OVER THE PUBLIC JUDGMENT OF THE CHURCH
Following is a post that Fr. Kramer put on his Facebook page, which Eric Gajewski (one of Kramer’s disciples) also posted on his website, under the title “Fr. Kramer Refutes Pseudo Traditionalists Salza and Siscoe.” It’s quite interesting to note that Gajewski was singing Salza’s praises just a few short months ago when he had Salza as a guest on his radio show to discuss the errors of Sedevacantism, and promoted the show on his website. But now that his shepherd (Fr. Kramer) has fallen into the Sedevacantist errors, Gajewski has suddenly changed his tune.
Here
is the post of Fr. Kramer in which he promotes the Sedevacantist error that an
individual can personally judge whether the man elected Pope is a true or a
false Pope, based on “natural law.”
“Fr. Kramer Response to Andy Sloan: You are confusing the distinction between the
judgment of the INTELLECT, and official judgment made with the power of
jurisdiction. The former is a RIGHT according to NATURAL LAW, and Canon Law
(can. 748); the latter requires authority to be lawful. You quote St. Thomas
out of context -- a passage that refers to a judgment that requires the proper
jurisdiction to be lawful. It does not refer in any manner to the private
judgment of the intellect, which is the individual’s right in natural law and
Canon Law, as I have already explained above, and multiple times in the past.
This failure to distinguish the two kinds of judgment in theological and canonical works is also the error of Salza and Siscoe.”
This failure to distinguish the two kinds of judgment in theological and canonical works is also the error of Salza and Siscoe.”
Reply: Given Fr.
Kramer’s freefall, it’s no longer difficult to believe that he would make such
a ridiculous argument. Martin Luther could not have said it better. According
to Fr. Kramer, man has a right under “NATURAL LAW” to form a judgment that is contrary to the
public judgment of the Church! He evidently believes that our duty to “hear
the Church” terminates when our private judgment is not in agreement with the Church’s
public judgment. Kramer even cites canon
748 for this absurd proposition. Canon 748, §1 says: “All persons are bound to seek the truth in those things which
regard God and His Church and by virtue of divine law are bound by the
obligation and possess the right of embracing and observing the truth which
they have come to know.”
In other words, Fr. Kramer acknowledges
that we are bound to seek the truth which regards the Church, but this does not
include the Church’s judgment on who is a true Pope, which is one of the
most important judgments that the Church can possibly make. If we have a “natural law” right to reject the
Church’s judgment on who is Pope (which John of St. Thomas equates with an article of Faith), what is stopping us from rejecting her other
judgments on doctrine, morals, or liturgical practices?
And if Fr. Kramer’s principle of private judgment were true, then on what basis does he disagree with the Sedevacantists who, by their own private judgment, reject all the conciliar Popes as antipopes? Fr. Kramer privately judges that the conciliar Popes up to Benedict XVI were not “manifest heretics” and therefore were true Popes, whereas the private judgment of the Sedevacantists is the opposite. Whose private judgment prevails?
And if Fr. Kramer’s principle of private judgment were true, then on what basis does he disagree with the Sedevacantists who, by their own private judgment, reject all the conciliar Popes as antipopes? Fr. Kramer privately judges that the conciliar Popes up to Benedict XVI were not “manifest heretics” and therefore were true Popes, whereas the private judgment of the Sedevacantists is the opposite. Whose private judgment prevails?
If Fr. Kramer is going to be faithful to his manufactured principle, then
he has no basis upon which to disagree with the Sedevacantists, other claiming
their private judgment is wrong and his private judgment is correct. But since Fr. Kramer surely knows that his
private judgment is not infallible, how can he be certain that they are
wrong and he is right? This demonstrates
why such matters are not to be decided and publicly declared by individual
Catholics, but must be established and declared by the proper ecclesiastical authorities.
Now, in advancing his false principle, Fr.
Kramer attempts to make a distinction between his alleged “natural law” right
to make judgments contrary to the Church, and the jurisdictional judgments that
the Church herself makes (this is why he claims the St. Thomas quotation on
judgments by public authority is “out of context”). This distinction only
highlights the errors of Fr. Kramer’s position. First of all, we have never
argued that people cannot make “a judgment of the intellect,” or that a
personal judgment is not different than the Church’s judgment “with power of jurisdiction.” These
are red herrings. Making personal
judgments is a natural function of the intellect which everyone must do daily,
and we have never denied it. The problem occurs when our private judgment is
contrary to the Church’s public judgment on matters of faith and morals.
The object of the intellect must be truth
and, as canon 748 says, “truth in those things which regard the Church.”
One of the “truths in those things which regard the Church” is the Church’s
judgment on who is the true Pope. Contrary to what Fr. Kramer argues, the
“natural law” does not give man a “right” to form a judgment that is contrary
to the public judgment of the Church, especially on such a grave matter as who
is Pope, since submission to the Pope in all things lawful is necessary for
salvation. If Fr. Kramer disagrees, let him produce the Pope, or saint or
Doctor who teaches his novelty of how one’s private judgment prevails over the
Church’s public judgment. Let him produce a quote saying that if an
individual Catholic personally judges a Pope to be a “manifest heretic,” while
the Church itself continues to recognize him as the pope, that the individual
has a “natural right” to declare publicly that the man is not the legitimate pope. Fr. Kramer will search in vain for such a
quotation; and appealing to his distorted interpretation of Bellarmine will not
help his case.
