Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò has released the following statement on the ongoing theological debate over the status of Pope Francis and the papacy. In many ways, this is his most pointed criticism yet. His Excellency argues that given the devastation caused by “Jorge Mario Bergoglio” on the universal Church — which stems from his embrace of the “cancer” of Vatican II — and given the role the Saint Gallen mafia played in the 2013 conclave, Pope Francis does not have and never did have the intention of serving as the head of the Catholic Church. Rather he hid his intentions from electors with the end goal of using the authority of the papacy to undermine the Church and to make it the “handmaid” of the New World Order. “I believe instead that his acceptance of the papacy is invalidated, because he considers the papacy something other than what it is,” Viganò remarks. He continues: “I would like us to take seriously … the possibility that Bergoglio intended to obtain the election by means of fraud, and that he intended to abuse the authority of the Roman Pontiff in order to do the exact opposite of what Jesus Christ gave a mandate to Saint Peter.” The Archbishop also states that he disagrees with Bishop Athanasius Schneider’s view that “universal acceptance” of Francis as the pope makes him the pope. His Excellency points to the historical example of Clement VII in the 14th century to support his argument. While admitting the current situation is “humanly irremediable,” his goal in publishing the letter is to “get to the root of the question” and to find a common starting point that can lead to a “remedy [to] the disconcerting, scandalous presence of a pope who presents himself with ostentatious arrogance as inimicus Ecclesiæ, and who acts and speaks as such.”
VITIUM CONSENSUS
A fructibus eorum cognoscetis eos.
Numquid colligunt de spinis uvas aut de tribulis ficus?
Sic omnis arbor bona fructus bonos facit; mala autem arbor fructus malos facit.
Non potest arbor bona fructus malos facere, neque arbor mala fructus bonos facere.
Omnis arbor quæ non facit fructum bonum exciditur et in ignem mittitur.
Igitur ex fructibus eorum cognoscetis eos.
By their fruits you will know them.
Does anyone pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?
Just so, every good tree bears good fruit; and a rotten tree bears bad fruit.
A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit.
Every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
Therefore By their fruits you will know them.
Mt 7:16-20
In this speech I will not try to give answers, but to pose a question that can no longer be postponed, so that we bishops, the clergy, and the faithful can look clearly at the very serious apostasy present as a completely unprecedented fact, one that cannot be resolved, in my opinion, by resorting to our usual categories of judgment and action.
The evidence of the ‘Bergoglio problem’
The proliferation of declarations and behaviors completely foreign to what is expected of a pope – and indeed in contrast with the Faith and Morality of which the Papacy is the guardian – has led many of the faithful and an increasingly large number of bishops to take note of something that until some time ago seemed unheard of: the Throne of Peter is occupied by a person who abuses his power, using it for the opposite purpose to that for which Our Lord instituted it.
Some say that Jorge Mario Bergoglio is manifestly heretical in doctrinal questions, others that he is tyrannical in matters of government, still others consider his election invalid because of the multiple anomalies of the resignation of Benedict XVI and the election of the one who took his place. These opinions – more or less supported by evidence or the result of speculations that cannot always be shared – nevertheless confirm a reality that is now incontestable. And it is this reality, in my opinion, that constitutes a common starting point in trying to remedy the disconcerting, scandalous presence of a pope who presents himself with ostentatious arrogance as inimicus Ecclesiæ, and who acts and speaks as such. An enemy who, precisely because he occupies the Throne of Peter and abuses papal authority, is capable of inflicting a terrible and disastrous blow, such as no external enemy in the entire history of the Church has ever been able to cause. The worst persecutors of Christians, the fiercest adherents of the Masonic Lodges, and the most unrestrained heresiarchs have never before succeeded, in such a short time and with such effectiveness, in devastating the Lord’s vineyard, scandalizing the faithful, disgusting the Ministers, discrediting its authority and authoritativeness before the world, and demolishing the Magisterium, Faith, Morals, Liturgy, and discipline.
Inimicus Ecclesiæ, not only with respect to the members of the Mystical Body – which he despises, ridicules (he never ceases to launch poisonous epithets against it), persecutes, and strikes; but also with respect to the Head of the Mystical Body, Jesus Christ: whose authority is exercised by Bergoglio no longer in a vicarious way, which would therefore be in necessary and dutiful consistency with the Depositum Fidei, but rather in a self-referential and thus tyrannical way. The authority of the Roman Pontiff is in fact derived from the Supreme Authority of Christ, in which it participates, always within the boundaries and scope of the goals which the Divine Founder has established once and for all, and which no human power can change.
