Trent Horn of Catholic Answers was asked about what he thinks of “sedevacantists’ claims that heretical anti-popes have invalidly reigned for decades.” [1]
Horn begins by linking Jimmy Akin’s radio answer to a question about the claim made by sedevacantists that we’re in the great apostasy and that the Catholic Church has strayed from “original traditions.” [2]
Trent Horn and Jimmy Akin are sharp individuals, but you won’t find them dealing with actual arguments made by sedevacantists. They make the mistake in assuming sedevacantism is wrong regardless and dismiss it. Trent Horn states:
One of the dangers of sedevacantism is that it can become a kind of universal acid that eats through the entire papacy, not just recent modern popes. For example, sedevacantists who focus on moral scandals among cardinals and the curia in the last forty years as evidence that the papacy is vacant would also disqualify several medieval popes, especially those who reigned during the infamous pornocracy of the ninth and tenth centuries. This time period included the infamous cadaver synod of Pope Stephen VI, where he put the corpse of his predecessor Pope Formosus on trial.
Of course, Horn leaves out a crucial point here. Those scandalous medieval popes were not canonized as saints unlike half of his scandalous Vatican 2 popes who are canonized and hailed as heroic examples we should emulate as Catholics. Horn is one of those who do believe John Paul 2 was great, too. Sedevacantists are quite aware that mere scandalous acts do not cause a vacancy with the Chair of Peter, but Horn misses the nuance about their canonizations. What he needs to do is explain how his Vatican 2 popes are canonized despite all their scandalous acts and behavior. He continues:
If they focus on theological errors that allegedly invalidated past popes, then they are going to end up no different than Protestants who try to find similar errors in all the popes, not just modern ones.
Sedevacantists are nothing like Protestants, since the whole point is that true popes can’t teach theological errors against the Catholic Church. The Vatican 2 popes praise Protestantism and salute it. [3] They promulgate the same errors as Protestants. Horn actually defends the very Protestant errors that Catholics must condemn such as religious liberty, the institution narrative of the novus ordo mass, and the nature of the church being divided in faith. To say we’re no different than Protestants while his religion endorses Protestantism is astounding. Horn continues…
They would end up invalidating popes like Honorius, whom a later ecumenical council (Constantinople III) sought to condemn as a heretic for failing to stop the Monothelite heresy, although Pope Leo II, as head of the council, did not confirm the condemnation.
This is false and irrelevant. The only people I’ve ever seen that argue that Honorius lost the papacy are those united to the Vatican 2 religion. A few of them have argued against sedevacantists by claiming Honorius needed the authority of a later pope to condemn him as a heretic or for tolerating heresy. Horn continues…
By creating enough gaps in papal succession through these arguments, all of apostolic succession would be threatened. The examples can be multiplied but, once again, my big concern is that the logic of sedevacantism and its desire to unseat recent popes could be weaponized against the entire papacy.
Horn’s argument is to ignore the facts because it might cause a difficulty he and Catholic Answers can’t answer. It’s a terrible thing to acknowledge reality when it threatens your way of existence, nevermind the fact that his modernist popes have weaponized their fake papacy against the entire Catholic Faith. This is precisely why we are speaking out and fighting. He continues…
Sedevacantism is basically Protestantism dressed up in a Catholic costume.
Here we go with the Protestant argument again. Protestants don’t defend the papacy as sedevacantists. Protestants don’t insist that popes be Catholic and promote Catholicism as sedevacantists. Protestants have never claimed the Chair of Peter was empty because the papal claimant was defending Protestant ideas and incorporating them into the Church. Horn has it exactly backwards. His Vatican 2 religion is basically Protestantism dressed up in a Catholic costume and that’s why sedevacantism exists in the first place. Horn continues…
It claims to be faithful to Tradition, but how can that be when prominent sedevacantists say that the faithful just have to stay home on Sunday and pray the rosary?
Due to the fact that the Vatican 2 sacraments are doubtful, staying home is the best-case scenario for many Catholics. Horn doesn’t deal the sacramental issues which we bring up. He needs to deal with the arguments presented by sedevacantists but he and his gang don’t even try. They’d rather assume their sacraments are valid and not doubtful and not look into it very deeply. He continues…
How much more unfaithful can you be to Catholic Tradition than by saying that the Holy Eucharist, along with Christ’s visible Church, has disappeared from the face of the earth?
