Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: paulk@caen.engin.umich.edu (paul kominsky) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Trent Message-ID:Date: 29 Sep 89 07:33:46 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: U of M Engineering, Ann Arbor, Mich. Lines: 70 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu >[I have often seen the claim that only the Immaculate Conception and >the Assumption are infallible. What makes something ex cathedra? --clh] There are three criteria for the attribute of infallibility, of which one is a statement being "ex cathedra." The other two criteria is that the statement relates to faith and morals, and that it is proposed as the belief of the entire Church. First, for a papal statement, encyclical, constitution, or bull to be infallible, it must concern faith and morals. Whenever the Pope speaks on art, science, or politics, he cannot speak with the absolute authority of infallibility, but with relative authority as a learned person. Some issues, like communism for example, involve both faith and politics, so the Pope can (and did) speak on that issue infallibly. The second criterion for infallibility is that a statment must be "ex cathedra" or "from the chair" of St. Peter. In other words, the Pope must make the statment not as a private theologian or even as a bishop of the Church, but as the official head of the Church. He must intend to exercise his authority as the Pope. That a statement is "ex cathedra" is normally shown by the word choice and the style of the statement. It is revealed by words like "we proclaim" or "we define." The literary style of ex cathedra pronouncements is also distinct. I've also been told that these pronouncements are written in the past tense in Latin, to show that they are not new ideas, but old and everlasting ideas. Furthermore, they often explicitly say that they are "spoken from the chair of Peter." Some pronouncements written in the proper style do not directly say this, and so there may be some argument over their status. The important point about the ex cathedra style of writing is that it emphasizes that the statement is not a change and not a new doctrine, but is something that was "true from the very beginning" and now publicly defined in order to make the dogma clearer to all. People (Catholics, at least) believed the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin long before 1950, since it was a Holy Day of Obligation for centuries. Pronouncements with the attribute of infallibility are unchangeable for this reason; they are not new revelation, but clear explanations of the original deposit of Faith. The third criterion is that the statement must be binding on the entire universal Church, not a particular rite or locality. There could never be an infallible pronouncement that celibacy is required of all Latin Rite priests because of this. The words "infallible" and "ex cathedra" are often used as synonymns. The essential criterion for infallibility is the statement being ex cathedra, because no statement failing the other two requirements would ever be stated in ex cathdra style anyway. The idea of infallible pronouncements is somewhat related to the idea that the Church, as a whole, can never err in what it teaches or believes. On some ideas the Church comes to a consensus on its own, like the Assumption, and the doctrine is then defined as the common belief of the Church. On other pronouncements where there is disagreement, the Church is in a sense "defined" by the pronouncement. "He who does not believe X, let him be anathema." Those that do not accept the statement are defined out of the Church, making the pronouncement a method of "purification" for the Church. | Paul J. Kominsky --+-- paulk@caen.engin.umich.edu | |\ | /| The more noble a thing is, ---\---|- the more reprehensible is its abuse. | V | -Aloysius Biskupek, S.V.D.