Closing the "Case"

Closing the "Case"
©Lúcio Mascarenhas, formerly "Prakash". July 22, 2003. This page is Copyright.
To,
Mr. Case, H.H. Pope Michael 1 & Mrs. Benns.

Reference: Bawden's Papacy: Human Faith? .

I have noted that Mr. Case has quoted from the Benns-Bawden book, and had not clarified originally, when so quoting, that he had picked up that quote from the website, not from the book. Therefore, he was very naturally asked how he quoted that when he claimed to have not read or desired to read the book.

Instead of answering civilly, Mr. Case has replied insultingly.

In the beginning, when a claim is presented by someone to be such and such a person or officer, one is free, indeed normally obliged, to not credit it, but to examine that claim and credit it only after it has been found to be true. And therefore, one is not under obligation towards the person who makes a claim as if the claim was proved.

That however does not permit one to insult or speak insultingly towards the claimant. Such is un-Christian, even anti-Christian behaviour. One is permitted to talk harshly only with proven frauds.

Mr. Case says, "David does not objectively represent the Church." I wrote that since he did not elaborate or write specifically, I did not understand what he meant by that statement.

Instead of a civil answer, Mr. Case replies with more insult. Now I am supposed to ignorant of the English language, supposed to be unable to comprehend the Engish language. Be that as it may. I have no desire to be a professor of English. But what is worse, is that I am being accused, without any evidence offered, of reading things into his words which they do not contain or imply...

At the end of it all, we have still not made any progress, precisely because Mr. Case will not state things properly. It may be that he is incapable of articulating his thoughts, understandings and concepts, or on the other hand, and which is, in my mind the greater probability, he believes that Mr. Bawden and all who confess him are so beneath contempt that he does not need to answer logically.

Mr. Case's statement, however, seems to be an act of pontifical promulgation, wherein he seems to declare: "I, Pope J. Lawrence Case, do hereby infallibly declare and define that Mr. Bawden is not pope, and therefore he is not pope. End of matter."

Unfortunately for me, that is NOT the end of the matter.

When I, on the other hand, set out to prove something, whether for or against any claims, I set out principles, context and background, build my case and arrive at conclusions, all of which is in the public domain, so that others can see and admit or discover errors and prove them.

Unlike Pope Lawrence, I do not rely upon mere pontifications in order to establish facts.

I am the only one on the internet who I know of, who has devoted much time and space to studying Mr. Bawden's claim. I am the only person on the net who challenged Mr. Bawden's claim, and those pages are still on the net, as part of the public record. I am the only person on the net who has proven Mr. Bawden's claim, and those pages too are very much on the net, part of the public record.

I have not behaved arrogantly and insolently, keeping my ideas on such vital matters that concern the salvation of innumerable souls, private to myself, but I have in Christian charity put my positions before the public that men may know, and have an opportunity to know, or to discover and prove errors in my reasonings.

In the Indian Gurukool tradition, parents sent their young children to the homes or estates of men reputed to be learned, where they were supposed to work as domestic help while they learnt from him, the guru. What the guru taught was defined as an esoteric, secret, hereditary doctrine, set out as mantras or secrets, and these secrets as a whole is called deeksha - imparted knowledge.

The students were supposed to be loyal and obedient, and only when they were found to be so were they considered to be worthy of being imparted the deeksha.

Mr. Case labours under the delusion that we, and that includes the Holy Father and Mrs. Benns together with me, had somehow agreed to submit ourselves to obediently and passively learn from Guru Case, patiently submitting so that we could be found worthy of being imparted Case's deeksha. However, that is not so.

Therefore, Mr. Case reproaches us.

There is nothing that I can do to disabuse Mr. Case of his delusions. However, I draw the line at being imputed with malafide intention, which is what Mr. Case does by imputing to us, to me together with the Holy Father and Mrs. Benns, the same malafide intention as described and set out by John Newman as characteristic of most Protestants.

We have not in fact behaved in that manner. However, at the same time, we have not either contracted, even by implication to submit ourselves to Guru Case that we be found worthy of his deeksha.

