Flashback: Might Edward Feser be using "Circular Logic" in saying "there can be no reasonable doubt that Benedict Validly Resigned"?
It is also a non-starter even apart from all that, because there can be no reasonable doubt that Benedict validly resigned. Canon 332 §2 of the Code of Canon Law tells us:
If it happens that the Roman Pontiff resigns his office, it is required for validity that the resignation is made freely and properly manifested but not that it is accepted by anyone.
Now, Benedict publicly and freely resigned his office, and has publicly reaffirmed that his decision was taken freely, in answer to those who have speculated otherwise. He has also explicitly acknowledged that there is only one pope and that it is Francis. His resignation thus clearly meets the criteria for validity set out by canon law. End of story.
Some have suggested that the resignation cannot have been made freely because, they say, it was done under the influence of an erroneous theory of the papacy, namely the one described by Gänswein. But this is a non sequitur, as any Catholic should know who is familiar with the conditions for a sin to be mortal – grave matter, full knowledge, and deliberate consent. My point isn’t that Benedict’s resignation was sinful, but rather that these conditions illustrate the general point that the Church distinguishes acting with full knowledge and acting with deliberate consent or freely. And canon law makes only the latter, and not the former, a condition for the validity of a papal resignation. Hence, even if Benedict’s resignation was made under the influence of an erroneous theological theory about the papacy, that would be irrelevant to its having been made freely and thus validly. - Dr. Edward Feser [http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2022/04/benevacantism-is-scandalous-and.html]
He resigned because God accepted his resignation. How do we know God accepted His resignation? Because he resigned.
You have not answered the Canonical question - which is very, very simple - it required one sentence and equivalent action: “I resign the Munus. I am no longer Pope but Father Ratzinger. Good bye”.
But that didn’t happen, did it?
The Catholic Monitor commenter Aqua and an Edward Feser-like "Francis is infallibly definitely the pope" guy named Michael O'Hearn fought a couple of rounds in the CM comment section with O'Hearn apparently using logic similar to Feser as quoted above. You decide who won the fight:
Dr. Mazza’s explanation of Benedict’s conception of the papal office as forever gift conferred by God is accurate. This also explains why Benedict did not refer to munus in his declaratio of February 2013.
Benedict’s explanation a la nouveau theologie seems to be that the later distinction incorporating a separate concept of potestas iurisdictionis was in fact a medieval accretion imposed by the exigencies inherent in the feudal system set up in Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire, and not without a secular purpose.
One can look at the papal prerogatives in either sense without necessitating the nullification of the resignation.
On Nov 18, 2021, Michael O'Hearn said: Father Kramer asserts [The Case Against Bergoglio, digital version page 479]: ““The incontestable fact that Pope Benedict XVI has maintained some claim on his papal munus proves absolutely, that he remains in full possession of the primacy as a result of the conditionality of his renunciation of the munus.
Michael O'Hearn commented on "Flashback: "Saruman" Taylor Marshall's False Dichotomies on Francis"
Nov 18, 2021
Father Kramer asserts [The Case Against Bergoglio, digital version page 479]: ““The incontestable fact that Pope Benedict XVI has maintained some claim on his papal munus proves absolutely, that he remains in full possession of the primacy as a result of the conditionality of his renunciation of the munus. The reason for this is that the nature of the papacy is such, that the actual holder of the office possesses the primacy in virtue of the Petrine munus which he possesses in its absolute and indivisible fullness, so that a pope who would attempt to renounce the papal office by an act that lacks a total and unconditional renunciation of the munus, by the very act of his stipulating a qualifying condition of the renunciation, whereby the intention is asserted in the act, to retain anything whatsoever of the munus he received from Christ upon his election, albeit only “spiritual” and not jurisdictional, nullifies the act in virtue of the fatal equivocation brought about by the logical opposition of contradictory assertions made in the act.” Excerpt From On the true and false pope Paul Kramer https://books.apple.com/us/book/on-the-true-and-false-pope/id1595649148 This material may be protected by copyright.
I contend that God does accept Benedict’s resignation and so reject the sedevacantist conclusions reached by some.
You didn’t make an argument. You made a declaration. What is the argument?
Canon 332.2: “Canon 332 §2 of the Code of Canon Law provides that: “[i]f it happens that the Roman Pontiff resigns his office, it is required for validity that the resignation is made freely and properly manifested but not that it is accepted by anyone.”
He resigned because God accepted his resignation. How do we know God accepted His resignation? Because he resigned.
You have not answered the Canonical question - which is very, very simple - it required one sentence and equivalent action: “I resign the Munus. I am no longer Pope but Father Ratzinger. Good bye”.
But that didn’t happen, did it?
https://file.wikileaks.org/file/?fbclid=IwAR2U_Evqah_Qy2wxNY12FMqFC5dAFUcZL5Kl4FIfQuMFMp8ssbM46oHXWMI
Pray an Our Father now in reparation for the sins of Francis's Amoris Laetitia.
Pray an Our Father now for the restoration of the Church as well as the Triumph of the Kingdom of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Stop for a moment of silence, ask Jesus Christ what He wants you to do now and next. In this silence remember God, Father, Son and Holy Ghost - Three Divine Persons yet One God, has an ordered universe where you can know truth and falsehood as well as never forget that He wants you to have eternal happiness with Him as his son or daughter by grace. Make this a practice. By doing this you are doing more good than reading anything here or anywhere else on the Internet.
Francis Notes:
- "If Francis is a Heretic, What should Canonically happen to him?": http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2020/12/if-francis-is-heretic-what-should.html
- "Could Francis be a Antipope even though the Majority of Cardinals claim he is Pope?": http://www.thecatholicmonitor.com/2019/03/could-francis-be-antipope-even-though.html
Election Notes:
- Intel Cryptanalyst-Mathematician on Biden Steal: "212Million Registered Voters & 66.2% Voting,140.344 M Voted...Trump got 74 M, that leaves only 66.344 M for Biden" [http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/intel-cryptanalyst-mathematician-on.html?m=1]
- Will US be Venezuela?: Ex-CIA Official told Epoch Times "Chávez started to Focus on [Smartmatic] Voting Machines to Ensure Victory as early as 2003": http://catholicmonitor.blogspot.com/2020/12/will-us-be-venezuela-ex-cia-official.html
Canon 332.2: “Canon 332 §2 of the Code of Canon Law provides that: “[i]f it happens that the Roman Pontiff resigns his office, it is required for validity that the resignation is made freely and properly manifested but not that it is accepted by anyone.”