Sunday Meditation for Pentecost: Can a Pope Be a Heretic and, If He Is, Does He Automatically Lose the Chair?

On this Pentecost Sunday, the birthday of the Church, let's consider a question on the mind of many faithful Catholics these days: Can a pope be a heretic? If he does fall into heresy, does he automatically lose the Chair of Peter. And a further question: Who has the authority to make a declaration of heresy and judge that the visually reigning pope is, in fact, no longer pope?

It doesn't seem to be as clearcut as many seem to think. And this is the reason I refuse to declare that Pope Francis is not, in fact, the legitimate pope and is, instead, an anti-pope. Much as I like and respect Ann Barnhardt, I can't jump on that bandwagon. And here are some of the reasons.

Saints have addressed this question. Here are a few quotes from articles that discuss the issue and their positions:

Fr. James Schall (RIP) writing in 2014 at The Catholic Thing, On Heretical Popes:

The technical issue of an heretical pope goes back to Reformation discussions, led by the Jesuits, Robert Bellarmine  [1542-1621] and Francisco Suarez [1548-1617], among others....We read in Romans that the authority of an emperor, as that of a pope, comes from God, but in differing ways.....Bellarmine and Suarez considered a de facto possibility of an heretical pope. They granted that the Church would have to depose him if he did not self-declare his heresy. They differed on the exact procedure that would be required. Basically, electors would de-designate the man chosen pope. But as such, they had no authority over the papal power itself, which is from God....

In recent discussions of an heretical pope, the term sedevacante shows up. It means that, if a pope is heretical, his chair is automatically vacant by divine law. Some hold that anyone can so pronounce this vacancy, which would logically make every man his own pope. [That's a big problem!] Bellarmine and Suarez thought the Church, in the persons of a General Council or the assembled Cardinals would have to declare the pope a heretic and depose him. They differed a bit on the exact procedure.... 

Heretical popes? The essence of Catholicism is that there be none. It is also its essence that, if necessary, the issue be faced squarely and judged fairly.

But then we are on the horns of a dilemma. Who are the the ones needed to "face the issue squarely and judge it fairly?" Does every lay person in the pew have that authority? Not by my calculations. Otherwise, like Martin Luther, each of us becomes prosecutor, jury, and judge of the pope and Holy Mother Church -- making each of us his own personal pope. Yikes! I can't go down that road.

Jacob Woods writing for Crisis Magazine in 2015 (Can a Pope Be a Heretic) also looked at the arguments of Suarez and Bellarmine. He makes the distinction between material and formal heresy and writes:

Suarez took it as a given that a pope could be a formal heretic. He then considered two possibilities for what happens next:

First possibility: The pope loses his office as a consequence of the sin of heresy, because people who commit that sin cease to be members of the Church, and God deposes a pope who is no longer a member of the Church. (Suarez, De fide, 10.6.2)

Suarez rejects this possibility for two reasons. First, falling out of a state of grace might mean that you aren’t a member of the Church in the way that you’re supposed to be, but it doesn’t mean that you’re not a member of the Church—otherwise you’d be kicked out of the Church every time you committed a mortal sin. Second, if Catholics are supposed to believe that God deposes popes, then Scripture, the Tradition of the Church, and the pronouncements of the Magisterium ought to have said something about it—but they haven’t. Besides, if God deposes popes, you could never be sure if the pope was really the pope—what if he was a secret heretic and God had secretly deposed him? How would you ever know? (Suarez, De fide, 10.6.2-4)

Second possibility: The pope keeps his office if he commits the sin of heresy, but loses his office if he is convicted of the crime of heresy. (De fide 10.6.6)

Suarez thinks that, just like Christ bestows the papacy on the man whom the Church elects, so also Christ takes away the papacy from the man whom the Church convicts (De fide 10.6.10). So, if a pope commits the sin of heresy, all the other bishops of the world have the right to try him for the crime of heresy, even against his will (De fide 10.6.7). If they were to convict him, he could be considered deposed from the papacy by Christ, and the Church could elect another pope.

Bellarmine was more hesitant about the whole question. Unlike Suarez, he did not take it as a given that the pope could be a formal heretic. Actually, Bellarmine considered it “probable” that God would prevent the pope from ever being a formal heretic (he says it twice: De Romano Pontifice 2.30 and 4.2). Nevertheless, Bellarmine was willing to consider what would be the case if the pope could fall into formal heresy.

If we assume that the pope could be a formal heretic, Bellarmine thinks Suarez’s opinion is wrong. Suarez allows the bishops to judge the pope. But one of Gratian’s basic rules is that no one can judge the pope. Sure, Suarez has Christ carrying out the judgment, but it is only because the other bishops of the Church have pronounced the judgment first.

Instead, Bellarmine adopts the position that Suarez rejected: the pope loses his office immediately by committing the sin of formal heresy, because people who commit that sin cease to be members of the Church, and God deposes a pope who is no longer a member of the Church. It’s true that the bishops could still get together and make a declaration that God had deposed the pope, but their declaration would not be a judgment in any real sense, only an acknowledgement of what God had already done. (De Romano Pontifice 2.30)

Suarez and Bellarmine both have good points, but I think they each show how the other misses the mark. Suarez is right that, if Catholics are supposed to believe that God deposes popes, then Scripture, the Tradition of the Church, and the pronouncements of the Magisterium ought to have said something about it. But Bellarmine has something important to contribute, too: if God doesn’t depose popes, then no one can, because no one can judge the pope. And besides, it’s not even agreed that the pope could ever be a formal heretic, anyway.

