Benedict XVI Never Said Francis is the Only Pope

It was reported last week that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI had allegedly said in an interview that Pope Francis is the only reigning pope at this time. The interview was published in the Italian weekly Corriere della Sera, and taken up by the Vatican News Service. Italian journalist Massimo Franco, who interviewed Benedict XVI on June 23, had published only a few direct quotes in his five-page article about the meeting. According to Catholic News Agency (CNA), Benedict said that Francis is the only Roman pontiff. "The pope is one, it is Francis," he reportedly told Franco.

LifeSiteNews has now foiled what appears to be an insidious Vatican plot to make it appear that Benedict XVI asserted that Francis is the only pope. While articles about the interview, including the one by CNA, state that the Pope Emeritus had said in the interview that "the Pope is one, it is Francis," evidence cannot be found in the interview itself. The following is from an explosive July 4 article just published by LifeSiteNews.

The actual paragraph in which the phrases can be found does not seem to be a direct quotation from Benedict XVI but a suggestion by the interviewer of what the Pope Emeritus says to Francis' critics. Found on page 28, the paragraph has been recently translated for LifeSiteNews by Diane Montagna. Purporting to describe the six years of Benedict's retirement in Vatican City, Franco wrote: "When the history of these hidden years in Mater Ecclesia is written, it must not leave out the confidential visits from cardinals and bishops who knocked at the door looking for reassurance and voiced their criticisms and perplexity about the current pontificate. And one will discover how much was done to avoid lacerations. Bergoglio's adversaries, who are often conservatives desperately searching for a word from Benedict that sounds like a criticism of Bergoglio, have invariably heard the response that 'the Pope is one, it is Francis.'" A trusted source told LifeSiteNews yesterday that Franco is refusing to confirm that the Pope Emeritus really did say those words. No evidence Pope Benedict said 'the Pope is one; it is Francis'

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What can we expect from an LGBT infested Vatican News Service? It almost reflects a phobia that Benedict XVI might still occupy some facet of the papal ministry. It's not that conservatives are looking for an anti-Francis word from Benedict but that Vatican liberals are looking for a pro-Francis word from Benedict, so much so that they made one up! It calls to mind the fake letter last year that claimed that Benedict was in praise of Msgr. Dario Vigano's new 10-Volume series on Pope Francis, when research later revealed that the Vatican News Service had doctored the letter. One has to wonder if maybe Benedict said something critical of Francis in the June 23 interview. Or maybe he said that Francis is "only one of the popes" and then Franco twisted it. If Benedict truly asserted that Francis is the only pope, he would have ditched his white papal garments and stopped using the name Benedict XVI, and would have gone back to being called Cardinal Ratzinger, but clearly he wishes to continue his semblance of the papacy, which coincides with his historic address on the eve of his resignation.

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Benedict's Words

The pope said on that occasion: "Anyone who accepts the Petrine ministry no longer has any privacy. He belongs always and completely to everyone, to the whole Church... "The 'always' is also a "forever"-- there can no longer be a return to the private sphere. My decision to resign the active exercise of the ministry does not revoke this." (Benedict XVI, General Audience, February 27, 2013) From this it appears that there has been no revocation of Benedict XVI's office. According to Church law, a pope must give up "his office" for his resignation to be valid. (Canon 332) The text indicates that Benedict XVI chose to retain his office "forever," which is why he continues to wear the papal garb and to go by the name Benedict. This matches the explanation offered by Archbishop Georg Gänswein, who serves as prefect of the Pontifical Household. Speaking at the presentation of a new book on Benedict's pontificate at the Pontifical Gregorian University on May 20, 2016, he told the press that Benedict XVI did not abandon the papacy like Pope Celestine V in the 13th century, but rather sought to continue his Petrine office in a way that better accommodated his frailty. "He left the Papal Throne and yet, with the step he took on 11 February 2013, he has not abandoned this ministry," adding that the renunciation of his office would have been "quite impossible after his irrevocable acceptance of the office in April 2005."