Horn should read Cardinal Manning of the First Vatican Council who wrote in 1861 [4]: “The apostasy of the city of Rome from the vicar of Christ and its destruction by Antichrist may be thoughts so new to many Catholics, that I think it well to recite the text of theologians of greatest repute. First Malvenda, who writes expressly on the subject, states as the opinion of Ribera, Gaspar Melus, Biegas, Suarrez, Bellarmine and Bosius that Rome shall apostatize from the faith, drive away the Vicar of Christ and return to its ancient paganism. …Then the Church shall be scattered, driven into the wilderness, and shall be for a time, as it was in the beginning, invisible hidden in catacombs, in dens, in mountains, in lurking places; for a time it shall be swept, as it were from the face of the earth. Such is the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church.”
Sedevacantists are actually being faithful to Catholic Tradition to acknowledge what we’re saying is possible, which Horn and his Catholic Answers gang rejects. How much more unfaithful to Catholic Tradition can you be than to reject the universal testimony of the Fathers of the early Church? Horn continues…
At this point, there is no path for Christ’s Church to be restored from this alleged apostasy, which is why many of them say that we must be near Christ’s Second Coming and the end of the world. But what’s more likely: that this apocalyptic sect correctly discerns the end times even though Christ said that no man knows that, or that they are simply leading people away from the Church which has faithfully persevered for two thousand years?
Horn created a false dichotomy and told an untruth. Jesus didn’t say we couldn’t know the end times, but rather He said we don’t know the day or hour of the Second Coming. We most certainly can know when we’re in the great apostasy, which precedes the last day. According to Holy Scripture, there is no path for Christ’s Church to be restored after the great apostasy.
It’s amazing how Vatican 2 apologists argue against the ability to know and recognize the great revolt when it comes. Of course, they are part of the apostasy, but logically it makes no sense to always say that we’re not in the apostasy because we can’t know the day or the hour of Christ’s return. One of the signs before Christ’s return is the great revolt, but apparently a sign that can’t be read according to Catholic Answers. It’s absurd!
Here we are in this moment of time and Horn and the rest of his gang are mocking us and telling everyone we’re leading people astray, when it is precisely their counterfeit religion that’s leading people astray. We are telling everyone to be Catholic, hold fast to Catholic teaching, and to reject the modernism and immoral nonsense coming out of Rome and its clerics. Horn and Catholic Answers are defending the modernism and immorality coming out of Rome. It is written in II Thessalonians:
“2 That you be not easily moved from your sense, nor be terrified, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by epistle, as sent from us, as if the day of the Lord were at hand. 3 Let no man deceive you by any means, for unless there come a revolt first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, 4 Who opposeth, and is lifted up above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, so that he sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself as if he were God. 5 Remember you not, that when I was yet with you, I told you these things?” (II Thess. 2:2-5)
Unfortunately, Horn and Catholic Answers argue against the application of this important bible verse.
Next comes Jimmy Akin’s arguments against sedevacantism.
Akin begins by defining apostasy. He writes:
The term “great apostasy” does appear in scripture, but it’s used in more than one context. And some of the uses refer to events that are already in our past, but—or actually, “great tribulation” is the term I’m thinking of there. The term “great apostasy” is really a theological term that’s based on some passages that indicate there will be a great falling-away from the faith towards the end of the world. And that’s something the Catholic Church accepts and recognizes, and it’s mentioned in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
But what I find problematic with a lot of these sedevacantist claims is they don’t understand what an apostasy is. Apostasy is defined as—and you can read this in the Code of Canon Law, including the 1917 Code of Canon Law, if I recall correctly, it’s certainly in the 83 Code and it’s in the Catechism—apostasy is defined as the total repudiation of the Christian faith. So in order to be an apostate, you have to say “I was a Christian and I’m not anymore.”