Where does that leave us? 

First, God has not abandoned his flock to the whims of heretics. Our Lord prayed for St. Peter’s faith (Luke 22:32), he promised Peter that the gates of hell would not prevail against the Church that was founding upon him (Matthew 16:18), and, on the day of Pentecost, he sent his Holy Spirit upon that Church, with Peter at its head, to proclaim the Gospel to all nations (Acts 2). Catholics shouldn’t expect, and shouldn’t go looking for falsehood in the successor of St. Peter. God is always faithful to his promises.

Canon lawyer, Cathy Ciardi, goes into this question at Canon Law Made Easy. She points out a case where Jesuits, Dominicans, and Franciscans disagreed on a theological question of religious worship in China. The pope had to make the final decision. Was he right; was he wrong? Pope's are not infallible unless they are speaking ex cathedra. Ciardi's article is worth reading and points out how difficult these questions can be, particularly with regard to declaring the pope a heretic. She concludes with a warning that canonically the term heresy has a strict meaning and interpretation and the term shouldn't be thrown around indiscriminately. That seems like good advice, particularly with reference to a pope who appears to have been legitimately elected by the college of cardinals. 

On the other hand, saints and Church documents have addressed the possibility of a heretical pope and certainly there are grounds that cause many to believe that Pope Francis is not a legitimate pope. You can read a number of quotes that address the question at Virgo Sacrata in the article, Catholic Church Teaching on Heresy. Are you experiencing brain vertigo yet? 

I'll conclude with Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, Thomistic theologian and liturgical scholar and his article, Could God permit a heretical pope to remain in office, and why would He?

The reason it is not impossible for a heretic to occupy an ecclesial office is that the Church is defined not only by belief and loyalty, but also by place and time. Someone who has defected from the Church’s belief and therefore ceased to be Catholic in the most important sense can still, in the stupidly physical sense of the word, occupy an ecclesiastical office: he can sit in a room in the Vatican or in a bishop’s estate, and he can write on official letterhead, and so on. One could approach him and say, “Excuse me, but since you are no longer a Catholic, you should leave the room.” But he will say, “How dare you say I am no longer a Catholic?”

Formal heretics, despite their formal heresy, have rarely admitted to being no longer in the fold. And as long as no one else can occupy the office, and the people subject to that office have no power to act, this squatter in the office wields a de facto authority. It is incongruous that someone outside the Catholic faith continues to tell people what to do in the Church — it is, in fact, rather like someone who does not belong to a family having absolute power over the family. But it is not impossible.

So what the heck is a faithful Catholic to do? 

In actual practice, therefore, formal heretics have occupied ecclesiastical offices, until someone with authority to do so (and, often enough, with thugs to back him up) insists that they leave. So the current Code of Canon Law repeats the old canon: “The following are removed from ecclesiastical office by virtue of the law itself: … 2. One who has publicly defected from the Catholic faith.” But it merely acknowledges the reality of the situation when it adds: “The removal mentioned in nn. 2 and 3 can be insisted upon only if it is established by a declaration of the competent authority.” True, this declaration is a mere recognition of fact, but for the automatic removal from office to have juridical effect, the recognition must come from a competent authority.

So there we are back to the question of who has the authority to declare the pope a heretic and remove him physically from Chair of Peter? I sure don't!

Therein lies the difficulty when it comes to the Petrine office. This principle stated by Canon Law can have its effect only if we can find someone authorized to say, in an official way, that the pope is a formal heretic. In any case, it is tricky to get a canon law case up against the man who has absolute power over canon law.

This leaves us with the practical difficulty of getting together a contingent of men somehow either authorized or competent and virtuous enough to “merely recognize” the pope’s de facto abdication. Pending that, no one else can occupy the office, and everyone under him continues under an obligation of obeying (according to a correct notion of obedience: one obeys unless commanded to act against the known truth held with a good conscience). This is to say that, in some real yet irritating sense, he still occupies the office despite having rejected it in some important way.

We are living in incredibly confusing times, not for the first time in Church history. Why has God allowed all this? I don't know! And Professor Kwasniewski doesn't give a clear-cut answer. He concludes with this:

The Lord does not allow any evil except for the sake of some good, and in the case of the just whom the Lord loves, that good will not be merely the eventual punishment of the wicked, but growth in virtue, achievement of sanctity, and everlasting glory for those who remain faithful. I hope and believe, as part of my basic act of faith in God, that every evil the Church suffers will somehow advance her well-being in the end.

The apostles couldn't see the "good" of Good Friday. It was only after the Resurrection that they recognized what God was doing. Perhaps this is a time for us to exercise the virtue of patience, obey the pope in those things where he acts with the mind of the Church, and oppose him when he commits acts that undermine the faith.  It's an important time for Catholics to recognize exactly what constitutes true obedience in the Church. That's the title of Dr. Kwasniewski's recently published book and I recommend it highly. I've already given it to a priest friend and bought another one to send to my bishop. 

In the meantime, making a declaration that the pope is a heretic really is above my status as a pew sitter. I can't even claim to have a deep understanding of the theological and canonical issues involved. But I can be faithful to the perennial teaching of the Church in her doctrine and sacred tradition. And that's what I'm doing.

With the aid of the Holy Spirit and through the intercession of the Blessed Mother may all of persevere in faith until the day we leave the battlefield and face our King. 

Come, O Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and kindle in us the fire of Thy love. Send forth Thy Spirit, O Lord, and we shall be created and Thou shalt renew the face of the earth.

St. Joseph, patron of the Universal Church, pray for us.