Hello,

I'm writing to find out if anyone is going to do a DNA study to determine the true identity of Sister Lucy II.

I showed my four year old son the two pictures and asked him if he thought they were the same person or different people, and he said, “No, one is a nun and one is a saint.” He identified Sister Lucy I as the saint and Sister Lucy II as just a nun.

Out of the mouths of babes!

     Sincerely,

     R.D.

TIA,

Why should we be surprised that the Homosexuals keep making advances in society and laws when the Church is going along with the program to make them – and lesbians and transgenders – all acceptable and normal. The Catholic Church should be the one to make a strong stand against it. Instead we have a book by a priest telling us how to make them feel welcome and accept them for what they are. We are supposed to let our children see them hugging and kissing at Mass, and say, "That’s okay. God made them that way."

What a lie. What a farce when the Church pretends to get tough on homosexuals in the priesthood. No, please don’t enter if you’ve been practicing in the last three years. Otherwise, welcome, welcome.

Bishop Cordileone, shame on you. Do you really agree with Catholic ministries and parishes welcoming homosexuals. Is this your idea of pastoral? I really can’t believe that. More likely you have some skeletons in your closet somewhere and are afraid to take on the Lavendar Mafia in the Church…

     A.S.

Dear Tradition in Action,

I enjoy your site very much and visit every day. Many of your articles have enlightened my mind and deepened my Faith.

I find, however, your position on sede-vacantism difficult to understand. Now, I am not a scholar having no degrees in Theology, that I might judge such matters. I certainly do not have the intellectual capacity to decide whether the Chair of Peter is vacant or not. You say that it is not vacant. At one time we could have had recourse to a impeccable authority (the Church) to decide the matter. But that authority is the very source of our doubts now.

I can, however, tell you one thing for sure. If the Chair of Peter has not been empty since 1958, it would be far better for us Catholics if it had been. If you hold these men to be the Vicars of Christ, then their words and teachings carry authority to a greater or lesser degree that Catholics cannot ignore. For we are bound to be subject to the Roman Pontiff as being subject to Christ himself.

Now if these five men, John XXIII to Benedict XVI, are real Popes, they have said things that never before have been heard in the Church, and done things that Popes before them would gladly have died to avoid doing, and have embraced heretics and embraced heathens. They have repudiated the traditions that our fathers passed on to us and which have been held since Peter and have changed the ancient rites. They have sown doubts everywhere, giving scandal, causing many to fall away.

Yes, if these men are real Popes, as you say, then it would be far better for us if they were not, far better that the Chair be vacant than it give the scandal it gives today.

Then the clear duty of Catholics to cling to tradition would be obvious.

     God Bless

     G.D.N.



TIA responds:

Dear Mr. G.D.N.,

Thank you for being a regular reader of our website. Thank you also for considering a hypothesis different from your position. That is to say, that the conciliar Popes are, or at least may be, valid Popes. It reveals a moral courtesy and an intellectual effort on your part that we appreciate, given that these attitudes are quite rare among sede-vacantists.

We agree that the mentioned conciliar Popes give scandal - as Benedict XVI gave days ago when he praised Luther at the very Monastery of Erfurt where the heresiarch broke with the Catholic Church. They even promote heresy, such as that of universal salvation, a point that is implicit in your message, but not mentioned.

Since you had the politesse of taking our position and arguing ad absurdum trying to prove it is not correct, let us do an analogous thing. Let us suppose that these Popes were not Popes.

As every Catholic knows, the Pope is the head of the Church. In the Mystical Body of Christ, Our Lord is the supernatural head, but the visible head is the Pope. This is not only a spiritual reality; every well established human society has a head. So does the Church, which is human and divine. As in the human body, the Church cannot live without a head.

Now then, if the sede-vacantists were right, since 1958 the Catholic Church would not have a head. For more than 50 years, therefore, we would have this visible society called the Catholic Church without a head. We believe that just as any human body or human society without a head does not live, neither does the Church.

So, using your method, we ask: What is better, to have a sick head in the Church or to cut it off? If we admit the first hypothesis, we fight to extirpate what is sick in the Church; if we admit the second, we kill her.

Admitting that the conciliar Popes are valid Popes, we can and should resist them when they teach bad doctrine or give scandal. Thus, we are not bound to obey whatever they do or say as you presupposed.

We hope that these considerations will help you see that the sede-vacantist position is a simplistic solution that accelerates the evil that it says it wants to avoid.

     Cordially,

     TIA correspondence desk

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  Resistance & Sede-Vacantism

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  When Does a Heretical Pope Become an Invalid Pope?