+Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul+

+Prayer Society intentions for the Month of July,

Dedicated to the Precious Blood of Jesus+  

Eternal Father, I offer Thee the merits of the Most Precious Blood of Jesus, Thy beloved Son and my Divine Redeemer, for the conversion of the enemies of our holy Faith.

In response to accusations by certain parties that the premises on which the book The Phantom Church in Rome are based must inevitably result in the conclusion that Pope Pius XII was an heretical pope, I offer the following. The objections of these critics will appear as OBJ and my response as ANS.

OBJ. 1: The crime of apostasy, heresy or schism must be manifested externally, either in words, writings or acts that reveal desertion from the Christian Church, denial of any article of faith or separation from the unity of the Church, according to Can. 2195, §1. Saint Thomas says in Summa Theologica Part II-IIae – Question 39 “Therefore, those who spontaneously and intentionally depart from the unity of the Church, which is the main unity, will be considered as schismatics in the strict sense.”

ANS: In last week’s blog I demonstrated beyond any doubt that such heresy was manifested in word, writing and acts by these bishops under orders of Roncalli and/or his unHoly Office. This only three months following his invalid election. Were all the bishops parties to this? Even if they were not, and we know they later proved their guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, they were OBLIGATED to know that what they were promoting was heresy. It occurred in sufficient numbers that it could not be denied or ignored (Can. 2197) and anyone who remained silent regarding said heresy and schism from the Church and teachings of Pope Pius XII and all his predecessors also incurred guilt under Can. 1325. And here I would like to add further proof of this willful and intentional disobedience and rebellion, issued only three months before Pope Pius XII’s death:

OBJ. 2: You state: “I have proven he was both [a usurper and a Masonic agent] and a heretic pre-election. It was the electing cardinals who designated Roncalli as their “pope,” uncanonically placing a heretic in Peter’s Chair.” Are you saying that Pope Pius XII was a formal heretic, by electing as a potential candidate for the papacy a heretic, Modernist and Freemason known to all the Cardinals and the Episcopal Body on October 28, 1958, making him a Cardinal on January 2, 1953 and keeping him until October 9, 1958, and therefore Pope Pius XII was not Pope?

ANS: Pope Innocent III and Canon Law teach that NO ONE may judge the pope. And as one reader pointed out, this applies especially to a pope who was ill and in a most precarious situation, at the mercy of Antichrist himself and his False Prophet! As I explained in my last blog, Roncalli was nominated as a cardinal by Montini, who had not yet shown his true colors to Pope Pius XII. The pope cannot be judged for committing heresy while in office given the Vatican Council definitions which did not yet exist in Pope Paul IV’s time. One would need to prove beyond any doubt that Pope Pius XII, then, was invalidly elected or that he was a heretic pre-election (Can. 2233 and St. Paul: “But PROVE all things; hold fast that which is good” 1 Thess. 5:2). This is something only a future ecumenical council and/or a canonically elected pope could determine.

OBJ. 3: Are you suggesting that before the “election” of Roncalli, the Cardinals chosen by His Holiness Pope Pius XII and His Holiness Pope Pius XI were not legitimate, and it was because of them that the “election” was invalid, and not that it was invalid by the apostate person of Roncalli himself, who, we insist again, was elevated to the Cardinalate by Pope Pius XII?

ANS: No; I am only saying that because the cardinals must designate the man to become pope, they are responsible for first investigating his character. The cardinals electing Roncalli were occult heretics prior to Pope Pius XII’s death who then openly and freely manifested their heresy by electing Roncalli at the behest of the American government/CIA, thereby violating Pope Pius XII’s infallible election law Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis (VAS) in this and in numerous other ways, deposing themselves and invalidating the election. This is the very “obstinacy and rebellion” referred to in your communique (see below). I never said that ALL the cardinals defected, only those who voted for Roncalli (35 out of 51 or thereabouts.) The cardinals rebelled first of all by failing to follow the commands of Pope Pius XII contained in VAS.

