Pope Francis Refuses to Answer the

Dubia

–

What Happens Next?

By John F. Salza, Esq.

A Two-Part Feature

Now that it has been published (on November 14, 2016) that Pope Francis has refused to answer the dubia of the four Cardinals (Brandmüller, Burke, Caffarra and Meisner) issued to him on September 16, 2016 concerning his erroneous and even heretical teachings in Amoris Latitiae, many Catholics are wondering what happens next. Some may be tempted to jump the gun and declare, on their own authority, that Francis’ refusal to answer proves he is a formal heretic and thus has lost his office. Is that true? Does Francis’ refusal to answer the dubia mean he has "judged himself" a formal heretic? Does his refusal prove the element of pertinacity which is required for the crime of heresy and loss of office? No. Not yet. We have a way to go. But the canonical process that could eventually lead to a charge and conviction of the crime of heresy

has indeed begun, and thus, we are no doubt entering into a very tumultuous time for the Church, as we approach the centenary of the Fatima apparitions.

A dubium is an official request for an authoritative and final response from the Holy See on a doctrinal, liturgical or canonical question. Dubia are customarily submitted by bishops to seek a definitive answer on a matter that pertains to the faithful in their diocese and the exercise of their apostolic ministry. It is not an accusation of heresy, and thus a Pope’s refusal to respond to a dubia, as extraordinary as that may be, does not establish the element of pertinacity necessary for the crime of heresy. Even in the secular legal process, one must be charged with a crime before he can be found guilty of it. That goes without saying.

We might recall that John Paul II did not directly respond to Archbishop Lefebvre’s dubia, submitted in October 1985 concerning Vatican II’s erroneous teaching on religious liberty in Dignitatis Humanae, and it took the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith a year and a half to issue a response (and which did little more than affirm the council’s teaching). For those who argue that Francis’ three month absence of a response proves his pertinacity and convicts him of heresy (even though the canonical norm for replying actually grants six months), does that mean John Paul II also lost his office after his three months of silence?

What about his six months of silence?

What about his year of silence? Or what about after the Congregation’s tardy response failed to reconcile Dignitatis Humanae’s novel teachings with Quanta Cura and the Syllabus of Errors?

1 These

rhetorical questions underscore that a Pope’s failure to respond to a dubia does not prove him guilty of the canonical crime of heresy. That is because the

1 I have a copy of the CDF’s March 9, 1987 reply which conspicuously fails to reconcile Dignitatis Humanae’s teaching with the perennial teaching of the Church. Furthermore, the Congregation admits the possibility of further study of the problem ("… demeure la possibilité d’une étude ultérieure de ce problème…"). If such matters were left to private judgment, one could have "convicted" of John Paul II for his failure to respond to Archbishop Lefebvre’s dubia.

Church has another means by which the crime of heresy is established: They are ecclesiastical warnings.

The Pope Must Be Formally Warned by Church Authorities Ecclesiastical warnings are issued by the Cardinals (who are the next highest authorities in the Church), which accuse the suspect of heresy and require him to respond with a correction of his errors within six months.

2 This is what Cardinal Burke was referring to in his interview with the National Catholic Register when he said: "There is, in the Tradition of the Church, the practice of correction of the Roman Pontiff. It is something that is clearly quite rare. But if there is no response to these questions, then I would say that it would be a question of taking a formal act of correction of a serious error." If the Pope would fail to respond to these warnings, the Church would presume that the Pope is incorrigible and hardened in his heresy.

As we explain in detail in our book True or False Pope?, the Church’s ability to warn and ultimately judge a Pope for heresy by establishing his pertinacity was taught by Pope Innocent III, Pope Adrian, St. Bellarmine,

3 Francisco

4 Suarez, John of St. Thomas, the famous Decretal Si Papa, and others, and remains the common teaching of the Church’s Doctors and theologians.

Establishing a Pope’s pertinacity is

2 As we read from Fr. Augustine’s commentary on canon law: "If, after the lapse of six months, to be reckoned from the moment the penalty has been contracted, the person suspected of heresy has not amended, he must be regarded as a heretic, amenable to the penalties set forth in canon 2314. Whilst the penalties enumerated under (b) are ferendae sententiae, to be inflicted according to can. 2223, 3, the penalties stated under (c) are a iure and latae sententiae." Augustine, A Commentary on the New Code of Canon Law, vol. VIII, bk. 5, pp. 288289. Fr. Henry Ayrinhac also notes: "A cleric should receive a second warning, and if this too remained fruitless he should be suspended a divinis. After inflicting these punishments, six months more may be allowed, and if at the end of this time the party suspected of heresy has shown no signs of amendment, he is to be considered as a heretic and punished accordingly."

