Fr. Kramer: Chapter XXX of De Romano Pontifice by St. Robert Bellarmine
This is Chapter XXX of De Romano Pontifice by St. Robert Bellarmine. I
first read this chapter about 25 years ago in Fr. Gruner's library. He
had a 19th Century edition in very good condition. I read through Chs.
29 & 30 very carefully, because Fr. Gruner wanted to discuss the
doctrine of those two chapters with me. Afterwards we discussed the
content of the chapters and were in full agreement on their meaning.
Salza & Siscoe fraudulently attempt to persuade the Catholic faithful that my "interpretation" is false, "erronrous", "superficial", etc. -- as if I were alone and isolated in my understanding of the text. They have gone so far as to state that my "interpretation" of Bellarmine indicates that I have never read the chapter!
In fact, their patently bogus interpretation of Bellarmine's teaching is based on their own heretical understanding of the nature of heresy, which Bellarmine clearly explains; and in his refutation of opinion no. 4 in particular, in relation to the heretic's ipso facto loss of office. The Salza/Siscoe doctrine on heresy denies the perpetual teaching of the Church, which professes that it pertains to the very nature of heresy (aa well as schism & apostasy) inquantum est peccatum, that the heretic is cut off from the body of the Church; unlike other sins which do not of their own nature cut one off from the body of the Church, but do so inquantum sunt delicta, only when the canonical penalty of excommunication is attached to them.
On the correct understanding of Bellarmine's opinion no. 5, the learned opinion of Don Curzio Nitoglia is in total agreement with my understanding of It:
The hypothesis of the pope heretic, so, it is not a certainty, but it is a pure chance or not disgust theologically hypothetical and at best it could be a probability; therefore, the doctors of the second school son places, the question of whether the proposition "[prior] It may be that the Pope can fall into heresy, [proposition or resulting conclusion] is deposed ipso facto (R. Bellarmine) or must be deposed after the canonical admonitions of bishops or of Cardinals (Gaetano)?". >
<Secondo the bellarmine (De Romano Pontifice, lib. II, CH. 30, p. 420), since the heretics posters, public and nearly lose ipso facto the jurisdiction, it may be that the Pope can fall into heresy, in case of any heresy manifests he would lose immediately papal authority. This is the interpretation of the position bellarminiana date by the Jesuits Franz Xavier Wernz and Pedro Vidal (jus canonicum, Rome, Gregorian, 1943, vol. II, p. 517 >
