Letter from Mr. William J. Morgan, received 14th November 1996.
Counter-Reformation Association
La Guerche, Main Street, Monks Kirby, Near Rugby, CV23 0QZ, England.
28th October 1996; SS Simon and Jude
Dear Mr. Mascarenhas,
Thank you so much for very kindly writing and sending me a copy of your article "Repair My Church". It is always a pleasure and encouragement to make contact with other Catholics who share one's grave concern as to the apocalyptic crisis in the Church. It is of particular value when, as in your case, it illustrates the fact that that concern is worldwide.
Your letter and article arrived this morning, and I immediately made an attentive reading of the latter. As you urge me to make a critical assessment of your article, I will attempt to do so; though as I am currently revising the text for the next issue of the CRA News and Views, have a pile of correspondence to reply to, and am engaged in several controversies through the columns of different publications, I am obliged to make this as succinct as possible.
Your article clearly falls into two sections. The first is your description and analysis of the contemporary situation, and takes up pages 1 to 8 (top). The second is your prescription as to how the present sedevacante situation may be ended, and runs from page 8 to page 10.
I am obviously in agreement with the broad thrust of the first section, and with a number of your detailed points. As to the second section; I equally obviously share your concern that we should obtain a true Pope as soon as possible. However, I submit that there are certain weak points, and even specific errors in section one. As to section two, while an extraordinary Council will almost certainly be necessary eventually, I must dissent radically from your thesis concerning the "emancipation of priests" (cf page 9), and accordingly conclude that you have omitted a key element from your proposals.
Concerning section one of your article, I would make a number of brief, illustrative points, where you might wish to clarify or correct individual statements, or perhaps reconstruct the argument.
On page 2, in point 1), you directly attribute to John XXIII the teaching that "the Unity of the Church is not an accomplished fact". I think that you would have considerable difficulty in finding any such teaching in John XXIII's pronouncements; indeed; his relevant encyclicals demonstrate the contrary.
That John XXIII was the key figure in launching the Conciliar crisis is manifest. It is also documented how he favoured those theologians whose views had been rejected by Pope Pius XII as at least erroneous, and that he wished to reverse the policies of Pope Pius XII and some decisions of the Holy Office. However, it is not clear that he personally held any heretical beliefs; although his policies were mistaken, indeed disasterous for the Church.
Also, on page 2, point iii), referring to later heretics as "Roncalli's followers" it wrongly suggests that John XXIII himself shared those heresies.
One must also be very careful to distinguish between the Catholic position, popularly expressed as "one may be saved in a false religion but not through that false religion", with the heretical teaching of John Paul II that adherence to a false religion is itself the work of the Holy Ghost (cf "Redemptor Hominis").
I wonder also, regarding page 1, piint iii), is it strictly true that it is (Catholic) "Doctrine" that "error has no rights", or is that maxim rather a philosophical / theological formulation used by certain Catholic thinkers? In any event, the Catholic criticism of the Vatican II doctrine must be expressed with great care, so as to distinguish between what is traditional and true in the Vatican II formulations and what is erroneous, possibly indeed heretical.
An incidental point is your formulation of the Cassiciacum thesis, on page 5 of your article. There you write that, according to the thesis, "the Roncallite pope... remains formally pope (but not materially)". In fact, the thesis maintains the reverse: that the "Conciliar Popes" have been "materially 'Popes' only"; not formally. But that, of course, may have been a slip on your part.
More importantly, on the same page (5), there is a very unfortunate formulation, where you write: "they implicitly teach the heresy of Papal Infallibility.."! Presumable you meant something like "the heretical distortion of Papal Infallibility..."
Finally, on a matter which overlaps section one and two of your article, I do not know of a mini-antipope in Lyon - a French city which I visit from time to time. Along with the "mystical Pope" of Palma da Troya ("Gregory XVII"), there is another "mystical Gregory XVII" in Canada (to whom a Thuc-line bishop has rallied). As to why any claims of "mystical Popes" are to be rejected a priori, I am in full agreement with you.
More interestingly, from the standpoint of section two of your article, there is also a "Pope Michael the First, gloriously reigning", as a result of a mini-conclave in Kansas, U.S.A.; and a more serious contender - in terms of the people who elected him in the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi - the "secret Pope", "Linus II".
The last time I heard of "Linus II" - who although officially the "secret Pope", the identity of whom is known and has been published - was living in England!
The objection to all such putative conclaves, of course, is the status of the self-styled electors. Prima facie by Divine Law the right to elect the Roman Pontiff ordinarily belongs to the local Roman Church, though that right has been exercised in different ways throughout the centuries (even, at some periods, by the designation of one person, the secular ruler of the time!). However, history and theology - as you indicate in part two of your article - make it morally certain that, when the local Church of Rome is incapable of providing an indisputably valid Pontiff, an extraordinary General Council can designate the electors and mode of election.
However, in the case of "Linus II", although his electors included zealous and internationally known Catholics, it is not apparent how they could claim to be the legitimate representatives of the local Church of Rome, or even of the Universal Church.
Now for the fundamental objection to your proposals. They rest on an extraordinarily contentious speculative hypothesis concerning the status of ordinary priests and bishops respectively.
It is true that some Catholic authors have speculated that the distinction is "basically juridical". However, that speculative opinion has been almost universally rejected, and on this matter - paradoxically - the teaching of Vatican II is solidly Catholic!
A bishop is made such by a sacramental act, his consecration, even though his hierarchical status is further dependent upon his election or appointment as Bishop (ordinary or titular) of a local Church. While a simple priest may be conceded extraordinary jurisdiction, certainly by a Pope, he cannot be made a bishop by any such act of jurisdiction - he has to be consecrated.
Further, if an ordinary priest is, so to speak, a bishop juridically forbidden to exercise certain powers (even under pain of invalidity), then indeed he could act "beside the law" in certain emergency situations - "necessity knows no law". However, there are no certain cases of priests attempting to act thuus from "necessity". Indeed, on the hypothesis that some had (perhaps in Japan), those they had "ordained" would have their "ordinations" judged invalid. Again, even those odd speculative authors we referred to, have not advocated any such emergency use of their speculations.
Some authors claim that two Popes in the Middle Ages did authorise some Cistercian abbots to ordain their own subjects (themselves not being bishops). The meaning of the relevant documents is a matter of controversy. Even on the hypothesis that that realy happened, most Catholic theologians would judge the acts ultra vires - instances of Popes acting, in individual cases, beyound their powers.
However, even if such a thing were theologically possible, it would not help your case. Given the wider context referred to above, such acts would have to be seen as cases of Popes supplying what was lacking in the ministers - that is, conferring some additional positive power upon them - not simply removing a juridical restriction as to the use of powers already possessed.
It has been necessary to deal at length and in some detail with this part of your proposals because it is clearly central to them, and given its unsoundness renders your specific proposals intrinsically unacceptable.
Even if you concede that absolutely crucial point, you may not unreasonably throw the question back at me: how then can a true Pope ever again be obtained?
The answer, I submit, is theoretically simple, no matter how difficult it may be in practice. It is, first, to enlarge the Catholic hierarchy by the de facto local Catholic Churches electing their own bishops and having htem consecrated as Bishops of their Churches.
When there has been such reasonable rebuilding of the remnant hierarchy, those new Bishops and, if practically possible at the time, such Catholic Bishops as have survived (even if only in Chinese prison camps), should indeed meet in an extraoridnary Council, solemnly to declare the See of Peter vacant, and to elect the next valid Pope.
This letter has already become inordinately long! SO I will stop at this point, save for expressing the hope that you will keep in touch.
With my good wishes,
Yours sincerely,
William Morgan