David Allen Bawden (born September 22, 1959), is an American citizen who was elected "Pope Michael I" by a very small group of Conclavist or post-Sedevacantist Catholics to fill the vacancy they consider to have been caused by the death of Pope Pius XII in 1958. He is one of a group of self-proclaimed papal pretenders, including Fr. Lucian Pulvermacher (proclaimed Pius XIII) in Montana and the late Clemente Domínguez y Gómez (proclaimed Gregory XVII) in Spain.

Bawden's claim to the papacy

Bawden's supporters argue that the elections of Pius XII's successors, namely Pope John XXIII, Pope Paul VI, Pope John Paul I, Pope John Paul II, and Pope Benedict XVI was invalid because they are all modernists. Pope Pius X had in Lamentabili Sane, condemned the heresy of Modernism. This Index was Supplementary to the general Syllabus of Condemned Errors issued by Pope Pius IX.

In 1907 Pope Pius X had issued Praestantia Scriptura where he imposed automatic excommunication upon all remaining Modernists who remained within the Church. He stated:

We declare and determine that if anyone, which may God forbid, should go forward so brazenly as to defend any proposition reprobated in either of these documents, by that fact itself, he incurs excommunication reserved to the Roman Pontiff.

The claim that Pius XII's successors are modernists as conceived by Pope Pius X is dismissed as factually inaccurate by the vast majority of Roman Catholics

Claims against popes

Michael Bawden's supporters accuse Pope John XXIII of "modernistic heresy". They also condemn Pope John Paul II's supposed association with pornography, specifically the appearance of "immodestly clad" acrobats at a performance in the Paul VI Hall in the Vatican and the presence of "half-naked natives" at some of Pope John Paul II's Masses in Papua New Guinea.

Justification for electing a pope

According to Catholic theology, the Church possesses popes in perpetuity (First Vatican Council, 1870), and it has always the right to supply itself with the Pope. The official process of election, through a papal conclave of the College of Cardinals is not a divinely ordered process for selection but a method created by the Church to replace ealier methods. Sedevacantists argue that if the College of Cardinals will not or cannot elect a valid pope, ordinary Catholics can do so, under the principle of "Epikeia" (Equity)

According to sedevacanists, none of the appointments made since 1958 to the College of Cardinals is valid, as the popes who made them were themselves invalid. As there are no surviving members of the pre-1958 College of Cardinals, according to their theory there is no college to do the electing, necessitating a new interim procedure to elect a new pope who would then fill the vacanies and so create a valid College of Cardinals.

Process for his election

Acting on the basis of this, David Bawden was elected Pope by six people (including himself, his parents Mr. Kennett Bawden and Mrs. Clara Bawden, a Mr. & Mrs. Robert Hunt, and a Mrs. Teresa Stanfill-Benns, who had been the main motivator of the Election) on July 16, 1990 in Belvue, Kansas in the United States in a store owned by the Bawden family.

Mrs. Benns and Mr. David Bawden, who together summoned the assembly to elect the Pope in 1990, claim to have invited all orthodox Catholics to join, but receive only six respondents. They then formed the assembly which elected Bawden, who took the reign name Michael. He said that his motivation Pope Leo XIII's decision to institute the Invocation of St. Michael Archangel, and to add it to every Tridentine Mass.

That invocation was deleted by the Second Vatican Council.

No clerical involvement

Unlike other papal pretenders, Pope Michael's election did not involve any previously ordained clergy from the Roman Catholic Church.

Supporters of 'Pope Michael'

The movement created by Michael Bawden has few known adherents.

Sedevacantist criticism of 'Pope Michael'

Some sedevacanists criticised the method of election of Pope Michael because three of the six 'electors', including David Bawden himself, belonged to his family. Other critics have noted that the Bawden family are themselves the publishers and authors of sedevacantist books, with the implication being that the proclamation of a member of the family as a 'pope' provided a higher profile and so enabled the promotion of their books. The family deny the allegation.

Thomas Frank interviewed Bawden for his 2004 book, What's the Matter with Kansas?, and devoted a chapter to him.

External links

• The Vatican-In-Exile
• Michaelinum - The Catholic Resistance to the Modernist Apostasy
• "Not In Communion With Rome?"