Introduction

I prefer to write a series of short posts on this topic, rather than one long article. Each post will focus on one part of my reply to the article by Regis Martin titled “Put an End to the Madness!”

In reply, I say: put an end to the madness of each individual Catholic judging Pope Francis as well as judging other Popes, Councils, doctrines, and disciplines of the Church. Put an end to condemning the Pope and impugning the indefectibility of the Church, whenever the Pope says something that does not seem right to your fallen sinful judgment. It is madness for each individual layperson or cleric in the Church to exalt themselves to be the judge over the Pope and essentially the entire Church. None of you judgmental accusers of the Pope have that role or authority. You are not Christ, the eternal Head of the Church, and you are not God.

Part One: Lying to the Vicar of Christ

Note: I have just been informed (Sunday, 6/11/23) that Regis Martin, subsequent to his article in which he claimed to have lied to get the Pope on the phone, has said that this claimed incident never happened, and he was just joking or presenting a spoof to the reader. I’ll leave the rest of the article intact. But I must say that, for a false assertion to be a joke and not a lie, the audience must have a reasonable way to realize that it is a joke. Otherwise, any lie could be excused, seemingly, by calling it a joke. So it seems to me that his claim about contacting the Pope was a lie, a deliberate knowing false assertion and not really a joke. Jokes are told to amuse the audience, while lies are inherently deceptive. I see no way that anyone reading that article could realize it was a joke, and so the assertions lack the inherent end of a joke, and have the inherent end of lying, which is deception by asserting a falsehood. Finally, I am left with some doubt as to whether the incident may be real, and the claim that he was joking was used to keep himself out of trouble. How can I be sure when he makes deceptive statements and goes on to contradict himself, and all of this on a grave subject matter regarding the Roman Pontiff?

Strict mental reservation is simply a type of lying, as Pope Innocent III decided (in the face of many theologians of that time claiming otherwise). The reason is that no one can tell that the assertion is accompanied by an unstated proviso, without which it is a lie. Similarly, Regis Martin’s “joke” cannot be discerned to be a joke from anything that was said. So I believe it may still be considered to be a lie to his audience, a lie regarding the Roman Pontiff, the purpose of which is to facilitate his condemnations and accusations against the Pope.

I must also point out that joking about committing mortal sins, such as deceiving and lying to the Pope, is itself a sin, possibly grave given the scandal to the faithful.

the text of the original article:

Regis Martin called the Roman Pontiff, during his General Audience, and was able to trick the Pope into answering the phone, briefly, by telling a gravely immoral lie. Regis Martin, a lay person, in speaking to the Vatican phone operator, claimed to be Father James Martin, an ordained Catholic priest. Based on Regis’ own explanation, he did this in order to deliberately deceive the Supreme Pontiff.

Regis Martin: “No sooner had I dialed the number than I was put immediately through to the pope, who seemed quite delighted to hear from me. For about five seconds, that is, no doubt thinking I was the Reverend James Martin, whom I had instructed the switchboard operator at the Vatican to inform the pope was on the other line.

And until things fell apart, which happened fairly quickly, I was hoping for a productive exchange. Once he realized he’d been snookered, however, he abruptly hung up…” [Crisis Magaine]

Regis Martin, by his own admission, deceived the Vicar of Christ by impersonating a Catholic priest with the same last name. It does not decrease the gravity of this objectively grave sin that he perpetrated this deception by lying to the Vatican switchboard operator, so that the operator would then relay the falsehood, unknowingly, to the Roman Pontiff. The sin is still that of directly and deliberately asserting a falsehood to the Pope.

And the sin is objectively grave for multiple reasons: (1) that the person deceived is the Vicar of Christ and the head of the Church; (2) that the purpose of the deception was to be able to judge, condemn, and denounce the Roman Pontiff while speaking directly to him; (3) that Regis Martin falsely claimed to be a Roman Catholic priest; (4) and an additional grave sin was committed by Regis Martin, that of grave scandal, when he wrote and published his article boasting of the effectiveness of his deception, and boasting that he was able to accuse and rebuke the Vicar of Christ directly by means of this lie.

The claim that Regis “was hoping for a productive exchange” is contradicted by the deceptive sinful means he used to get the Pope on the phone, and by the words he chose to speak to the Roman Pontiff. We only have these words in paraphrase from Regis himself, possibly because if Regis were to quote himself accurately, he would embarrass himself. But here is Regis’ explanation of the meaning of the words that he blurted out to the Pope, before the Pope hung up the phone.

Regis Martin: “But not before I had succeeded in leaving my own message, which was to tell him to stop all the madness. At once. Otherwise, I managed to blurt out just before the papal smartphone slammed shut, it would not be possible to acquit His Holiness from complicity in the disasters taking place in the life of the Church. He will own them.”

These are not the words of someone hoping for a productive dialog. They are the words of a man who committed multiple objectively grave sins, out of pride that the Roman Pontiff and the Church Herself should be subject to Regis Martin’s judgment and condemnation. Based on Regis Martin’s own description of what happened, Regis sinned gravely, and his grave sins are worsened by the sin of scandal, in that he publicly boasts about his sins, his deception of the Roman Pontiff and his judgment, condemnation, and denunciation of the Roman Pontiff directly to his ears. Such a shameless sin committed directly against the Vicar of Christ is a grave scandal, made worse by Regis Martin’s manifest perseverance in this grave sin, as demonstrated by his boasting of his sins his article.

Regis Martin should not present himself for holy Communion, until he has repented and confessed these sins, and publicly retracted his article.

My next post will deal with the grave error of judging the Roman Pontiff, an all-too-common sin and error in the Church today. After that, I will treat the subject of the Divine will and the plurality and diversity of religions, and possibly other subjects.

Ronald L Conte Jr