The Conciliar-Synodal Church is not the Catholic Church – Editors' Updates
A "square" lacking the necessary property of four sides is not a square.
Dear Readers,
This is our regular Editors’ Updates Newsletter for monthly and annual subscribers.
Many traditional Catholics assert that the Conciliar Church – which we could now call the “Conciliar-Synodal Church” – is not identical to the Roman Catholic Church.
This claim seems incomprehensible to many well-intentioned persons who simply want to be Catholic. After all, we all know that the Conciliar-Synodal Church has a more or less plausible prima facie claim to be the Roman Catholic Church:
It is headed by a man claiming to be the Roman Pontiff, based in Rome
Its representatives occupy various formerly Catholic buildings
Even its most outrageously non-Catholic officers appear to have some sort of material succession to the Apostles
It has retained some aspects of the Catholic faith and religion.
All these points could be summed up by saying that the Conciliar-Synodal Church has retained a sense of visibility, and it is to this visibility that its defenders most frequently appeal.
But those who appeal to this supposed visibility to insist that the Conciliar-Synodal Church is the Roman Catholic Church are motivated by natural considerations and are missing what is most important.