three popes at once

The Roman Catholic Church claims that the pope is head bishop of the Church and the Vicar of Christ and has been chosen by Jesus to stand in for him on earth to rule the Church, protect its doctrine and teach it as supreme shepherd. The pope is the rock the Church is built on.  History would be to differ!

In 1378, cardinals in Rome elected an Italian pope, Urban VI. Urban showed signs of madness. The cardinals regretted electing him and said he was not a true pope for they had fiddled his election and were forced to elect him. Soon they gathered in a new conclave and produced a rival pope, Clement VII.

Urban VI wasn’t mad all the time. He knew he shouldn’t stay on as pope and should have resigned in favour of Clement VII. That way even if Clement were not validly elected he would still become pope.

Surely a pope who causes division and heresy like Urban and who is unsuitable must be considered an ex-Catholic who deposes himself from the papacy? It is ridiculous to say that a person who breaks from the Church becomes an ex-Catholic by excommunication and that a Catholic who causes others to break away or who keeps that kind of trouble up is still a true Catholic.  The Church says that the pope like Peter is the rock Jesus said his Church is built on. Urban was not the rock the Church was built on. He was the hammer that smashed it. He was not the rock so he was not the pope.

All of the cardinals agreed that the election of Urban VI was invalid. They asserted that they didn’t have any freedom during the conclave due to threats from a mob demanding a Roman or an Italian so the election was a fiddle. The mob had even invaded the building they were in. The Catholics say that Urban was accepted by the Church as pope and this made him pope even if the cardinals invalidly elected him. But how could their acceptance be genuine when it was based on the election that was a trick? In those times, the idea of deposing a pope was very acceptable. However, the cardinals didn’t try that route. They just argued that you can't depose a non-pope. They didn’t want a schism - they wanted the Church to accept Clement and ignore Urban. All this indicates their sincerity, the election really was fiddled. They didn’t have to admit it and they did.

Anyway, the two rival popes caused the Great Western Schism and resulted in one Roman Catholic Church being led by Urban in Rome and another led by Clement VII in Avignon, France. Nobody knew then who the real pope was. St Catherine of Siena backed Urban and St Vincent Ferrer backed Clement VII. Both popes excommunicated one another and one another’s followers as well. Each Church claimed to be the true Church and that the other was a fake Church. They launched violent crusades against one another with a view to killing each other. The confusion was exacerbated by the fact that the election of Urban was indeed carried out under threats of violence.

History says that before they let Urban know he was pope, they presented a Roman in pontifical robes to the mob as their pope. This was strange for they knew the mob would go berserk if they thought they were being fooled. It is possible that this was the man they really elected and not Urban? It certainly must have been the case. They changed their minds and lied about Urban being elected probably because they thought he would be a better political choice. They were wrong.

The Church today says that if an election is faked the pope chosen is still a valid pope for God doesn’t want schism and God doesn’t necessarily like the new pope. The Church doesn't believe this at all for if a female to male transsexual or somebody that had no intention of being a valid pope and who didn’t believe in it or if a plastic surgery copy of some papable person was made pope they would consider this an invalid election resulting in a fake pope. All the Church acceptance in the world cannot help. The Church says that a woman does not validly accept a man she doesn't know well enough to be her husband. Her accepting is not real accepting and they fail to validly marry. So why should it be different if a papal election is invalid and accepted by the Church? If acceptance by the Church is valid then why don’t they acknowledge Alexander V (who was appointed when the Council of Pisa deposed both the Roman and Avignon popes as heretics and schismatics) as a real pope when he had the most support and the Roman pontiff Gregory XII who they consider the true pope had hardly anybody? Didn’t the whole Church accept antipope Vigilius leaving the alleged real pope Saint Silverius in a dungeon without any followers or support? (page 125, Reasons for Hope).

