By Br. Alexis Bugnolo
Over at True and False Pope, Mr. Salza has published a reply to Ann Barnhardt full of vile insults, which is most unworthy of any man.
I do not usually comment on blogs, but I decided to join the fray. After soliciting from Mr. Siscoe a clear definition of the theory of Universal Acceptance, I show why that Theory in this case is contrary to Faith, Law and Fact. Here is my reply:
There are major problems with your theory and its application.
First of all, no theory of interpretation trumps canon law, because if it did, then Jesus Christ would be a liar Who said of Peter and the laws of all his successors, Whatsoever you bind upon Earth, shall be bound also in Heaven. Thus if a man were accepted by all in the Church as the pope, when however he had no legitimate claim to the papacy because of the non compliance with any papal law regarding becoming pope, then Christ would be proved a liar.
Therefore, to assert such a theory is applicable in such a circumstance is contrary to the Faith. Therefore, in such a case, if you want to use it, I would have to conclude you are a blasphemer and a heretic, and also a schismatic, since you would thereby adhere to a false pope.
The other problem with your theory is that in the present case, there never was universal acceptance. Bishop Gracida never accepted the renunciation or the election. And I just met about 12 persons at a Conference here in Rome, over the weekend, who told me they did not accept Bergoglio the moment he came out of the Loggia and said, Buona Sera!
The use of this theory of Universal Acceptance in the case of a papal renunciation has been abrogated explicitly by Canon 332 §2, which said that the acceptance of a renunciation by anyone whomsoever is not required for its validity. Therefore, it is not the cause of its validity, nor a sign of its validity. Therefore, to resort to it in the present case is to be a rebel against the papal law, and thus to be condemned by Unam Sanctam, because it is a grave duty of the Faith that we be subject to papal laws and to the true pope.
Finally, you resort to this theory of Universal Acceptance because you manifestly reject to accept the norm of Canon 332 §2 which defines the essential juridical act as a renunciation of munus, which never occurred. Nor can you legitimately read munus where ministerium is written in the Declaratio, because as Saint Alphonsus dei Liguori says in his tract on Interpretation of Law in his Theologial Moralis, that such an interpretation would require a positive additional act of the lawgiver. But such a requirement means the original act is not clear in itself. And as Mons. Arrieta of the Pontifical Council of Legal Texts affirmed for me on De. 11, 2019, such a renunciation which is not clear in itself would be invalid.
Please note, that I have used no ad hominems in my response to you. Unlike the comments you publish here which hurl them at me.
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I add here, not at the other blog, that the use of the theory of Universal Acceptance is the last resort of the willfully blind. Because everyone trained in law knows that the validity of a juridical act has nothing to do with whether it is accepted as valid or not.
I will admit, here, however, that I only read True or False Pope Blog, because the authors of it admitted in substance that they did solicit the financial support for the Fatima Center and that the requirement of the donor was that the center be purged of anyone who held the opinion of Father Gruner, that Benedict was still the Pope.
So, here, I will ask Mrs. Siscoe, Salza and Ferrara a public question: Did any of that financial support arrive in your pockets directly or indirectly? And was it given before you adhered to the theory of universal acceptance?
Finally, it does not surprise me that the authors of the Book True or False pope cannot comprehend the present Church Crisis, in which we have both a True AND a False pope. When you begin with a false premise which you use as a principle of epistemology, then you have blinded yourself from the outset.
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Fantastic and bold rebuttal, Br. Bugnolo. Your last sentence is the crux of the matter: “When you begin with a false premise which you use as a principle of epistemology, then you have blinded yourself from the outset.” This is diabolical.
Only the mind of a demon would deliberately do this, unless a person has been bribed or sold on doing so for a handful of silver coins.
Their blog subheading should read: “Defending Sedevacantism and other Modern Errors” because that is exactly what they are doing.
I also really hope they answer your question about the money, but what hope? These guys could be very serious crooks, but they won’t fool us!
When this book was published it was hailed as the answer to all our doubts about PF’s erroneous election but when readers started to ask questions about the way the resignation was forced upon us as a done deal, with PBXVI flying off in a helicopter & then returning & the innovation of a dual papacy (bifurcation of the PO) & a Pope Emeritus which up to that time was a title only used in cases of Bishops retiring.