3 Bellarmine wrote: "Firstly, that a heretical Pope can be judged is expressly held in Can. Si Papa dist. 40, and by Innocent III ( Serm. II de Consec. Pontif.) Furthermore, in the 8th Council, (act. 7) the acts of the Roman Council under Pope Hadrian are recited, in which one finds that Pope Honorius appears to be justly anathematized, because he had been convicted of heresy…" ( De Romano Pontifice, bk. 2, ch. 30).

4 "Let no mortal man presume to accuse the Pope of fault, for, it being incumbent upon him to judge all, he should be judged by no one, unless he is suddenly caught deviating from the faith"( Si Papa Dist 40). Latin found in Brian Tierney, The Crisis of Church and State (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1964), p. 124.

more difficult than judging the matter of heresy (e.g., the teachings), because it involves something that exists within the internal forum (the realm of conscience). If a person does not openly leave the Church, or publicly admit that he knowingly rejects what the Church definitively teaches on faith or morals (neither of which Francis has done), pertinacity would need to be established another way. The other way, according to Divine law and canon law, is by issuing an ecclesiastical warning to the suspect or, as Cardinal Burke described it, a "formal act of correction."

An ecclesiastical warning serves as an effective means for establishing pertinacity, since the response will determine, with a sufficient degree of certitude, whether or not the person who has professed heresy (not a lesser error) is truly pertinacious (he is consciously departing from a dogma of Faith), rather than merely mistaken - which still might be a sin, but not necessarily the sin of heresy. Because pertinacity is itself a necessary element of heresy, it does not suffice that its presence be presumed, especially by Catholics with no ecclesiastical authority; it must be proven, and by the Church’s authorities.

The ecclesiastical warnings accomplish this by removing any chance of innocent ignorance.

This is why St. Robert Bellarmine said that a cleric "shows himself to be manifestly obstinate" in his heresy by virtue of the two warnings. Wrote Bellarmine: "For, in the first place, it is proven with arguments from authority and from reason that the manifest heretic is ipso facto deposed. The argument from authority is based on Saint Paul (Titus, 3:10), who orders that the heretic be avoided after two warnings, that is, after showing himself to be manifestly obstinate…"

5

In his Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to Titus, St. Thomas Aquinas confirms that the admonitions spoken of in Titus 3:10 come from official, ecclesiastical authority, and not from any Catholic in

5 De Romano Pontifice, bk. 2, ch. 30.

the pew. Speaking of a person who has deviated from the Faith, St. Thomas wrote: "Such a person should be warned, and if he does not desist, he should be avoided. And he [the Apostle] says, after the first and second admonition, for that is the way the Church proceeds in excommunicating."

In the Summa, St. Thomas confirms the same point when he notes that "the Church" condemns, not at once, but after the first and second warning, according to the teaching of St. Paul. He wrote: "On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy which looks to the conversion of the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but ‘after the first and second admonition,’ as the Apostle directs: after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer hoping for his conversion, looks to the salvation of others, by excommunicating him and separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him to the secular tribunal to be exterminated thereby from the world by death."

6

In a 1909 article published in The American Catholic Quarterly Review,

Fr. Maurice Hassett also confirmed that the admonitions spoken of by St. Paul must come from the proper ecclesiastical authorities: "From the earliest Christian times heresy was universally regarded as the most heinous of sins. The heretic, St. Paul instructs Titus, shall be admonished a first and a second time of the grave character of his offense; if he will not heed, he must be avoided by Christians as a man in evident bad faith, who stands self-condemned - Titus 3:10. (…) Heretics were consequently cut off from all association with the faithful, who must hold no relations with them so long as they obstinately refuse to heed the official remonstrances of the Church authorities."

7

Thus, in order to establish pertinacity (that the heretic is "manifestly obstinate"), canon law requires that the Church issue warnings to a prelate before he is deposed for the crime of heresy.

8 As Bellarmine indicates, this aspect of canon law is founded upon Divine law, as revealed in Scripture ( cf.

Tit. 3:10), and is considered so necessary that even in the extreme case in which a cleric publicly joins a false religion (which Francis has also not done), he must be duly warned by the Church

6 ST, II-II, q. 11, a. 3, sed contra. As we can see, contrary to the teachings of Pope Francis, St. Thomas also affirms the justice of capital punishment to the extent it is in proportion to the severity of the crime (and the death penalty is proportionate to the crime of harming "the salvation of others"). See, for example, ST, II-II, q. 11, a. 3; q. 64, a. 3; Gen. 9:6; Lk 19:27; Rom 13:4.

7 Hassett, "Church and State in the Fourth Century," published in The American Catholic Quarterly Review, vol. 34, January - October, 1909, pp. 301-302.

8 Canon 2314.1-2 says: "All apostates from the Christian faith and each and every heretic or schismatic: Unless they respect warnings, they are deprived of benefice, dignity, pension, office, or other duty that they have in the Church, they are declared infamous, and [if] clerics, with the warning being repeated, [they are] deposed."

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