Today the Church regards Urban VI and his successors as the real popes. They were not so the Church today is in communion with fake popes and so is schismatic and heretical. To follow the wrong pope is heresy for it means you believe in the wrong rock and regard the wrong man as shepherd and father and teacher of all Christians. Antipopes are not infallible so they are dangerous and since the supreme authority in Catholicism is tradition it follows that the wrong pope means separation from tradition and the means of its protection and the forfeiture of its infallibility.

BOOKS CONSULTED
 
A CONCISE HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, Thomas Bokenkotter, Image Books, New York, 1979
A HANDBOOK ON THE PAPACY, William Shaw Kerr, Marshall Morgan & Scott, London, 1962
ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS CATHOLICS ARE ASKING, Tony Coffey, Harvest House Publishers, Oregon ,2006 
A WOMAN RIDES THE BEAST, Dave Hunt Harvest House Eugene Oregon 1994
ALL ONE BODY – WHY DON’T WE AGREE? Erwin W Lutzer, Tyndale, Illinois, 1989
ANTICHRIST IS HE HERE OR IS HE TO COME? Protestant Truth Society, London
APOLOGIA PRO VITA SUA, John Henry Newman (Cardinal), Everyman’s Library, London/New York, 1955
BELIEVING IN GOD, PJ McGrath, Millington Books in Association with Wolfhound, Dublin, 1995
BURNING TRUTHS, Basil Morahan, Western People Printing, Ballina, 1993
CATHOLICISM AND CHRISTIANITY, Cecil John Cadoux, George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1928
CATHOLICISM AND FUNDAMENTALISM, Karl Keating, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 1988
DAWN OR TWILIGHT? HM Carson, IVP, Leicester, 1976
DIFFICULTIES, Mgr Ronald Knox and Sir Arnold Lunn, Eyre & Spottiswoode, London, 1958
ENCOUNTERS OF THE FOURTH KIND, Dr RJ Hymers, Bible Voice, Inc, Van Nuys, CA, 1976
FROM ROME TO CHRIST, J Ward, Irish Church Missions, Dublin
FUTURIST OR HISTORICIST? Basil C Mowll, Protestant Truth Society, London
GOD’S WORD, FINAL, INFALLIBLE AND FOREVER, Floyd McElveen, Gospel Truth Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI, 1985
HANDBOOK TO THE CONTROVERSY WITH ROME, Karl Von Hase, Vols 1 and 2, The Religious Tract Society, London, 1906
HANS KUNG HIS WORK AND HIS WAY, Hermann Haring and Karl-Josef Kuschel, Fount-Collins, London, 1979
HERESIES AND HOW TO AVOID THEM, Editors Ben Quash and Michael Ward, SPCK, London, 2007
HITLER’S POPE, THE SECRET HISTORY OF PIUS XII, John Cornwell, Viking, London, LONDON 1999
HOW SURE ARE THE FOUNDATIONS? Colin Badger, Wayside Press, Canada
HOW DOES GOD LOVE ME? Martin R De Haan II, Radio Bible Class, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1986
INFALLIBILITY IN THE CHURCH, Patrick Crowley, CTS, London, 1982
INFALLIBLE? Hans Kung, Collins, London, 1980
IS THE PAPACY PREDICTED BY ST PAUL? Bishop Christopher Wordsworth, The Harrison Trust, Kent, 1985
LECTURES AND REPLIES, Thomas Carr, Archbishop of Melbourne, Melbourne, 1907
NO LIONS IN THE HIERARCHY, Fr Joseph Dunn, Columba Press, Dublin, 1994
PETER AND THE OTHERS, Rev FH Kinch MA, Nelson & Knox Ltd, Townhall Street, Belfast
POPE FICTION, Patrick Madrid, Basilica Press, San Diego California 1999
PUTTING AWAY CHILDISH THINGS, Uta Ranke-Heinemann, HarperCollins, San Francisco, 1994
REASON AND BELIEF, Brand Blanschard, George Allen & Unwin Ltd, London, 1974
REASONS FOR HOPE, Editor Jeffrey A Mirus, Christendom College Press, Virginia, 1982
ROMAN CATHOLIC CLAIMS, Charles Gore MA, Longmans, London, 1894
ROMAN CATHOLIC OBJECTIONS ANSWERED, Rev H O Lindsay, John T Drought Ltd, Dublin
ROMAN CATHOLICISM, Lorraine Boettner, Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, Phillipsburg, NJ, 1962
SECRETS OF ROMANISM, Joseph Zacchello, Loizeaux Brothers, New Jersey, 1984
ST PETER AND ROME, J B S, Irish Church Missions, Dublin
THE CHURCH AND INFALLIBILITY, B C Butler, The Catholic Book Club, London, undated
THE EARLY CHURCH, Henry Chadwick, Pelican, Middlesex, 1987
THE HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY, LION BOOKS, Herts, 1977
THE LATE GREAT PLANET EARTH, Hal Lindsay, Lakeland, London, 1974
THE LION CONCISE BOOK OF CHRISTIAN THOUGHT, Tony Lane, Lion, Herts, 1986
THE PAPACY IN PROPHECY! Christadelphian Press, West Beach S A, 1986
THE PAPACY ITS HISTORY AND DOGMAS, Leopold D E Smith, Protestant Truth Society, London
THE PETRINE CLAIMS OF ROME, Canon JE Oulton DD, John T Drought Ltd, Dublin
THE PRIMITIVE FAITH AND ROMAN CATHOLIC DEVELOPMENTS, Rev John A Gregg, BD, APCK, Dublin, 1928
THE SHE-POPE, Peter Stanford, William Hienemann, Random House, London, 1998
THE VATICAN PAPERS, Nino Lo Bello, New English Library, Sevenoaks, Kent, 1982
TRADITIONAL DOCTRINES OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH EXAMINED, Rev CCJ Butlin, Protestant Truth Society, London
VICARS OF CHRIST, Peter de Rosa, Corgi, London, 1993
WAS PETER THE FIRST POPE? J Bredin, Evangelical Protestant Society, Belfast
WHATEVER HAPPENED TO HEAVEN?, Dave Hunt, Harvest House, Eugene, Oregon, 1988
 