I remember questioning the Universal Acceptance dodge & categorically stated that neither I nor any member of my family or community of church goers were ever approached about accepting PF as the legally elected Pope, so why imply that we did support the outcome of what appeared to us to be a totally false conclave, given the machinations of the St. Gallen Group etc. I was told those with authority in the CC had accepted the outcome & that’s what mattered. The Remnant were extremely pushy & strictly blocked anyone with real concerns that went against its support of the conclave. From that time on, they judged themselves to be the ‘elite’ Catholics – the remnant that would save the Church – & we were the schismatics & even sedevacantists.
So, supposedly UA is an “infallible sign” that Bergoglio is a legitimate pope.
So it is infallible that the conditions were met.
So it is infallible that Christ took the office from Benedict.
So it is infallible that Benedict really resigned.
So it is infallibe that ministerium = munus.
But Christ’s own Law says ministerium does NOT equal munus. S
o according to Siscoe’s argument, Christ is a liar Who call two things the same which are not the same.
And Christ’s own Words tell us He binds himself to Peter. So Siscoe’s argument again blasphemes Christ when it claims Christ stripped the munus from Benedict even though Benedict did not renounce it.
One question for Siscoe: did Christ strip Bergoglio of his canonically invalidating Lodge membership upon UA? And if he did, did He drop the Lodge a note to that effect?
There is another issue too.
To say that UA is an sign of a valid election is not the same as to say that it is a sign that the election is valid. In the first case UA is an effect, in the second it is a cause.
Also, to say that a valid election produces UA is simply not true, there have been many schisms in which part of the Church did not accept the valid election of the true pope. Also, the theory ignores that the MSM is controlled and that whatever they say it likely to be accepted even if it were not true. The theory of UA arose in an age when such announcements were controlled by the Church, and that is not the case any more. So Siscoe is applying UA to a case to which it does not refer, on several levels.
REALLLY, John Salza, Ann Barnhardt is a Liar and a Fool???
With defenders of the Church and faith like Salsa who needs Enemies???!! What the very unpopular anti-pope Francis could never do among conservatives in actually finishing off the Church among them, Salsa and his fake Catholic cult followers are actually accomplishing by trashing the very foundation of the Church, the validity of Church Law and all certainty of the preservation of the Church and its faith under the Rock of Peter. How can we NOT say Salsa is an enemy of the Church?
Thank you for taking this on…it SO needed to happen!
Just a minor error: it was John Salza who made the article, not Robert Siscoe. Robert Siscoe only joined in the comment section.
Thank you for taking up the trouble to defend the Truth, brother.
I found about Salza’s reply to Barnhardt on some website. I’m not even occasional visitor to TrueorFalsePope.com. While ago I decided it’s not worth my time and what I see today confirms my decision.
I tried to response to the article directly but was moderated off couple times.
In my opinion there is no point discussing UA in the vacuum. What I mean is firstly I’d try to get straight answer from Mr Salza if requirements of Code of Canon Law were fulfilled by Benedict’s “resignation”. I’d be looking for simple answers canon by canon. I started asking about 332 §2 as well with intention to move on to others after getting an answer but with no success.
In questioning weight should be put on adherence of acts to the letter of the Law, not on determination if act of resignation was valid. I expect they (Salza/Siscore) will try to avoid any plain answer, but if they do, we will have some ground do discuss application of UA. Let’s take advantage of they engagement in public discussion.
Your answer, brother, is short but correct (seems correct to me, rather) just focusing on UA distracts our attention from the Law which is what we should be looking at at the first place.
Thank you very much for your blog, brother, and for your work. I discovered it only recently. You will get my support.
M.C.
Brother Bugnolo, for what it is worth, here is my contribution to Salza’s commentary on “UA”, you reference for this post.
“The moment the entire Church adheres to a man as Pope, his legitimacy becomes an infallible fact.”
That is about the least convincing (I hate to use impolite words here) of any statement I have ever heard, of all the many that try to prop up this two-Pope Emeritus Sharsie.
Everyone says so. Therefore it is so. And it is infallible, as long as everyone says it is. !!??!
Let’s assume that is so, for argument. Then –
How do you define “entire”? 100%? 95%? 2/3rds super majority? To me entire means – with no part left out; whole (ie 100%) Sorry. You don’t have that.
