Bishop Athanasius Schneider is a calm voice in a time of trouble. I pray that he will keep his rock-hard devotion to the truth while maintaining and promoting peace of heart. He has lived through enough turmoil himself (having been born in the Gulag, where his parents were confined) to have perspective as well as a firm understanding of where the evils of man can take us.
His commentary on the validity of the current pontificate (and how to assess it) is well worth reading -- a good follow-up to my previous post. It's hard to read on the site, so I will reproduce it here. (If you read it there on your phone, you can select “show reader view” to put the text in regular black and white text.)
Do read it all.
Bishop Schneider is saying that no person or group can depose the pope -- at least, history and tradition do not support that idea. Even if some theologians might come to a different conclusion, due to the uniquely bad circumstances of this pontificate, that would take a tremendous amount of time -- time we ordinary people still have to live through and keep our faith.
One point that might be brought out, in relation to that scenario: there is one other way out of our troubles: for the laity, through prayer and insistence on the truth, to convince the bishops that they must confront Pope Francis with his wrongs and urge him to repent and amend. Such a thing did happen in another time, in the Arian heresy; and there has been a pope who repented, as St. Robert Bellarmine says happened with John XXII. I believe that it is the duty of the laity to speak out loudly enough for the bishops to hear.
You might ask: Is Bishop Schneider saying to give up hope? No. We must keep our hope. We must remember that the Church is the body of Christ and as such, will endure, will recapitulate, all His sufferings, including interior abandonment and desolation.
Is he trivializing this matter? Again, no. Just as Our Lord did not trivialize his Passion, even though as God He could have, as the bad thief said, just shown His power, we must endure the bitterness to the end, if that is what He wants us to do. Bishop Schneider says, "The surer Catholic tradition says, that in the case of a heretical pope, the members of the Church can avoid him, resist him, refuse to obey him, all of which can be done without requiring a theory or opinion, that says that a heretical pope automatically loses his office or can be deposed consequently."
Let's support each other, tell the truth, and be of good cheer! What choice do we have?
Bishop Schneider: About the Validity of the Pontificate of Pope Francis
There is no authority to declare or consider an elected and generally accepted Pope as an invalid Pope. The constant practice of the Church makes it evident that even in the case of an invalid election this invalid election will be de facto healed through the general acceptance of the new elected by the overwhelming majority of the cardinals and bishops.
Even in the case of a heretical pope he will not lose his office automatically and there is no body within the Church to declare him deposed because of heresy. Such actions would come close to a kind of a heresy of conciliarism or episcopalism. The heresy of conciliarism or episcopalism says basically that there is a body within the Church (Ecumenical Council, Synod, College of Cardinals, College of Bishops), which can issue a legally binding judgment over the Pope.
The theory of the automatic loss of the papacy due to heresy remains only an opinion, and even St. Robert Bellarmine noticed this and did not present it as a teaching of the Magisterium itself. The perennial papal Magisterium never taught such an option. In 1917, when the Code of Canon Law (Codex Iuris Canonici) came into force, the Magisterium of the Church eliminated from the new legislation the remark of the Decretum Gratiani in the old Corpus Iuris Canonici, which stated, that a Pope, who deviates from right doctrine, can be deposed. Never in history the Magisterium of the Church did admit any canonical procedures of deposition of a heretical pope. The Church has no power over the pope formally or judicially. The surer Catholic tradition says, that in the case of a heretical pope, the members of the Church can avoid him, resist him, refuse to obey him, all of which can be done without requiring a theory or opinion, that says that a heretical pope automatically loses his office or can be deposed consequently.
Therefore being it so, we must follow the surer way (via tutior) and abstain from defending the merely opinion of theologians (even be they saints like St. Robert Bellarmine), which says that a heretical pope automatically loses his office or can be deposed by the Church therefore.
The pope cannot commit heresy when he speaks ex cathedra, this is a dogma of faith. In his teaching outside of ex cathedra statements, however, he can commit doctrinal ambiguities, errors and even heresies. And since the pope is not identical with the entire Church, the Church is stronger than a singular erring or heretical Pope. In such a case one should respectfully correct him (avoiding purely human anger and disrespectful language), resist him as one would resist a bad father of family. Yet, the members of a family cannot declare their evil father deposed from the fatherhood. They can correct him, refuse to obey him, separate themselves from him, but they cannot declare him deposed.
Good Catholics know the truth and must proclaim it, offer reparation for the errors of an erring Pope. Since the case of a heretical pope is humanly irresolvable, we must implore with supernatural faith a Divine intervention, because that singular erring Pope is not eternal, but temporal, and the Church is not in our hands, but in the almighty hands of God.
We must have enough supernatural faith, trust, humility, spirit of the Cross in order to endure such an extraordinary trial. In such relatively short situations (in comparison to 2000 years) we must not yield to a too human reaction and to an easy solution (declaring the invalidity of his pontificate), but must keep sobriety (keep a cool head) and at the same time a true supernatural view and trust in Divine intervention and in the indestructibility of the Church.
+ Athanasius Schneider