Violations of VAS by paragraph

1) Without a two-thirds plus one vote by CATHOLIC cardinals who have not tacitly resigned from their offices by heresy (Can. 188 n. 4, VAS para. 35), the election is “ipso iure null and void,” (para. 68).

2) Roncalli promoted himself for election prior to Pius XII’s death, a fact proven from several different sources, contrary to the excommunication in para. 93 and Can. 2330 n. 6. If the cardinals attempted to absolve him from that excommunication, this is a usurpation of papal jurisdiction (para. 1), since this excommunication is reserved in a most special manner to the Roman Pontiff. That absolution therefore was invalid under VAS and Roncalli was invalidly elected, since Can. 2265 §1, n. 2, which VAS teaches must be followed along with all the other canons, states: “Every excommunicated person whatsoever is incapable of acquiring dignities offices, benefices ecclesiastical pensions or any position in the Church.” Number one of this same canon would also deprive them of the right to vote, but VAS allows excommunicates (for everything but heresy governed under para. 35) to vote.

3) Any lay interference automatically incurs excommunication reserved in a most special manner to the Roman Pontiff, (paras. 94, 95, also para. 3; Can. 2330, n. 7,8), and there are numerous sources of great import documenting the fact that this actually occurred.

4) Any act violating any of the provisions of VAS itself, especially, or of the Sacred Canons in general is null and void. These would include:

• any attempt to usurp papal jurisdiction (para.1);
• all the canons decreeing excommunication of the cardinals, if not observed;
• any usurpation of papal jurisdiction or unopposed attempts to subvert the election (para. 2).
• The election of one not yet absolved by the Roman Pontiff himself from those censures in VAS especially reserved to him, for this would be a usurpation of papal jurisdiction.

OBJ. 4: We quote from The Communication of Catholics with Non-Catholics, Catholic University of America dissertation on canon law, 1948, on schism: “One must withdraw directly (expressly) or indirectly (by his actions) from obedience to the Roman Pontiff and separate from ecclesiastical communion with the other faithful; the withdrawal must be done with obstinacy and rebellion; in relation to those things by which the unity of the Church is constituted.”

ANS: As already stated above, that withdrawal WAS made with obstinacy and rebellion by a) disobeying the binding decrees of Pope Pius XII, especially VAS in electing an unworthy candidate; b) accepting the authority and “papacy” of John 23 by distributing the 1959 mass booklets, c) preparing for and attending the first session of the false Vatican 2 council, and d) by observing the 1962 missal changes and other calendar changes.

OBJ. 5: Canon 2229 §2. Canon 2316: “A person who knowingly and on his own account helps in any way to propagate heresy, or who communicates in sacred rites (in divinis) with heretics in violation of the prohibition of Canon 1258 incurs suspicion of heresy.” If the law uses the words: “He has the audacity, dares, knowingly, intently, recklessly, on purpose” or other similar words that require full knowledge and full deliberation, any reduction of imputability by the understanding or by part of the will exempts from the penalties ‘latae sententiae’.

ANS: It is presumed that cardinals and bishops act knowingly and on purpose, with full knowledge and deliberation, since they have been educated in the teachings of the Church and Canon Law. This was already stated above. You will notice that Can. 2314 §1 (3) does not use this wording, so they are not exempt. Moreover it cites Can. 188 n. 4 which REMOVES THEM FROM THEIR OFFICES AS BISHOPS FOR RECOGNIZING RONCALLI AS A LEGITIMATE POPE AND FAILING TO DEPART FROM HIM TO ELECT A TRUE POPE. This happened in 1958-59, NOT in 1965! Furthermore, the Very Rev. H. A. Ayrinhac, S.S, D.D., D.C.L., in his Penal Legislation in the New Code of Canon Law writes under Can. 2316: “under the former legislation those who helped the spread of heresy were among the fautores hereticorum who incurred the same excommunication as the heretics themselves. The penalty now is suspicion of heresy and the law more explicitly defines the circumstances under which is it is incurred. The assistance must be given not simply to heretics personally but to the heresy so as to contribute to its propagation.”