 
THE WEB

Pope John Paul II condemned as an immoral and traitorous and heretical pope
www.trosch.org

Of Bones and Boners: St Peter at the Vatican, Frank R. Zindler ,
 www.atheists.org/church/bones.html

Has Rome Become the Seat of the Antichrist? Br Michael Diamond OSB
http://catalog.com/endtimes/diamond.html
This page claims that prophecies about the Vatican apostatising have come true and that the pope, John Paul II is a fake and a heretic. It reports on evidence from Masons and Communists that they had a plan to subvert the Church from within and had placed spies and impostors in the Church. Pope John Paul II was the first pope not to take the standard oath to defend the traditions of the Church and the canon laws and to excommunicate anyone who threatened the faith of the Church. That shows that there is more to this heretic than meets the eye and he is famous for allowing fake Catholics to function within the Church. Padre Pio who was famous for seeing the future snubbed Karol Wojtyla, he who would become John Paul II. It is said too that John Paul II having stated that religious freedom is lawful is contradicting Leo XIII who said that once you give men the right to believe whatever they will you give them the right to refuse to believe in loving God and remove all restraint on crime. It has been noticed too that the pope claims that Muslims worship the same God as Christians though the Muslim God said that anybody who believes in a three in one God is as impure as dung. In 1986 the pope let ash that was a sign of devotion to the Hindu god Shiva be placed on his forehead. In Assisi 1986 the pope invited devil-worshipping animists to pray with him there for peace. The psalm says that the gods of the pagans are all evil or demons (95:5). And there have been similar meetings since, ones in Warsaw and Bari for instance. Another fault is that Cardinal Ratzinger, the pope’s right hand man, has stated that the resurrection of Jesus is not a historical event the way the crucifixion of Jesus is. The 1917 Code of Canon Law states that if the pope becomes a heretic he is no longer pope. Even the autocratic Innocent III stated that a pope who becomes a heretic is to be cast out and ignored.