We have pointed out glaring faults in the Guerardist ideology and we have sought for clarifications. The honest way out was to prove that there are, in fact, no errors, and to prove the validity of Guerardism, or admit that there is in fact errors and abandon the false course.

Mr. Case failed, fails and is entirely incapable of proving Guerardism. He has chosen to ignore my repeated requests for clarifications. And now to cover up for himself, he turns around and accuse us of bad faith, of frustrating his every effort at setting out the truth.

Indeed, Mr. Case actually claims that he had already answered and answered satisfactorily and conclusively many of our queries and that we have ignored these answers in silence, but that we have, after a gap of time, returned again with the same queries, once again asking for answers to those very same queries.

It is true that if we did indeed do so, that it would be incontrovertibly evidence of bad faith on our part. However, it is just as evident that Mr. Case has not in fact provided any such clarifications and that he is lying.

In Indian history, we are taught of one rebel against the Mughal Empire who attacked the Governor in his palace along with his troop of guerrilla fighters, and then fled under cover of darkness, the while yelling out, loudly, "Thief! Thief!" By this stratagem, he and his followers gave the Mughal troops converging on the palace the impression that they were ordinary people or victims of the guerrillas fleeing from the commotion to safety.

Mr. Case evidently attempts the same stratagem. He loudly - and dishonestly - yells "Thief! Thief!" at us, when in fact it is he, not us, that is being dishonest!

This is unacceptable behaviour. This is intolerable behaviour. This is not the behaviour that I had expected from Mr. Case, who I had rather hoped was a gentleman.

My belief has been belied. Be that as it may, I have no intention whatsoever of countenancing any more of this nonsense. I speak for myself, which is within my authority: I want no more commerce with the man; the Holy Father and Mrs. Benns can make their own decisions.

Therefore, this is my last missive to Mr. Case. I take my "farewell", though, in keeping with the Gospel injunction, I do not say "Godspeed" to you.

I hope that I make myself very clear. I desire that Mr. Case will not address me any further. In his words, I am dishonest, and I have no desire to defend myself before him. In my eyes, he is dishonest and unworthy of my respect. We can get together once again only if he repents and admits his wrongs, which is greatly improbable. I have reproached him, and he persists shamelessly in slandering me, us.

I have no intention to countenance these insults and humiliations. For to countenance them is to be seen as admitting them to be true...

Therefore, with these words, I close this "Case", atleast as far as I am concerned. This is, of course, exactly what he wants, since he is not able to defend his fantastic Guerardism. However, that is by the way...

Prakash John Mascarenhas, Bombay, India.

Date: Sat, 19 Jul 2003 07:03:29 -0400
To: "Prax Maskaren"
From: "J. Lawrence Case"
Subject: Re: Benns & Bawden: Defending a 'Human Faith'?
CC: [email protected], [email protected]

Prax,

It seems you may have some trouble comprehending the English language. When I write, I assume you will infer what I think I am obviously implying without you reading something else into my words. I believe that David Bawden is not the pope. That is no secret. Therefore, when I say you are promoting a human faith, I am implying that he doesn't represent the Church or the divine Faith. Simple as that.

To say you are doing something that Cardinal Newman says in a quote that Protestants do, is not a cheap shot. It is a fact. Cardinal Newman was talking about them, and it just so happens that you three people have been doing that particular something Cardinal Newman was complaining about. If you don't like doing what Protestants are known to do, then stop doing it. You can look at the archive record and see how I keep trying to focus and stay on a subject, and how you either change the subject, or else don't reply to crucial points. Then after a period of silence you act as though I never addressed a particular subject. It is very erratic. Look at the archives. It is all there. You act as though questions you ask LATER take precedence to what we were discussing before those questions you ask. If I don't answer a question, it is because I am waiting to take care of first business first, which you three keep shelving and running away from.

For example, I was very detailed about material & formal. I asked how a "material sin" could be termed "a sin" but admittedly "not a true sin" and asked if this is a contradiction. Just when I was getting to the crux of explanation, I meet with silence and a change of subject.

