by Br. Alexis Bugnolo
Since the death of Pope Benedict XVI new cults and sects have arisen which focus around novel ideas of juridical and ecclesiastical right. Not all of these are sedevacantist, for an equal number are also globalist and willingly recognize Pope Francis as always having been pope.
But since these errors regard topics which are never quoted by “Traditionalists” or “Conservatives”, though the latter do mention “morality” at election time — their only morals left being the assertion that “it is a mortal sin not to vote for a Masonic politician of the right” — it will be important to review a few basic Catholic truths to distinguish the true Faith from the doctrines of sectarians.
First of all, in ecclesiastical elections, like civil elections, there is a moral responsibility for all who have the right to vote, to make a decision. However, this does not equate to the moral responsibility to vote. Because in a system where there are only a few candidates, whose names are chosen by a Masonic elite, you are never obliged to vote for any of them.
But in an ecclesiastical election, by the norms of Canon Law and ecclesiastical tradition, everyone with a right to vote is free to vote for whomsoever he will, even if, at later stages in the voting the number of possible victorious candidates is reduced to only a few. This freedom shows how the Catholic system is much more sane and liberal than any modern “democracy”, where the masses are never entrusted with such discernment or decisions.
And yes, in an ecclesiastical election just as in a civil election, you are not obliged to even show up for the vote. However, while not exercising your right to vote in a civil election nearly never makes any difference, due to the high numbers of those who have the right to vote, in an ecclesiastical election it always makes a difference, due to the low numbers of electors.
Thus, if you do not come to vote, in an ecclesiastical election, you have the much greater moral responsibility for the outcome than someone who came and voted against the one who ultimately won. Similar situations can also arise in civil elections in parliaments, of course.
Thus, when it comes to voting for a Roman Pontiff, electors have a very grave duty to take their responsibilities seriously. In a Conclave, for example, when the election involves just 120+ electors, not attending the Conclave, by law, means that you cannot vote afterwards: but morally speaking it also means you consent to whatever is the outcome.
Certain immature individuals never accept the outcomes of elections and say things like, “He is not my President”, or “He is not my Pope”. In the former, they never act out on their virtue signalling, though some emigrate for a time from their country. In the Church there have been but rare cases of schisms caused by persons or groups not accepting an uncontested election.
But in the case of an election of the Roman Pontiff by Apostolic Right, the Faithful of the whole Roman Church — the Diocese of Rome and all the suburbican dioceses — are all responsible for the outcome. That is why in ancient times they meet immediately and without delay, if they could, and elected holy men. There are dozens of saints who were popes before 1058, when the College of Cardinals was established. There are but a handful since that time, in the last 1000 years. A fact that should cause all of us to stop and think.
So in the recent and extraordinary juridical case of a pope who appears to renounce but does not, or who is pushed out of power by a College of Cardinals in total rebellion, but who tricks them by an intelligent ruse, after his death the only ones likely to vote for his successor are the Faithful of Rome who paid close attention to his words and did what he himself urged to be done, elect his successor by those who are competent, that is, who have the right to do so, in such extraordinary circumstances, wholly outside the presumed conditions which would exist in the time of a papal election, as are provided for in the current Papal Law, Universi Dominici gregis.
And thus we come to the most sober consideration: that everyone at Rome who refused to attend that Assembly is entirely responsible morally and juridically for the election of the one who was elected there, just as all the clergy and faithful of Rome who held Pope Francis to be the pope from 2013 to this day, and thus who did not attend. Merely claiming that you held Pope Benedict XVI to be the pope until death does not excuse you from responsibility. Nay it magnifies it to an infinite degree.
Even those who had no right to vote, are morally responsible, and gravely so, if they did anything to encourage electors not to attend or took steps not to inform them or encourage them to exercise their right.
If you could have prevented an unworthy candidate from being elected, and did not, then you are gravely responsible, and cannot be saved if you never repent of this.
At the same time, for those who did attend, there’s was a responsibility greater than the cult leaders and grifters who talk about controversies in the Church to gain money or attention. They had to do the utmost to protect the Church, with the men who were willing. They had to balance the salvation of the whole body against the interest of a few. These faithful Catholics, betrayed and abandoned by everyone but the readers of FromRome had also to prevent another Assembly being called by nefarious voices who would elect someone even worse than Bergoglio or someone who had no desire to promote the unity of the Church after his death, putting the Church in a century long internal schism. They had to find a candidate that most Catholics would accept; a candidate whose acceptance would be morally certain, and by whose acceptance the whole body of the Faithful would return again into communion with Christ.
Also, in this matter, it is important to note that the concept of Quorum in elections is also important to consider. The Quorum rule in most modern “democracies” guarantees that no minority will enact a law or decision which binds the majority. In some ecclesiastical elections there are Quorum rules, But in elections of the Roman Pontiff there never has been a Quorum rule, neither in a Conclave, nor in an Assembly of Apostolic Right. Precisely because, in morals, if you do not come you have in fact voted for whoever has won, whether you like the outcome or not. This is why even if all the clergy do not come, they have in fact voted for whoever has won.
That these few electors on January 30, 2023 A. D., are so viscerally hated by all grifters and cult leaders and “Bergoglio is certainly the pope” fake opposition, shows that they did the will of God against all the fanatics of Hell.
While we are not privy to the decisions than many generations of Cardinals had to make in Conclaves, during the last thousand years, to hold the Church together and protect her from persecution, we can be sure that many times many honest and holy men had to make similar decisions. Of them we know nothing on account of the Pontifical Secret to which all Cardinals are bound, in Conclaves, however.
In postcript: a certain uninformed civil attorney in South America, who never studied in an ecclesiastical institution, has been reporting that since a certain Pope denied that the people can elect their own bishops, that therefore the election of a Roman Pontiff by the faithful of Rome is never lawful. Her argument is a sophism of the kind condemned long ago by Aristotle, where you take one statement which denies a thing (by the People) and apply it to a fact which regards another thing (the Faithful) and draws a conclusion of the undistributed middle term, as it is called in logic. It’s the most common way to deceive or lie, and is often used by lawyers. This attorney, if their thesis was correct, would have to become a protestant, since their conclusion leads to the implication that there were no legitimate Popes until 1058 when an illegitimate pope established the College of Cardinals. Idiots might find that line of reasoning sound. But all sane men from every age shall laugh at them on the Day of Judgement!
Traduction française :
RESPONSABILITÉ MORALE DANS LES ÉLECTIONS ECCLÉSIASTIQUES ET POLITIQUES : 30 JANVIER 2023
https://www.homelie.biz/2025/02/responsabilite-morale-dans-les-elections-ecclesiastiques-et-politiques-30-janvier-2023.html