What is an Anti-Pope
By Jim Carroll
An "Anti-Pope" is someone who is validly elected but does not occupy the Throne of Peter in Rome.
We had anti-popes in the Middle Ages because the rules of election at the time did not prohibit the election of a new Pope while the current Pope was still alive. So during the Western Schism we had 2 and sometimes 3 claimants to the throne. Because they all had been validly elected they all retained the charism of infallibility.
Eventually a
Council was held, the two anti-popes were persuaded to surrender their claims,
and as soon as possible, the recognized pope re-wrote the rules to prevent the
election of any new pope before the old pope died. (And later on, "abdicated"
was added.)
The danger is that there is a flaw or defect in Francis'
election. The two that come to mind is if the St. Gallen cabal existed and did
conspire to elect Bergoglio as Pope, AND Bergoglio was unaware of the
conspiracy, then he might be considered an anti-Pope. If the cabal did conspire
AND Bergoglio was aware of, or participated in, the conspiracy, then they all
violated the rules of election and Francis is in fact a FALSE Pope, without the
charism of infallibility.
The key is whether or not Francis issues any
heretical statements AS DOCTRINE.
To date that has not happened -- to date, none
of his documents have risen to that level. Amoris laetitia is an apostolic
exhortation, not a declaration of doctrine, and his "modification" of the
Catechism's statement on the death penalty is still non-binding, since it hasn't
found support among most (if any) of the Magisterium, and can (and probably
will) be revoked after Francis' reign.
The first pope accused of heresy
was Pope Formosus, back in the 850s. He was trying to help the Byzantine Empire
by supporting a definition of Christ that negated the doctrine of the
homeostatic union, i.e., that Jesus was made God, not created as God. While he
supported different heretical bishops in the Eastern Church, possibly as trying
to help unify the two branches, he never actually issued a heretical definition
himself. His case was one that was used to support the doctrine of Papal
Infallibility during the First Vatican Council.
Hope this helps.
YBiC,
Jim Carroll
1/20/20