In questioning the culpability of the cardinals and bishops, we have a doubt regarding the application of this law. What does the Code of Canon Law tell us to do whenever there is a doubt regarding the application of a law? It tells us to return to the old law under Canon 6 n. 4. What is the old law? Well Rev. H. A. Ayrinhac has just told us what the old law was — heretics who cooperate with the principal agent in the spread of heresy. incur the same excommunication. And guess what the old law governing Can. 2316 is? It is no less than Cum ex Apostolates Officio and we know what that law says — these bishops lose all offices for publicly pronouncing heresy. So there we’ve solved our problem. Now we will examine whether or not under Can. 2316 bishops would be presumed to know or could be considered ignorant (invincibly or otherwise) of the fact that they were committing heresy.

Rev. MacKenzie comments: “The very commission of any act which signifies heresy, e.g., the statement of some doctrine contrary or contradictory to a revealed and defined dogma gives sufficient ground for juridical presumption of heretical depravity. There may be excusing circumstances which excuse from grave responsibility in the external forum and the burden of proof is on the person whose action has given eyes to the imputation of heresy. In the absence of proof all such excuses are PRESUMED not to exist” and here MacKenzie refers obliquely to Canon 2200 of the Code, for later he writes: “…Ignorance must be proved. By virtue of Can. 2200 §2 the fact that a delict has been committed establishes a PRESUMPTION that the delinquent was fully responsible.  A mere assertion of ignorance will not suffice. Laypersons will be able to prove this claim more easily than clerics…”

Regarding the election of a future pope, Pope Pius XII’s Vacantis Apostolicae Sedis also sheds further light on this matter: “We command those individuals to whom it pertains and will pertain for the time being to vote, that the ordinances must be respectively and inviolably observed by them, and if anyone should happen to try otherwise relative to these things, by whatever authority, KNOWINGLY OR UNKNOWINGLY, the attempt is null and void” (para. 108). Below I will provide lengthy quotes from theologians well versed in this subject. We must remember that clerics as referred to by Rev. MacKenzie  would more likely refer to those who are deacons and priests. Bishops are much higher on the chain than what is assumed here.

Teaching on ignorance and heresy

We must first remember that from the very beginning of his usurpation, John 23 made it very clear that he intended to modernize the Church. This should have served as a grave warning to the bishops. In his 1935 work Canon Law, Abp. Amleto Cicognani quotes Pope Celestine, who said: “No priest may be ignorant of the canons;” and Pope Leo I: “If ignorance is hardly tolerable in laymen, how much more so in those who are over them; such ignorance is inexcusable and intolerable.” Another pope, whose Bull is the basis for nearly every Canon governing heresy in the Code, taught:

“We likewise consider it fitting that those who do not refrain from evil through love of virtue should be deterred therefrom through fear of penalties. Bishops, Archbishops, Patriarchs, Primates, Cardinals [etc.]…, who must teach others and give them good example to keep them in the Catholic Faith — when these prevaricate, they sin more gravely than others; for they not only lose themselves, but drag down with them to perdition and the pit of death countless other peoples entrusted to their care and government or otherwise subject to them… All and sundry Bishops, Archbishops, Patriarchs, Primates, Cardinals…WHO, IN THE FUTURE, SHALL STRAY OR FALL INTO HERESY OR SHALL INCUR, INCITE OR COMMIT SCHISM… being less excusable than others in such matters… (all these persons) are also automatically AND WITHOUT ANY RECOURSE TO LAW OR ACTION, completely and entirely, forever deprived of, and furthermore disqualified from and incapacitated for their rank” (Cum ex Apostolatus Officio, para. 3). But our critics are attempting to excuse these cardinals and bishops  by having recourse to Can. 2316, when Cum ex… governs this very canon?

