For a Pope to be a Pope, he must be the one that Secular Rulers know they should be dealing with, right?

Like the Christmas messages on Radio to the faithful, in Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, one year even in English. How could he have spread them on the Radio, if there hadn't been country after country willing to broadcast his words?

RADIOMESSAGGIO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO XII
Mercoledì, 24 dicembre 1941(1)
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/it/speeches/1941/documents/hf_p-xii_spe_19411224_radiomessage-peace.html

RADIOMESSAGGIO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO XII
ALLA VIGILIA DEL SANTO NATALE
Giovedì, 24 dicembre 1942(1)
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/it/speeches/1942/documents/hf_p-xii_spe_19421224_radiomessage-christmas.html

RADIOMESSAGGIO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO XII
AI POPOLI DEL MONDO INTERO*
Venerdì, 24 dicembre 1943
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/it/speeches/1943/documents/hf_p-xii_spe_19431224_radiom-natalizio-popoli.html

RADIOMESSAGGIO NATALIZIO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO XII
AI POPOLI DEL MONDO INTERO*
Domenica, 24 dicembre 1944
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/it/speeches/1944/documents/hf_p-xii_spe_19441224_natale.html

DISCORSO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO XII
«NEGLI ULTIMI SEI ANNI»
24 dicembre 1945
https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/it/speeches/1945/documents/hf_p-xii_spe_19451224_negli-ultimi.html

38:06 — 39:20

Time travel to medieval Europe - Q&A
Premodernist | 28 Dec. 2023
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fWrJ4WHz_g

And one thing to keep in mind about that is, 1054 was not a unique situation. There were lots of schisms. There were lots of situations where the Church got split in temporary ways, for particular circumstances they'd split for a particular period of time. Like in the 12th century, it was really common for there to be two popes at the same time. We don't hear about this today. If you take a world history class today, if it talks about late medieval Catholicism at all, it might talk about the Great Schism of the West, where there were two popes in the late 1300s. But that wasn't a unique situation. All through the 12th century there were multiple times when there were two different popes, and also at other times too before and after that. Because the cardinals would pick one pope. The emperor (what we call the Holy Roman Emperor) didn't like that choice. He'd come down with his army and get another pope elected. So now you have two popes. And because he's there with his army, the previously elected pope would flee and go to somewhere else where he'd be safe from the imperial troops. And so now you have two popes in two different towns. That was super common in the Middle Ages.

So, how did they manage, when in some countries and cities no one was broadcasting them? Innocent II was not in a position to send radio messages for Christmas, even if there had been a radio. At least not all of the years. When the Emperor came as a penitent to him in Canossa, actually he had first gone as a refugee to Canossa to escape the Emperor.

So, why didn't the Emperor get to Canossa with an armed guard and arrest the Pope instead? Well presumably he didn't want trouble with Lotharingia. What's the connexion? Matilda of Tuscany had a maternal grandfather and a husband (divorced as when we speak of separated, not as when we speak of divorced) who were Dukes respectively of Upper and Lower Lorraine. She was the owner of the castle Canossa. She also was an ardent supporter of Pope Innocent II. And that's basically how Innocent II avoided being eaten and swallowed by the Emperor. A pretty far cry from Pius XII sitting even just beside Mussolini (who was respectful of the Lateran Treaty) and disposing of several countries' willingness to pass on his Christmas message on their radio stations.

In the Middle Ages, most of the time, there was no regular postal service built on international collaboration. Each Pope sent emissaries, rather than rely on an independent postal service. That's another way in which they could be Popes even if opposed by a world that basically preferred the Antipopes.

Today, you have the internet. As the late Pope Michael I said : "nuff said"/HGL

Monsignor Schneider, was the canon law Decree of Gratian Magisterium ?

The theory of the automatic loss of the papacy due to heresy remains only an opinion, and even St. Robert Bellarmin noticed this and did not present it as a teaching of the Magisterium itself. The perennial papal Magisterium never taught such an option.

So far Athanasius Schneider.

Bishop Schneider: About the Validity of the Pontificate of Pope Francis
September 18, 2023, Bishop Athanasius Schneider
https://www.gloriadei.io/articles/bishop-schneider-about-the-validity-of-the-pontificate-of-pope-francis/

Now, here is some comment on canon law ...

2.1. Il canone Si papa a fide devius (D.40 c.6) del Decretum Gratiani.

Il canone sesto della distinzione 40 del Decretum Gratiani ammette una prima deroga. Dopo aver presentato il caso di un papa non curantesi della salvezza della propria anima, inutile e "a bono taciturnus", osserva che un siffatto pontefice e un vero flagello, ma che nessun uomo può aver la presunzione di redarguirlo e correggerlo, poiche egli e colui che tutti giudica e da nessuno può essere giudicato, a meno che non "deprehendatur a fide devius".

Possiamo fare una duplice osservazione: da una parte si esclude assolutamente la possibilità di giudicare il papa per indegnità morale, dall'altra si ammette contemporaneamente un'eccezione.

HISTORIA DE LA IGLESIA Y DE LAS INSTITUClONES ECLESIASTICAS.
TRABAJOS EN HOMENAJE A FERRAN VALLS I TABERNER Vol. X, Barcelona 1989
https://www.mgh-bibliothek.de/dokumente/a/a062665.pdf

The position of St. Robert Bellarmine is in fact a comment on this part of the canon law.

But canon law binding on the Church universal is magisterium. And the Decree of Gratian was so./HGL