The evidence of Bergoglio’s alienity to the office he holds is certainly a painful and very serious fact; but becoming aware of this reality is the indispensable premise for remedying an unsustainable and disastrous situation.
Agere sequitur esse
In these ten years of his “pontificate” we have seen Bergoglio do everything that would never be expected of a pope, and vice-versa everything that a heresiarch or an apostate would do. There have been occasions when these actions have appeared manifestly provocative, as if by his utterances or certain acts of government he deliberately wanted to arouse the indignation of the ecclesial body and urge priests and faithful to react by giving them the pretext to declare them schismatic. But this typical strategy of the worst Jesuitism is now uncovered, because the whole operation has been conducted with too much arrogance and in areas on which not even moderate Catholics are willing to compromise.
The sexual scandals of the clergy, and in particular the response of the Holy See to the scourge of moral corruption of Cardinals and Bishops, have shown a shameful disparity of treatment between those who belong to Bergoglio’s so-called “magic circle” and those he considers adversaries. The recent case of Marko Rupnik is evidence of one who exercises power like a despot, legibus solutus, who considers himself free to act without being accountable for any of his actions. It often happens that the consequences of the decisions taken personally by the Argentine are then passed on to his subordinates, who find themselves accused and discredited for choices which are not theirs. I think of the case of the London building in which officials of the Secretariat of State were involved, while the contract of sale bears the august chirograph. I think of the shameful handling of the Rupnik case, which in addition to having rehabilitated a criminal responsible for horrendous crimes, in contempt of the numerous victims, has also discredited the former Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Ladaria. I am thinking of the McCarrick case, which with the farce of a secret administrative procedure was hastily liquidated without any compensation to the victims, and declared res judicata unappealable. And the list goes on and on. It remains evident that the unfortunates who willingly or unwillingly collaborate with Bergoglio find themselves thrown overboard as soon as the press discovers the Vatican scandals. Many are noticing this cynical utilitarian behavior, which in fact brings them to decline appointments and promotions precisely so as not to find themselves in the uncomfortable role of scapegoat.
Breaking down the wall of silence
The silence of the Episcopate in the face of the Bergoglian nonsense confirms that the self-referential authoritarianism of the Jesuit Bergoglio has found servile obedience in almost all the Bishops, terrified by the idea of being made the object of the retaliation of the vengeful and despotic satrap of Santa Marta. Some diocesan bishops are beginning to no longer tolerate his devastating action, which undermines the authority and authoritativeness of the whole Church. Bishop Joseph Strickland, for example, has commendably reiterated immutable doctrinal truths that the Synod on Synodality in the coming months is preparing to demolish. And Cardinal Gerard Ludwig Müller has rightly recalled that the Lord did not give power to the pope to “bully” good bishops.
Something therefore is beginning to change: alignments are taking shape, and we see on the one hand Bergoglio’s “synodal church” – which he emblematically calls “our church” – and on the other hand what remains of the Catholic Church, toward which he does not fail to reiterate his absolute extraneousness.
The sanatio in radice of the irregularities at the 2013 conclave
Bishop Athanasius Schneider maintains that any irregularities that may have occurred in the 2013 Conclave have in any case been healed in radice by the fact that Jorge Mario Bergoglio has been recognized as pope by the Cardinal Electors, by the Episcopate, and by the majority of the faithful. Practically speaking. The argument is that, regardless of the events that may have led to the election of a pope – with or without external meddling in it – the Church, practically speaking, places a time limit beyond which it is not possible to challenge an election if the person elected is accepted by the Christian people. But this thesis is called into question by historical precedent.
In 1378, after the election of Pope Urban VI, the majority of Cardinals, Prelates and the people recognized Clement VII as pope, even though he was in reality an antipope. Thirteen out of sixteen cardinals questioned the validity of the election of Pope Urban due to the threat of violence from the Roman people against the Sacred College, and even Urban’s few supporters immediately retracted their election, summoning a new Conclave at Fondi which elected the antipope Clement VII. Even Saint Vincent Ferrer was convinced that Clement was the real pope, while Saint Catherine of Siena sided with Urban. If universal consensus were an indefectibly valid argument for a pope’s legitimacy, Clement would have had the right to be considered the true pope, rather than Urban. Antipope Clement was defeated by Urban VI’s army in the battle of Marino in 1379 and transferred his See to Avignon, leading to the Western Schism, which lasted thirty-nine years. Thus we see that the universal acceptance argument does not withstand the test of history.
The post Archbishop Viganò: Catholics Must Seriously Consider the Possibility that Francis Isn’t the Pope appeared first on LewRockwell.