitimacyofTraditionalistOrdinations.html

For Catholics there is no choice. They either accept Christ’s Vicar on earth, defending and faithfully transmitting the deposit of faith entrusted him by Our Lord, or they follow and obey neither Jesus nor His Vicar. It is for this reason that St. Bernard of Clairvaux, St. Catherine of Siena and Pope Pius XII himself called the popes and their successors "Christ on earth." And the excuses listed for not acknowledging the pope today cannot be given credence. Certainly moral theology teaches that when one is in doubt, judgment may be suspended. But moral theologians also teach that the faithful must diligently strive to resolve such doubts and arrive at certitude. Certainly neither St. Bernard nor St. Catherine could easily distinguish, during the reign of the anti-pope Anacletus or during the Western Schism respectively, who was he true pope. Yet they did pledge their allegiance regardless, because they knew, as Pope Boniface VIII declared, that in order to save their souls they must die in obedience to the pope. One might be mistaken as to his physical identity, but could never doubt his necessity for the Church’s existence.