So if you’re a schismatic that has left full communion with the Church, you’re not an apostate. You have not committed apostasy. If you’re a heretic that has denied some dogma of the faith, you’re not an apostate. In order to be an apostate, you have to say “I am not a Christian any more.” And that is not what’s happening in terms of the claims sedevacantists are making with regard to the bishops of the Church.
Akin is partly correct. However, Pope Leo XIII declared in Satis Cognitum, “In this wise, all cause for doubting being removed, can it be lawful for anyone to reject any one of those truths without by the very fact falling into heresy? without separating himself from the Church? – without repudiating in one sweeping act the whole of Christian teaching? For such is the nature of faith that nothing can be more absurd than to accept some things and reject others… But he who dissents even in one point from divinely revealed truth absolutely rejects all faith, since he thereby refuses to honour God as the supreme truth and the formal motive of faith.”
Both heretics and apostates commit the same specific act of rebellion against divine and ecclesiastical authority. Therefore, when we talk about the Great Apostasy, we are talking about the great rebellion or revolt against the Church. Heretics are included because heretics are not Christians even though they claim to be.
Because Akin misrepresents the apostasy, he misunderstands what constitutes the Church. He continues by claiming the Church is bigger today than ever even though most of the members of his Vatican 2 religion reject basic revealed truths of Christianity. Akin is aware of this problem, which makes his understanding of the Church a religion divided in faith but who acknowledges the same guy as pope.
Akin continues…
Similarly, Jesus asks “Will the son of man find faith when he comes back?” So all this and various other indicators suggest that by the end of the world we’re gonna have dramatically diminished in size. We’re not gonna be a sixth of mankind and be bigger than we’ve ever been in history. So we just don’t see the conditions necessary for The Great Apostasy.
Akin misses the Great Apostasy, because he misunderstands it. True Christianity is dramatically diminished in size because the true Catholic Church is united in faith and holy in doctrine, which his Vatican 2 religion is not. He continues…
And you do not have bishops, you don’t have the pope and the body of bishops saying “Guess what, you know, we used to be Christian, but we’re not anymore.” Therefore, whatever criticisms you have of the pope and the bishops, they have not apostatized. So the people who are making these arguments simply do not understand what an apostasy is.
The fact is they have apostatized. Modernism is the synthesis of all heresies so said Pope St. Pius X. Therefore, modernists are the synthesis of all heretics. They are practical atheists, which makes them apostates!
Akin continues on the issue of traditions…
Now there was another component to your question which is: has the Church abandoned its traditions? Well, one of the things you discover when you read the Church’s documents and when you study the course of history is, although tradition has elements of continuity that are the same all the way down through Church history and have been since the first century, there are other elements of tradition that adapt and that develop with the course of time.
Sedevacantists don’t argue that adaptations and changes can’t occur. There are many changes over the years in practice. Therefore, we can skip over Akin’s examples because we acknowledge them. However, Akin misapplies his own argument when he states:
And so part of the problem with sedevacantists is they don’t recognize the degree to which development can happen. They insist frequently—and frankly—on an uncharitable reading of every development, and portray it as if it was an unacceptable development, and they have essentially fossilized a certain stage of development in the history of the Church and said “Any departure from that is an apostasy.” And that’s just a misrepresentation, both of the concept of apostasy and of the way tradition works. Because it has not only the element of continuity, but it also has the element of development that occurs, and you can’t arbitrarily fossilize a certain stage in the Church’s history and say “There can be no departures from this. Anything else is a betrayal.”
The problem is that Akin doesn’t recognize the degree to which development can legitimately happen. He accepts things that can’t be accepted. Dogmas can’t change nor can practices change if they contradict the truth of the faith. The death penalty is one example which I’ve dealt with in ‘Pope’ Francis’ Heresy on the Death Penalty and in Jimmy Akin, Patrick Madrid, and Christopher Ferrara in the same Boat of Stupid. Vatican 2 outlawed the Catholic State by declaring that the public practice of false religion is a God-given civil right. [5] Altar girls is not a permitted development because it was already declared to be intrinsically evil. [6] There are many more examples, but it only takes one to prove my point. Akin continues…
In terms of Pope Francis, he’s the pope. He’s the one that the college of cardinals elected, and I have no doubt about that. I have no doubt that the bishops are, as a college, successors of the apostles. One of the things that Christ promised is that he would be with his church till the end of time. He also promised the gates of hell would not prevail against it. Well, whatever else that means, it means there’s not going to be a sudden apostasy of the bishops who were guided by the Holy Spirit, according to Jesus, and by Jesus himself. There’s not going to be a sudden apostasy with nobody noticing.
