Infallibility: What Does It Mean?

[abajab]

Hi again Bubba,

There are many reasons but the main two that I will put forward are these: 1) humans are fallen and fallible by their nature, and 2) the OT and NT are incongruent. (I’ve discussed these in detail in other threads and just mention them by reference here to answer your question.)

1. Infallibility does not meen impecability. The Pope, Bishops, Cardinals and Priests go to confession on a regular basis.
2. The old and new testments do take on the appearance of being incongruent but this occurs as a result of the different languages that they where translated from. However, perhaps you can throw one at me and let me see what I can do with it.

Interestingly, most Catholics do seem to make the claim that infallibility is a logical certainty though there has been at least one other poster in this thread that approached it as a matter of faith.

It just occured to me. Has anyone explained to you that infallibility only reffers to matters of “faith and morals”? Not science and mathimatics or anything else.

If by “Protestantism” you mean anything contrary to Catholic dogma, perhaps, but while I do read Protestant theologies I don’t expect to find a Protestant denomination that provides better answers. But, again, I’m not looking for a club to join, just seeking truthful answers to questions.

By the way, my “Welcome to the club.” comment was tongue in cheek in an attempt to lighten the conversation.

I use to own a libarary of nearly 100 Protestant books. I read each more than two or three times and found one concistancy. They would all contain sections within each book that had anti-Catholic slams. This cause me to do a great study of anti-Catholicism and to every slam I found an answer. I was amazed at how much missinformation about Catholicism exists. Anti-Catholicism was that which brought me to the strong faith in Catholicism that I have today and I use it to teach people Catholicism.

Jeff

 

[Bubba_Switzler]

1. Infallibility does not meen impecability. The Pope, Bishops, Cardinals and Priests go to confession on a regular basis.

I know. I’m not referring to naughty pope stuff but to the fact that the Church is a human institution even in it’s dogma. I’m willing to believe that the CC (probably) had an unbroken line of apastolic succession that is undimished by a few playboy popes and, further, that the most important elements of Christian theology were set down in the first and second centuries AD during which time there was persecution of, not abuse of power by, the Church.

1. The old and new testments do take on the appearance of being incongruent but this occurs as a result of the different languages that they where translated from. However, perhaps you can throw one at me and let me see what I can do with it.

This is one of those issues hiding in plain sight. Start with the fact that official Judaism rejected Jesus as the fulfillment of prophecy and that their reasons for doing so are still pretty reasonable and the fact that Jesus did not attract a following by being the obvious fulfillment, that came after the fact (and in hushed whispers). Add to this the guesswork that is plainly obvious in Acts regarding such fundamental questions as to whether the OT Law was still binding. Then, too, there is the mysterious gap between the destruction of the temple and the Bar Khoba rebellion during which time Christianity became estranged from Judaism by war and the center shifted from Jerusalem to Antioch and Rome.

It just occured to me. Has anyone explained to you that infallibility only reffers to matters of “faith and morals”? Not science and mathimatics or anything else.

Yes, yes, I understand this. To be precise it is only in matters of dogma, not even faith and morals generally. (There are many moral issues that the Church does not make infallible claims on such as just war.)

I use to own a libarary of nearly 100 Protestant books. I read each more than two or three times and found one concistancy. They would all contain sections within each book that had anti-Catholic slams. This cause me to do a great study of anti-Catholicism and to every slam I found an answer. I was amazed at how much missinformation about Catholicism exists. Anti-Catholicism was that which brought me to the strong faith in Catholicism that I have today and I use it to teach people Catholicism.

I don’t read Protestant books for consistency and I don’t take their anti-Catholicism seriously. I’ve shot holes in Protestant anti-Catholic arguments myself on several occassions. But not all Protestant theology is anti-Catholic.

What I do like about Protestant theolgoical works is that they are more willing to explore unorthodox ideas. If there are problems with Christian theology then the answers will not be found in orthodoxy.

(Needless to say, I am not very interested in Fundamentalist Protestantism.)

 

[abajab]

Hi Bubba,

I think that you’re on your way to the answer of this question for yourself without anyone’s help. It seems to me that you’ve educated yourself pretty well. I guess that the next step could only be a leap of faith on your part.

From my point of view a logical answer does not exist for anyone. If such a logical answer did exist you would have found it already and there would be a heck of a lot more Catholics in the world. The only advice that I could give at this point is to pray about it. Either God will place it in your heart or not. It is, however, my prayer that you find peace with your many questions. I know that I had to go through a long battle with myself until I found that peace.

This has been a very injoyable conversation for me.

Jeff

 

[Bubba_Switzler]

I guess that the next step could only be a leap of faith on your part.

Who knows, maybe I will ultimately make that leap. I’m not averse to the exercise of faith, just very cautious about it.

From my point of view a logical answer does not exist for anyone.

This is the conclusion that I have come to lately. But I wanted to find out if I was missing some rational argument. Catholicism tends to be very well thought out, if you go to sources like NewAdvent you can find rational justifications for virtually all of Catholic dogma. So I was more than a little surprised that this was not the case for infallibility of scripture and tradition and, in fact, I think there are many Catholics who do believe that this is a matter of reason and not faith.

I know that I had to go through a long battle with myself until I found that peace.

The irony is that I have found a peace in my current view. I used to struggle trying to reconcile the issues I described previously (without throwing out the baby with the bathwater). Human fallibility provides a simple answer. Faith in the infallibility of the CC (on dogma, of course) is an alternative solution but one that does not currently appeal to me.

This has been a very injoyable conversation for me.

I truly appreciate your contribution to the discussion.