Why I Accept Pope Michael

©Prakash João Maskaren. 28^th December, 2002.
It may be known to you by now that I have come to acknowledge the claim of David Bawden to be the Pope under the name of Pope Michael I. By and large, I have had no comment on this, except for one lady who went into denial and started to pretend that this announcement came from a false or Pseudo-Prakash who has hacked into my email and website accounts. I pity her.

I wish to make it very clear that I have not made any change in course in acknowledging Pope Michael. I have always accepted the principles that underlay his claim, so that the only reason I rejected it was because I had perceived that the procedure that the organizers (himself and Teresa Stanfill-Benns) of the election which resulted in his claim, was defective, for reasons that can still be found on my original evaluation of the Bawdenite claim, at The Sad Mis-Adventures of Benns & Bawden.

Some months back, Teresa Benns challenged my evaluation. I therefore sat down and reread the book and while reading it again, I found that my earlier interpretation was wrong. Indeed, it is evident that it was more than wrong, for I can see now that I — my own fault — allowed myself to be influenced and therefore misread, even misinterpret, the book upon which the Bawdenite Claim stands. This I have set out in my Re-Evaluation, Re-Evaluating The Bawdenite Papal Claim.

However, that statement does not seem to convince people of the legitimacy either of the Bawdenite Claim nor of my submission to it. I therefore need to redraw the attention of the reader to the principles that underlie my submission (to Pope Michael) in my page, Orthopapism, at http://www.geocities.com/orthopapism/orthopapism.html.

I ask you to give me a sincere answer: Have I changed my principles from what I had already stated before? Moreover, are the principles I elucidated in that statement not the principles of the Catholic Church?

I am entirely confident that these principles are indeed Catholic. It is because of this that I acknowledge Pope Michael's claim.

At the time I had first written this page, I had been unaware of Pope Michael's claim. When I had revised it, I had rejected that claim based upon a misinterpretation. Today, however, that misinterpretation being removed, I am forced to decide and make a choice: whether I shall continue to be faithful to our Lord and acknowledge whom is unmistakeably His Vicar, or to be unfaithful. This is a choice that does not involve David Bawden / Pope Michael personally, but lies entirely between me and my Saviour.

If I rejected and continued to misrepresent the Bawdenite Claim, I could not be anything but unfaithful to Christ Jesus. My obligation lay clearly and unmistakeably towards acknowledging Pope Michael.
Pope Michael's claim rests on these incontrovertible facts:
His was the first attempt at an election: all previous claimants claimed to have been constituted Pope in one apparition or the other — obviously illegitimate.

Joseph Cardinal Siri, it is claimed, was elected and then forced to resign, but (it is claimed) secretly maintained his claim, created cardinals and has from them a successor. This claim cannot stand its ground in the face of Catholicism: The man became, in the external forum, an accomplice of the apostates and thus could not be a Catholic anymore. Moreover, there is no legitimacy possible in Catholicism for an occult claimant.

Linus II was elected AFTER Bawden's election, without providing any reasons whatsoever for disregarding Bawden's election as illegitimate — Obviously, enough, there cannot be two popes simultaneously! To this day, despite desperate efforts on my part to gain any such pre-election statement by Linus or his partisans, I have not seen any such statement. Indeed, I am confident today that there is none: the organizers of Linus II's blissfully ignored this necessity and went about electing a pretend-pope! Such a procedure is horrible and viciously anti-Catholic, and no true Catholic can countenance it even for a moment.

Regarding the Right of the Roman Church to supply the Pope, it is true. However, given the failure of this Church's surviving members in making themselves known and in acting to supply the Pope, the Church Universal is not obliged to standny idly, waiting for the Romans to act; on the contrary, since this is an urgent matter, and since the Church is obliged to act expeditiously to supply the want, the clergy have the right to act, as at Constance, or failing them, the laity, as have done now.

Regarding the Right of Electing the Pope belonging to the Bishops: I ask, which Bishops? I have sought to be convinced of the validity of the Thucite etc. clergy, but I have had no real response, nor have I found any such defense anywhere on the internet. Again, even with these bishops, they are badly split into factions, and themselves acknowledge the impossibility of organizing a Council such as Constance to elect the Pope. Given these facts, a purely lay election, as an EXTRA-ORDINARY MEANS is certainly legitimate.
Therefore, I acknowledge David Bawden to be Christ's Vicar: Michael I, by the Grace of God, Pope, Bishop of Rome, Metropolitan-Archbishop of the Roman Province, Primate of Italy, Patriarch of the West, Sovereign of the Vatican City-State, Vicar of Christ, Successor Of St. Peter, Prince Of The Apostles, Supreme Pontiff Of The Universal Church, Servant Of The Servants Of God.

I also therefore call upon one and all to join me in so acknowledging, after due study and investigation, the Roman Pontiff, submission to whom is, as taught in Pope Boniface's Bull, Unam Sanctam, necessary for our Salvation. I will remind you that those who culpably refuse to do so, who neglect or refuse their duty to do so, will account for it before God.

Prakash João Maskaren