Of course, if someone is guided by the Holy Spirit and follows Him he will not go astray. However, that is not our argument. God doesn’t force His bishops to stay united to Him in Faith. The vast majority of them could indeed go astray if they wanted. I don’t think the vast majority of them didn’t notice what was happening. I think they all knew very well what was happening and the faithful ones were too cowardly to stand up for the truth. They were not allowing the Holy Spirit to guide them, which is the whole point we’re raising. Akin continues…
So what happens with these sedevacantists is they will typically say things like “Vatican II was the point of the rupture,” and maybe even a little earlier than that, with Pope John XXIII, “He was not a valid pope for…reasons,” which are really hard to specify. And then Vatican II said all kinds of horrible things, in their mind, that contradicted the historic faith.
John XXIII and Vatican 2 did in fact say horrible things that contradicted the faith. Akin doesn’t deal with a single issue, but of course, he can’t do so logically. It’s much easier just to make blanket assertions without going through the arguments made by sedevacantists. Akin continues…
Well, here’s the thing: the bishops of the world, who are guided by the Holy Spirit and are successors of the apostles—they were there at Vatican II! And if Vatican II had done something that fundamentally betrayed the faith, then number one, the gates of hell would have prevailed against the Church, which Jesus said wouldn’t happen, and number two, there would have been an outcry from the bishops!
Akin is giving his opinion only. The gates of hell could prevail if error was officially taught by a true pope for all to believe. Christ would not allow such a thing as promised. However, it did happen in the Vatican 2 religion. So what gives? Akin doesn’t deal with it. He tries to explain away the erroneous death penalty teaching found in his Catechism of the Catholic Church, but he misrepresents the catechism completely.
The gates of hell could prevail if an evil practice was introduced into the Church as an official church discipline. Such a thing couldn’t happen in the true Church, but has happened in the Vatican 2 religion, such as altar girls, women lectors, and a Protestant styled liturgical service with an institution narrative.
Here are 40 Defects of the Vatican 2 Religion. There was no outcry of bishops because they were cowards or they wanted a different religion. Akin continues…
I mean, how do you get—maybe you get some of the bishops to have a wrong-headed notion about something, maybe even got a significant number of them to have a wrong-headed notion about something— but some of them are gonna be guided enough by the Holy Spirit that they say “Wait a minute! This is really wrong here!” And that didn’t happen. You didn’t have a protest of bishops denouncing the Vatican II documents at the time of Vatican II. You had a little bit of buyer’s remorse afterwards by one bishop—I’m thinking of Marcel Lefebvre— but at the time of the Council, he didn’t you know, shout from the rooftops, “This is all wrong.” He signed the Vatican II documents.
So there just would have been, at the Council, some kind of massive protest if it did anything fundamentally wrong. So even if you want to say, “Well, I think they could have done better, or think they could have phrased this differently,” fine. But if there was some horrendous theological error that struck at the foundation of the Church, some group of the episcopate would have protested. And they didn’t. And that tells us that Christ is maintaining his Church in the truth fundamentally, just like he said he would.
Again, Akin is giving his opinion on what he thinks must happen. Because it didn’t happen the way Akin thinks doesn’t mean his conclusion is correct.
Has Catholic Answers ever dealt with the actual arguments made by sedevacantists? They do so with everyone else. faiths. They just dismiss sedevacantism, because it doesn’t square with their belief that the Church must be everywhere as they have it now. Akin ends his answer with…
As Saint Paul says, it’s the pillar and foundation of truth in the world, Christ said the gates of hell are not going to prevail against it, and so consequently, this—and I hate to say this, because I don’t like to say things in general that are negative about people—but the ideas that are being proposed by sedevacantists are just paranoid and delusional ideas that are not in conformity with the promises of Christ.