As for the 1887 quote....it is an official function of the Holy Office to scrutinize and approve such a work. Unless you actually have something more official to counteract that, you have NO business denying it. A Catholic simply accepts it as a normal function of the Church. And the work expresses that there were only TWO positions; both of them accept that a pope can automatically cease being a pope through heresy. Furthermore, Pope Pius IX, the pope who defined "papal infallibility" in 1870, seven years later upon declaring St. Francis de Sales a "Doctor of the Church" said that the Doctor's "Controversies" were "a full and complete demonstration of the Catholic religion". In that work, originally written to Calvinists, St. Francis states as a matter of doctrinal fact, that a pope can automatically cease being pope by heresy....and that a declaration needs to be made before another can take his place. A pope is the highest authority, and he approved. Do you approve? I brought this subject up because I noticed that Bawden and Benns deny that a pope can cease to be pope by heresy. I always desired to continue that, but it was aborted in silence.

JLC

At 04:10 PM 7/18/2003 +0100, you wrote:

Dear Sir,

You wrote:

That which is written to a certain public could easily be addressed to that same public instead of creating a separate Web page only for a few.

I wrote privately first, as my page is more than normally hard, and I do not want to publicly ridicule you.

What I wrote is no more sinful than saying that David Bawden is just a layman. Since our Faith is tied to what the Church teaches, and David does not objectively represent the Church, I used "human faith" to describe it.

You are still not being exact in your objections. I do not see how Mr. Bawden's remaining a layman to this day is in anyway relevant, unless you wish to accuse him of neglecting or refusing to procure consecration. If so, I would prefer that you state that upfront.

I agree with him that he should not solicit consecration from any one indiscriminately, but only one with certain orders and lineage and moreover from one who has submitted to him as pope prior to his consecration.

It is important to know that a layman elected pope is so constituted, with full power, from the moment of his assent.

It is schismatic and heretical for a pope to submit to be consecrated by one who does not submit to him as pope.

I would like you to be more specific when you say, "David does not objectively represent the Church," and I could not even begin to guess what exactly you are angling at.

It is exasperating to see discussions on the forum be aborted by all of you each time we are just starting to get somewhere... and then later a point is brought up as though we never were discussing it! And then you say things that were already given answers in the past. Don't you think that is strange? It is just what Cardinal Newman spoke about in his "Difficulties of Controversy" quoted in the Bawden/Benns book in regard to the way Protestants handle polemics.

I strongly resent this baseless charge. I do not know what you mean when you say that "discussions are aborted just when we are starting to get somewhere..." and I certainly do NOT appreciate your cheap shot at trying to compare us to the typical prot described by Newman.

Even as I believe in Mr. Bawden being the pope, and am therefore naturally aligned with Mrs. Benns, there is no absolute agreement of minds between us, and certainly, I have not been part of any conspiracy to gang up together on you... There has NOT been any attempt at ganging up, as far as I can see, there is only a shared repugnance for the ideology of Guerardism, as much as for Lefebvrism.

If you think or believe that we are ganging up against you, then I can only suggest that you are paranoid.

I have asked you a set of questions. You have not answered them. The only one you did answer was my request to provide what you said you could provide on the matter of Papal Indefectibility, and even then you failed to honour your promise by providing the promised decision of the Holy Office of 1887. As a matter of fact, I believe that you had promised wrongly, out of a mistaken understanding of the nature of the particular quote, which is not infact a decision of the Holy Office at all. All that the Holy Office did was vet the document, a special action, and then approve or imprimatur it. That cannot be constituted a "decision" in the sense of normal Holy Office decisions.

I find your attempt to misrepresent me - to pretendedly conform me to the typical prot described by Newman - is disgusting and utterly contemptible, leaving a bad taste in the mouth. I had believed you a honourable man and did not expect you to fall so low.

I had found your ideas weird from the beginning, long before the UDI. However, I believe that the Guerardists too must be given a chance to represent themselves.

Again, I had invited you to join because of the regard I had for Robert (I believe that is his name, and that he is your son, "Rawbit"), from my experience of his posts on TCC. Therefore, I had invited both of you, but desired more that he, rather than you, should have come in. He shares your weird, Guerardist, ideas, but atleast he has an open mind, I believe.

When you came in, and not he, I kept quiet because I do not want to come or be seen to be attempting to come in between father and son.

This is for your information and record.

Yours disappointedly,

Prakash J. M.