In his work, Ignorance in Relation to the Imputability of Delicts (1941), Rev. Innocent Swoboda, O.F.M., J.C.L. observes: “One who is well versed in the law, or one who holds an office in regard to the things pertaining to the office,” is PRESUMED to be unable to claim ignorance of the law or its penalty or ignorance of some fact concerning the delict. Swoboda explains that in priests, (far less bishops), a knowledge of the law is so strongly presumed that even if ignorance is claimed, it would most likely be considered crass by an ecclesiastical court, or culpable, (meaning the offender is at fault). Crass ignorance is subjectively defined by Swoboda as: “A complete lack of diligence when it is known that the truth could be easily discovered… A complete and total failure to use any effort to fulfill the obligation of knowing the law or the pertinent facts surrounding the law. The failure itself may arise from mere sloth or from a sinful habit of acting without due consideration of the results of one’s own conduct… Only the ignorance of those things which can be easily learned can be considered crass or supine.” 

And Rev. Eric MacKenzie writes in his 1932 Canon Law dissertation, The Delict of Heresy, p. 48: “Mere ignorance of the penalty does not remove all imputability from the delict but only diminishes it… If the delinquent making this claim be a cleric his plea for mitigation must be dismissed either as untrue or else as indicating ignorance which is affected or at least crass and supine. His ecclesiastical training in the seminary with its moral and dogmatic theology, its ecclesiastical history, not to mention its Canon Law — all ensured that the Church’s attitude toward heresy was imparted to him. Thereafter his professional associations and his contacts with Church affairs offer further guarantee that HE HAD AMPLE OPPORTUNITY TO KNOW ABOUT HERESY. Hence his present ignorance is unreal or if it be real, it can only be explained as deliberately fostered.”  But our critics would excuse these men?

Can. 2200 states that: “…Given the external violation of a law, the evil will is PRESUMED in the external forum until the contrary is proved.” Rev. Chas. Augustine (Bachofen) concurs with Rev. MacKenzie, stating that, “The text adds that if the fact of the violation of the law is certain, the intention or dolus is presumed until the contrary is proved. Hence the proof of ignorance rests on the perpetrator. This is also recognized by civil law.” He adds: “For any culpable act there is required under Canon 2228: (a) knowledge that what the offender is doing is criminal (meaning knowledge that a censure is attached to the delict); (b) culpa(bility), as distinguished from dolus which can arise from ignorance, carelessness or thoughtlessness… (c) [Also], the evil effect must be foreseen at least in a general or confused way, and (d) [there must have been] an obligation to avoid the evil effect. And according to Pope Paul IV and Revs. MacKenzie and Swoboda above, it will be practically impossible for anyone who holds an office in the Church to prove their innocence.

Let’s analyze these point by point:

1. a) Knowledge of the crime. Even a good Protestant would admit that it is a terrible thing to change words in the Bible, and if one examines ANY Bible, Catholic or Protestant, it will become clear that nowhere can be found the words “for all men.”
2. b) Lack of culpability cannot be granted to those who have received a commission as a successor of the apostles and taken an episcopal oath to preserve the faith and protect the faithful from all error.
3. c) The evil effect, Modernism, had been well outlined by Pius XII as well as Pope St. Pius X and these bishops had studied such things in the seminary and the pontifical universities.
4. d) These men were strictly obliged to avoid such evils.

The Holy See has clarified the above in regard to both the laity and the clergy in the following decision from the Sacred Congregation of the Propaganda, July 20, 1859. As Revs. Woywod-Smith report in A Practical Commentary on the Code of Canon Law: “Formal heresy only is punished with Canon 2314; wherefore, as Cerato remarks, persons born and educated in an heretical sect without knowing the true faith, cannot be said to have stubbornly denied the Catholic faith, and thus, do not incur the penalties of Canon 2314 §1 (3)” [as these critics being addressed here say of the bishops]. “NEVERTHELESS, in the external forum, they are not free from them, for according to Canon 2200, when there is an external violation of Church law, malice is PRESUMED in the external forum until its absence is proven. The Holy See insists that converts from heretical or schismatic sects be not received into the Church until they have first abjured the heresy or schism and been absolved from the censure” (p. 511). The cardinals and bishops later proved their guilt by proceeding to convene the false Vatican 2 council and establish the Novus Ordo religion. Any further questions?