If our ideas are paranoid and delusional, then we must be paranoid and delusional. What would make so many of us paranoid and delusional about demanding that our popes maintain Catholic doctrine and practices rather than compromise with error and incorporating Protestant errors? We readily admit that we’re in what seems an impossible scenario and we most definitely don’t want things to be as they are.
I will say that Jimmy Akin calling our ideas paranoid and delusional interesting. He doesn’t necessarily accuse us of being ill-willed and malicious. I sincerely hope that Jimmy Akin is truly delusional rather than being deliberately ignorant, ill-willed, and malicious against Christianity with his defense of the Vatican 2 religion.
Lastly, what sedevacantists are saying is in conformity to the promises of Christ. They are not in conformity to Akin’s opinions, wishes, and best guesses. He has not demonstrated how sedevacantists are delusional with ideas that contradict Christ’s promises. Making blanket statements doesn’t cut it, but I’m sure it works for passersby who are too lazy to try to get to the bottom of it.
Footnotes
[1] Have heretical anti-popes invalidly reigned for decades? | Catholic Answers Q&A
[2] The Errors of Sedevacantism | Catholic Answers Video
[3] 35 Proofs of Protestantism in the Vatican 2 Religion
[4] Henry Edward Cardinal Manning
The Present Crisis of the Holy See, 1861, London: Burns and Lambert, pp. 88-90
[5] Religious Liberty and the Dignity of the Human Person
[6] Altar Girls Revisited to Prove Again Sedevacantism
Their first argument in red shows me bad faith. They must know we don’t reject popes that are bad. They simply must.
We use perennial Catholic teaching: a non Catholic can’t become Pope, even if he wins papacy.
Don’t tolerate experienced non sedes to use Bad pope argument without calling into question how do they not know this?
They are quite ignorant about our position as they demonstrate all the time. However, I did say “Sedevacantists are quite aware that mere scandalous acts do not cause a vacancy with the Chair of Peter…”
Their definition of “bad pope” assumes that a pope is teaching error all the time. Most of them simply think that heretical popes, or at the least popes actively leading the faithful to help, are commonplace in history.
Addendum: their only reference point is John XXIII through Frank the Tank.
Edit. Even if he wins papacy should be CONCLAVE
These so-called traditionalists are incapable of distinguishing between an immoral Pope who is orthodox in the faith and a heretic disguised as a Pope who is neither Pope nor Catholic. In view of all that has happened since 1958, it is clear that Rome has lost the faith and is no longer Catholic. This is the great deception set up by Satan and which has succeeded in deceiving almost everyone, even people who sincerely claim to be Catholics and defend the V2 sect believing it to be the Catholic Church.
It is, I believe the result of a redefinition of “bad pope” and bad history. Alexander VI was a morally corrupt pontiff. However, he didn’t ACTIVELY lead the Church astray, and he didn’t teach error. Semi-trads don’t make the distinction.
Another great article which clearly shows a shallow and lacking knowledge and understanding of sedevacantism but totally accepted as standard dress for media and self ordained theologians and apologists. At this point in time, I and others are growing weary of hearing the same stale arguments and non=sensical rebuttals and explanations of these religious media jerks who are so foolish as to believe they have the answers to all that ails their church. It’s very refreshing to read articles such as yours that aligns what is actual fact and truth and consistently and effectively stand your ground. Thank you.
I love the “sedes are like Protestants “.
Protestants: rejected the authority of previous Pontiffs, established novel doctrines, invented new liturgical rites.
Sedevacantists: embrace and hold tight to all the teachings of valid popes, maintain the Catholic Faith whole and entire, and retain the Liturgy that has been passed down for centuries, as approved by valid popes.
Vatican II Religion: rejected the doctrines and authority of previous Pontiffs, invented new doctrines (that are in direct contrast with what the Church has always taught), and made up new liturgical rites…based on Protestant ideas.
Tell me who the Protestant is again?
Trent Horn states that sedevacantism “can become a kind of universal acid that eats through the entire papacy”. The irony is that sedevacantism prevents the antipapacy from eating through one’s Faith including belief in the papacy.
So true!