Who are you measuring as part of the “entire Church”? Cardinals only? Or do Laity count for purposes of “the Church”. The measurement changes based on who is being measured in your “entire” grouping. Either way … You really sure you have 100%?
Does one person who disagrees invalidate The whole “entire” thing? Or is this a “large number of important people” kind of thing?
And are you saying that subsequent universal acceptance overrules a prior illegal act?
The Conclave was illegal. The Pope did not resign his Office. You cannot have a Conclave until the Papal Office is vacant – Sede Vacante … not Sede Emeritus – *vacante* as in *completely vacant* from the Munus / Office. One Pope at a time. But they did, illegally, call a Conclave. And you say their Papal result is accepted by everyone. And that is infallible, now, because “everyone” says so.
It is not so. From the moment the invalid resignation of Ministry was tendered, to the faux Conclave and the Emeritus thingy, to the present Amazonia Pachamama moment, everything about this farce SCREAMS invalidity.
For clarity: I posted this at True Or False Pope blog in response to Salza’s “Ann Barnhardt is a liar and a fool” article.
Perhaps Salza’s ‘conversion’ from FreeMasonry is a ploy.
I wonder, too, where did Fr. Gruner’s estate go?
If it’s true he died intestate (without a will), who were his heirs? $100,000’s in bullion? That’d be unusual.
Messrs. Ferrara and Salza may know the answers to sone if these questions–certainly if they benefitted from the million dollar donation after Fr. Gruner’s death.
Perhaps they can tell us.
Whether or no, I think a perusal of the IRS Nonprofit Form 990 filings of the Fatima Center bear looking at.
Guys, I am with you in staying that our genuine Vicar of Christ is Benedict XVI; but my discernment hasn’t led me to Cannon Law or any intellectual motivations – I like to keep things simple and as such, I rather listen to what our Mother in Heaven, Jesus, God, seers and prophets have warned us and instructed so many times! I struggle to understand how so many Catholics completely ignore this end times reality, because without analysing everything through its lenses, it’s absolutely impossible to discern things properly. Why are so many bloggers, for example, so afraid of stating this truth? Why have they been ignoring Benedict XVI’s revelation in 2013 that it was God who told him to resign…and this makes all the sense in the world because the last biblical prophecies have to be fulfilled in order for God to be able to bring His final Justice!!! God won’t give Satan the slightest chance for him to say he didn’t have enough time and power! 2 These 2:7 has been already fulfilled, but most of the world, with all its noise, ignored it…’justice’ like in the days of Noah’! Prophets are people who received revelations from God; St Malachi back in the 12th century received from God a list of the last 200 Popes before the Second Coming. He was still on on every single one of them so far, so why would it be different with Benedict XVI? Hasn’t Pius X also received a vision regarding B16, the Pope of tribulations, the one who will temporarily flee Rome, come back and be martyred…being then replace by Peter the Roman. Have you read St Anne Catherine Emmerich’s revelations from God? How she saw Bergoglio among the evil wolves plotting go ‘create a new false Church with new false teachings…that the first new false teaching was “LIVE AND LET LIVE”, exactly what Bergoglio said in 2013 to be the first of ‘ten secrets for hapiness’ – as if our faith had anything with ‘hapiness’! But there are other prophecies both confirming B16 as our true Pope and Bergoglio as the destroyer , like St Francis prophecy of the False Prophet. Bergoglio is an ecclesiastical freemason, his main mission is to drag as many souls possible into apostasy…his second mission is to gradually build a New One World Religion, where all the religions and faiths will be Equal and he will be its symbolic leader [as Simon Peres asked him some years ago] .
I choose to keep things simple and call things by their names!!
When will the world come out of its stupor? Those who know Church law are pointing out that Pope Benedict XVl is the true Pope and it seems like Catholics have fallen into the cult created by the anti-Pope Bergoglio. Many Catholics are adhering to the false religion of Bergoglio. Prayer and labor are the answer. I thank God for this site.
The cult of Bergoglio is a strange cult. The worst members are Trad Inc, because they pay the closest attention and they fully know what they are doing.
Weeping and gnashing of teeth over his destruction of fundamental dogmatic supports of the Faith – all of them are in collapse.
Fierce resistance to any who explain how and why he is an antipope; how to return the Church to its proper mooring; defend Dogma, save souls, restore the Faith and elevate Jesus Christ.