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Benedict Up Close: The Inside Story of Eight Dramatic Years

Gänswein said that Benedict XVI's resignation announcement of February 11, 2013, marked the introduction of a new institution into the Catholic Church: "a de facto enlarged ministry, with both an active and a contemplative member." He said we now have "two living successors of Peter among us" that "are not in competition with each other," i.e. Benedict and Francis. The Archbishop said that the introduction of a "shared papacy" was the reason Benedict did not renounce his papal name or give up his white cassock as did Celestine V. "This is the reason why the correct appellation for him is 'Your Holiness.' This is finally the reason why he did not retire to an isolated monastery, but within the Vatican walls, as if to simply take a step aside to make space for his successor and for a new step in the history of the papacy." If Gänswein is right and Benedict still occupies a "contemplative dimension" of the papacy, then there is no dimension of the papacy that he doesn't occupy. It would mean that Francis is not the pope, since there cannot be two Petrine representatives. If Francis is the pope, then Benedict's office is revoked, but Benedict insists it was not revoked. Benedict has never repudiated Gänswein's claim that he [Benedict] still occupies the "contemplative" dimension of the papacy, nor has Ganswein recanted this. Upon being challenged about this, he simply said, "I never said there were two popes," but he never denied saying that Benedict's resignation announcement marked the introduction of "a de facto enlarged [papal] ministry, with both an active and a contemplative member" consisting of "two living successors of Peter among us." Veteran journalist Paul Badde--author of Benedict Up Close: The Inside Story of Eight Dramatic Years--affirmed on December 15, 2017, that Gänswein "hasn't denied" saying this, adding that "there was no reason for such a step."

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Benedict Ousted

What it boils down to is that Benedict XVI was driven from his post, but this was done under the guise of a resignation so as to not split the Barque asunder with controversy. Credible reports from 2015 indicate that Benedict XVI was coerced into stepping down, which was providentially foreshadowed in his inaugural speech of April 24, 2005, when he said: "Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of the wolves." We know from the late Cardinal Danneels of Brussels that he was part of a radical "mafia" reformist group opposed to Benedict XVI. Danneels, known for his support of abortion, LGBT rights, and gay-marriage, said in a taped interview in September 2015 that he and several cardinals were part of this "mafia" group that was calling for drastic changes in the Church, to make it "much more modern," and that the plan was to have Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio head it. Cardinal Danneels Admits to Being Part of 'Mafia' Club Opposed to Benedict XVI Accordingly, Benedict XVI does not share in Francis' new political church, nor is he optimistic about the immediate future of the Church as he indicated in his eulogy on Cardinal Meisner in July 2017 when he said that the Church "is on the verge of capsizing." (July 15, 2017)

Insidious Editing

Hence it appears that even Benedict's true words may have received some slick editing from the Vatican media. In his June 23 interview with Corriere della Sera, Benedict said, "The unity of the Church has always been in danger, for centuries. It has been for all its history. Wars, internal conflicts, centrifugal forces, threats of schisms." Did editors leave out the punchline or some other key quote? This comes across as saying that the state of the Church today is basically no different than what we have seen for the past 2000 years, which is the last thing from the truth. There is no disputing that the Church has been battered for 2000 years, but they're forgetting that the enemy hijacked ship at Vatican II and began using it as its stronghold. There is no denying that the Church today has been all but devastated through the infiltration of Satan (through Judas cardinals and Freemasons) who has managed to capture the Church's ruling body and who is now using it to mislead the wide body of the Church. The Church in our time is truly being led by temptation under the illusion of Divine guidance. The Great Apostasy is here, something that Benedict has alluded to many times. Benedict told Corriere della Sera, "In the end the awareness that the Church is and must remain united has always prevailed." He said, "Its unity has always been stronger than internal struggles and wars." Certainly, he is not referring to the present time, since disunity has become the predominant new order of the day while a mere remnant of the flock has kept the True Faith. The present-day war against the Faith greatly outweighs any attempts to keep it universally intact. Did Benedict XVI also say something along those lines?