And when exactly did these bishops renounce their heresies and obtain absolution and abjuration if they only just became formal heretics or apostates in 1965? If the Holy See requires this abjuration and absolution of converts, how much more so a CARDINAL OR BISHOP who once held the faith, whole and entire; whereas, a baptized convert is most likely to have been ignorant. This ruling is obviously in place so that the faithful are protected from ANY person who has ever been publicly outside the Church, by requiring a public act or submission to the Church and Her authority before admitting them to the communion of the faithful. Both the canonists Revs. E. J. Mahoney and Adolphe Tanquerey teach the same on this subject.

There is also further consideration of this point under Canons 2207.This canon reads: “Besides other aggravating circumstances, an offense is made worse by the greater dignity of the person who commits the offence or … by the abuse of authority or office for the purpose of committing an offense.” Rev. Charles Augustine comments on this canon as follows: “The higher the dignitary who commits a crime or against whom a crime is committed the greater the crime itself. For not only is the scandal greater but the law itself surrounds these persons with greater protection and inflicts severer penalties for crimes committed against them. Consequently clergymen are more severely punished than laymen… Heresy is more severely punishable in clerics than in laymen. Authority and office may be abused and such abuse is the more detestable the higher the office and being an abuse of a public trust also enhances imputability.”

Finally, as reported in my previous blog, the cardinals could easily have had access to the truth regarding Roncalli’s suspected heresy, which would have disqualified him from election. They were required to have been aware of the laws regarding heresy and the election of a pope. The cardinals are members of the Sacred Congregations and the proof of Roncalli’s suspected heresy issued from one of those congregations. They had a strict obligation to investigate the worthiness of the candidates; in fact they took an oath to do so. Canon 16 § 1 and §2 state: “No ignorance of invalidating or disqualifying laws excuses from their observance unless the law expressly declares otherwise (1). Ignorance or error as a rule is not presumed when it concerns a law or its penalty or one’s own act or when it concernsthe generally known acts of third persons.  Concerning the acts of third persons which are not generally known, ignorance is presumed until the contrary is proved (2).”

Therefore there IS NO EXCUSE for the ignorance of the cardinals or the bishops regarding their lack of due diligence in discerning those laws or acts that disqualified Roncalli from election. Abp. Amleto Cicognani comments on this canon: “Wherefore an act performed even in ignorance or error contrary to the prescriptions of an invalidating or disqualifying law, unless it be given as a penalty for an offense, is invalid just as if a person performed the act with full knowledge. Hence the legislator decreed no ignorance of invalidating or disqualifying laws excuses from their observance; namely no ignorance of the aforementioned laws can make acts valid which they have rendered invalid nor can it make persons capable of acting whom they have declared incapacitated from acting.” Rev. Bernard Wuellner S. J. states the same in his Summary of Scholastic Principles (1957): “Laws justly declaring an incapacity to act or to receive benefits invalidate the attempted act or reception even if they are inculpably unknown or facts pertaining to their application in a concrete instance are unknown.”

OBJ. 6: If Roncalli introduced 47 false cardinals, more than half, to the false conclave of 1963, is it not evident that election was anti-canonical by the members of the conclave and by the person elected of Montini himself?