When the Church presents a man to us as Pope, and when he is
accepted as such by the Church, his legitimacy becomes a “dogmatic fact”. When this occurs, Catholics are not permitted
to publicly reject his legitimacy based on their private judgment. Rather, they have a moral obligation to
assent to it with ecclesiastical faith, which is faith in the authority of the
Church teaches. In his
1951 book On the Value of Theological
Notes and the Criteria for Discerning Them, which was drafted for use by
Roman congregations under Pius XII, Fr. Sixtus
Cartechini, S.J., explains that the rejection of a dogmatic fact (and the example he uses is a Pope who has been
accepted as such by the Church) constitutes a “mortal sin against faith.”[1] Cartechini also says that it is a “mortal sin
of temerity” to deny opinions held in common by all theologians – and submitting
to the judgment of the Church on who is Pope is certainly one of those
opinions. Again, if Fr. Kramer disagrees that his position is leading people
into mortal sin (at least the mortal sin of temerity), let him produce the
Pope, or saint, or Doctor who teaches that we can reject the Church’s public
judgments in favor of our own private judgments.
Has Holy Mother Church ever said that the
legitimacy of the man she elects and presents to the world as Pope is a matter
of “the private judgment of the intellect” for Catholics? Of course not. By way
of example, it’s not like the Church allowing Catholics to make private
judgments about the age of the Earth, which she did under St. Pius X’s
Pontifical Biblical Commission, by permitting exegetes to debate whether the
Hebrew word yom (for “day”) literally meant a natural day or a certain
space of time. In such matters, Catholics can make a “judgment of the
intellect” on which interpretation they believe is correct, since the Church
herself has not settled the matter. Not so with the one who the Church elects
and presents to the faithful as Pope.
Fr. Kramer’s distinction between the
“private judgment of the intellect” and “the official judgment [of the Church]
made with the power of jurisdiction” also doesn’t help his case because his
“private judgment” concerns a matter that falls within the exclusive purview
of the Church’s judgment (i.e., who is a true Pope). Because who is a true Pope
is a matter of Church law according to the Church’s ecclesiastical
process of election and acceptance (the very authority who made the law), it
follows that the same authority must interpret and make the definitive
judgments about the law, which extend over all who are in communion with the
Church. As St. Thomas teaches:
“Since judgment should be
pronounced according to the written law, as stated above, he that pronounces
judgment, interprets, in a way, the letter of the law, by applying it to some
particular case. Now since it belongs to the same authority to interpret and
to make a law, just as a law cannot be made except by public authority, so neither
can a judgment be pronounced except by public authority, which extends over
those who are subject to the community.”[2]
It goes without saying that Fr. Kramer’s
“private judgment of the intellect” must conform to the public authority and
judgment of the Church, that is, if he wishes to remain in communion with her.
His effort to distinguish these two judgments to justify his rejection of
Francis as Pope only proves that he is guilty of “judgment by usurpation,”[3] in
the words of St. Thomas. It also separates himself from the Catholic Church,
which is a visible, social and hierarchical unit – a perpetual attribute of the
Church that Fr. Kramer publicly denies.
Most importantly, Fr. Kramer’s claim
that he can make a “private judgment of the intellect” about who holds office
in the Church, and then separate from the one he rejects based on his private
judgment, was condemned by an ecumenical council of the Church. The Fourth
Council of Constantinople certainly acknowledged a person’s ability to make a
“judgment of the intellect” according to “natural law.” But contrary to the
claims and practices of Fr. Paul Kramer, Constantinople IV declared that
Catholics could not exercise that private judgment by separating from their Patriarch
(the Pope is the Patriarch of the West) before a public judgment of the
Church. Nor could they refuse to include his name in the canon of the
Mass. And, under the council’s penal
legislation, Fr. Kramer would have been debarred from all priestly functions
for doing so:
“As divine scripture clearly proclaims,
Do not find fault before you investigate, and understand first and then find
fault, and does our law judge a person without first giving him a hearing and
learning what he does? Consequently
this holy and universal synod justly and fittingly declares and lays down that
no lay person or monk or cleric should separate himself from communion with his
own patriarch before a careful enquiry
and judgment in synod, even if he alleges that he knows of some crime
perpetrated by his patriarch, and he must not refuse to include his patriarch's
name during the divine mysteries or offices.
“In the same way we command that bishops
and priests who are in distant dioceses and regions should behave similarly
towards their own metropolitans, and metropolitans should do the same with
regard to their own patriarchs. If anyone shall be found defying this holy
synod, he is to be debarred from all priestly functions and status if he is a
bishop or cleric; if a monk or lay person, he must be excluded from all
communion and meetings of the church [i.e., excommunicated] until he is
converted by repentance and reconciled (Canon 10).” [4]
As we can see, an ecumenical council of
the Catholic Church has condemned the error of Fr. Paul Kramer and the
Sedevacantists, by which one, in an act of “private judgment,” separates
himself from communion with his Patriarch (or Bishop), and the Pope is the
Patriarch of the West.
We pray that Fr. Kramer returns to his right
mind and abandons his “private judgment prevails over the Church’s public
judgment” theology, which is not only insulting to the dignity of the Catholic
priesthood, but also putting many souls in danger, especially his own.
[1] http://www.the-pope.com/theolnotes.html.
[2] ST, II-II, q.
60, a. 6 (emphasis added).
[4] Fourth Council of
Constantinople, Canon 10, (869-870), http://www.papalencyclicals.
net/Councils/ecum08.htm.
