Another papal infallability question

[LilyM]

So you saying that the Pope isn’t infallible, its just that God wouldnt let him make a statement against what is true?

The Pope IS infallible, part and parcel of that infallibility IS that God wouldn’t let him make a statement etc etc.

I think you have your definitions wrong. Infallibility is something that relates to the office, not the man. And it IS purely a gift of God and not a possession that whichever man happens to be Pope ‘owns’.

For example, both JP2 (as Cardinal Wojtyla) and Benedict 16 (as Cardinal Ratzinger) wrote plenty before becoming Pope. None of which is infallible in and of itself. It is only infallible inasmuch as it agreed with what previous Popes and Church Councils had proclaimed as certain teaching.

Once each man became Pope, duly elected and installed, they THEN became subject to the charism of infallibility. If JP2 had, for example, abdicated due to ill health as he certainly could have done, he would no longer, once a new Pope had been chosen and installed, be protected by Papal Infallibiity.

Hope this makes it clearer for you.

 

[LilyM]

When God chooses to work through his vessels, like us, free will becomes a part of it. Like Noah, it was God’s will that he should go to assyria(?) (I’m a little rusty) but he choose not to obey and went to Ninevia. i don’t see how it is possible to say that the God the Father can coerce, or otherwise force anyone to do his will.

You know if this wasn’t a christian forum, I think by now, a few people would have been a little less than cordial with me.

It was Jonah - and it is true that he didn’t want to go to Nineveh and tried to run away. But if you read his full story in the Book of Jonah - God sent a whale to swallow Jonah up, which spat him out again after three days on the shore near - guess where? Nineveh.

So in the end Jonah DID do what God commanded, since he realised God COULD (although maybe He wouldn’t really) use force, and he went and preached to the Ninevites

That’s kinda how infallibility works. As an example, there was one Pope who wrote his own (very poor and full of theological mistakes) translation of the Bible into Latin. He wanted to make it the official translation for Church use. He was, if I remember rightly, days away from doing so when he was struck dead.