FAQs

Modernism is the heresy of heresies, because it carries within it all previous heresies, being as it is a direct, frontal assault upon faith and all doctrine and dogma. It is liberal theological opinions developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The term came to prominence in Pope Pius X ‘s 1907 encyclical Pascendi dominici gregis, which synthesizes and condemns modernism as embracing every heresy.

 The school of thought, in Roman Catholicism, that the popes from John XXIII were defective because of their modernist views

Sedeplenist may also be used to signify the minds of Catholics who believe the Novus Ordo popes are fully fledged popes and are truly in possession of the full authority promised by Christ to Saint Peter and his successors, yet have substantially erred in the teaching of the universal ordinary magisterium on matters of faith and morals. In their perspective they believe this kind of error is possible and has occurred, so they may lawfully recognize and resist the fully seated papal authority on the most essential matters which constitute a religion: doctrine, morals, liturgy, sacramental system, code of law, and nature of government.

Sedevacantism is the position held by some people who identify as Catholic that the present occupier of the Holy See is not truly the pope due to the mainstream church’s espousal of what they see as the heresy of modernism and that, for lack of a valid pope, the See has been vacant since the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958 or the death of Pope John XXIII in 1963.

The term magisterium is based on the Latin word for “teacher” (magister). In contemporary Catholic usage, it has several meanings.

First, it refers to the teaching authority which Christ has given to the Church. Here the term refers to the authority itself, not those who exercise it. This usage appears in statements like, “The Church exercises its magisterium when it authoritatively proclaims Christ’s teachings.”

Second, the term refers to those who exercise this teaching authority—in other words, to the pope and the bishops teaching in union with him. Collectively, they are referred to as the “Magisterium,” as in “the Magisterium has infallibly taught that God is a Trinity.”

Third, the term can refer to a particular body of teachings that have been authoritatively proclaimed.

The Deposit of Faith ( depositum fidei) is the body of revealed truth in the Scriptures and Tradition proposed by the Roman Catholic Church for the belief of the faithful. 

Ecclesiastical authority (potestas sacra) is the authority which the Church has been given by Jesus Christ to be exercised in his name in carrying out the mission entrusted to it. Sedevacantists do not usurp any ecclesiastical authority in arriving at the conclusion that Francis is not the Pope, because this conclusion is not arrived at by means of putative “legal” judgments, which no sedevacantist has the right to make, but because any Roman Catholic can discern as a matter of fact (not law) that Francis does not adhere to all the dogmatic teachings of the Magisterium of the Church until 1958. Heretics and schismatics are barred from the Supreme Pontificate by the Divine Law itself, because, although by divine law they are not considered incapable of participating in a certain type of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, nevertheless, they must certainly be regarded as excluded from occupying the throne of the Apostolic See, which is the infallible teacher of the truth of the faith and the center of ecclesiastical unity.

The Tridentine Mass, also known as the Traditional Latin Mass (often abbreviated as TLM) or Usus Antiquior, is the Roman Rite Mass of the Catholic Church which appears in typical editions of the Roman Missal published from 1570 to 1962.

Novus Ordo is short for Novus Ordo Missae, which literally means the “new order of the Mass” or the “new ordinary of the Mass.” The term Novus Ordo is often used as shorthand to distinguish the Mass promulgated by Pope Paul VI in 1969 from the Traditional Latin Mass promulgated by Pope Pius V in 1570