ANS: Roncalli may have remained only suspect of heresy all the years preceding his election, though in retrospect we know that his heresy was more than proven by his subsequent written works and actions. That suspicion was enough to disqualify him, just as it disqualified Cardinal Morone from being elected following the death of Pope Paul IV. I demonstrated that the “elections” of both Roncalli and Montini were uncanonical over 30 years ago in my first published work, Will the Catholic Church Survive…? This according to the method advised under Can. 18 when there arises a doubt about some fact not covered in the law. Canon 18 reads: “Ecclesiastical laws are to be interpreted according to the proper meaning of the terms of the law considered in their context. If the meaning of the terms remains doubtful or obscure one must have recourse to parallel passages of the Code, if there are any, or to the purpose of the law and its circumstances and the intention of the legislator.”

In his dissertation Canonical Elections, (Catholic University of America Press, 1939), Rev. Anscar Parsons states that, “The election of the Holy Father has been the prototype for the election of inferior prelates.”  As both Rev. Parsons and Rev. Timothy Mock (Disqualification of Electors in Ecclesiastical Elections, Catholic University of America Press, 1958) explain, the election of an unworthy candidate is null and void from the beginning, because QUALIFIED ELECTORS are bound to know that the one they elect is duly qualified. By unworthy is meant a person branded by infamy of law or fact or a notorious apostate, heretic, schismatic or public sinner. Canon 2391 §1 provides the parallel passage of the Code mentioned in Can. 18: “A college which knowingly elects an unworthy person is automatically deprived, for that particular election, of the right to hold a new election.” The fact that this election was based on the wishes and desires of the U.S. government alone, in violation of VAS — not to mention all the other violations noted above — indicates the intent to deliberately act contrary to the commands of Pope Pius XII, i.e., knowingly.

This takes us back to the election of Roncalli himself, which not only disqualifies him as a candidate but voids the election of Montini and all who followed him. Rev. Parsons comments that those considered unfit or unworthy of election are “…those who are legally infamous or laboring under censure [also] notorious apostates, schismatics… public sinners and persons whose conduct is sinful or scandalous… In normal cases it is PRESUMED that the chapter made its choice with full deliberation and knowledge, because it is their duty to investigate the qualities of the person whom they elect … If the majority elect someone who is unworthy, all the voters, even those who are innocent are deprived of the right to vote in this instance” (p. 197).

Rev. Mock agrees with Parsons, writing: “…The burden of proof …will be upon the electors to show that they did not know of the defect in the candidate. The electors are PRESUMED to know the qualifications required by law” (p. 137). Parsons poses the question: “Is the election of an unworthy person void from the beginning? It seems that it is. For the law says that the chapter is deprived of the right to proceed ‘…to a new election.’ In making this disposition, the legislator seems to suppose that the original choice was null and void” (p. 197.)” The electors showed their true intent by the subsequent election of Montini, the CIA’s star operative in the Vatican, and the eventual devastation he wreaked upon the Church. What further damning evidence could anyone possibly hope for to prove this case?!

Conclusion

In the end, we have the principle of St. Robert Bellarmine confirmed by the practice of the Church Herself: “A DOUBTFUL POPE IS NO POPE,  and there is plenty of doubt to go around regarding Roncalli’s election. So what is this hoorah posed by these objectors REALLY all about? These critics have accused me of deliberately refusing to answer their claims. I have answered them at length here, and the burden of proving their own case — that these cardinals and  bishops can be held invincibly ignorant and free of censure — now rests with them. Those cardinals and bishops electing and recognizing Roncalli as a true pope are PRESUMED to have known the law and to have acted with full knowledge and deliberation; they are PRESUMED to have been fully aware of the qualifications of Roncalli. Most importantly, Canon 2200 PRESUMES malice until the contrary is proven. And all those miscreant cardinals and bishops not only did not prove their innocence, but they also did everything necessary to prove their guilt!

These presumptions are crucial, for Canon 1827 reads: “He who has a PRESUMPTION of law in his favor is freed from the burden of proof which has thus shifted to his opponent. If the latter cannot prove that the presumption failed in the case, the judge must render sentence in favor of the one on whose side the presumption stands.” My 1958 designation of the beginning of the end of the Great Apostasy with the election of Angelo Roncalli STANDS.