Matthew 16 question

[mozart-250]

1. Doctrine is infallible, Conduct is not. That is the simple answer. Everyone can Sin, including the pope…

Actually I was not referring to the pope sinning. If Pope Benedictus gets up on the wrong side of bed some day and yells at a Cardinal, I could care less. I assume he would go to confession and get it right.

I am talking about gross lapses in conduct that spoil the testimony of the church in the world. Examples (from both sides of the house so I am not picking on anyone are)

• Priest sex abuse scandals
• Televangelist scandals
• The inquisition
• The persecution of the anabaptists (by everyone)
• Killing of Catholics in England
• Pastors of megachurches resigning because of a male hooker and crystal meth.
• A pastor defrauding an elderly couple of money and killing them when they find out (I visited this pastor’s church in Maine once…he is serving a life sentence in Florida).

These are not the gates of hell prevailing? Yet being wrong on something is? I don’t get it.

However a Lapse in the clarification of Doctrine through papal infallibility would have disastrous consequences and would cause Church ending schism from within. That is why.

1. For the obvious reason in that it would bring the theological end of the church. Hell prevailing over Jesus. Of Cause as Jesus himself said, it is an impossibility, because god will not let it so.

Why would being wrong on something necessarily necessarily lead to a schism and be the theological end of the church?

Maybe sooner or later line God shows the church they didn’t get this one exactly correct, leadership admits their mistake, and it gets fixed.

This is another thing I also dislike about infallibility, it makes back out impossible.

The reason why all of this troubles me is that at least in my life I sense my behaviour is much more important to the Holy Spirit than getting every minor detail of my belief system correct.

For example say at the end of my life I learn gosh-diddly-yarn that Catholicism was right and Mary was immaculately conceived. I doubt that I will (Catholic: spend more time in Purgatory…Protestant: lose rewards at the judgement seat of Christ) over that one. Different story about my behaviour however.

 

[mozart-250]

The gates (or jaws) of hell are always chomping at us, and sometimes they take a hunk out of our hide.

And true! Triumph don’t always come cheap!

Then you can understand me reading this passage and believing (based on this passage) that being wrong about something is more likely satan taking a hunk out of our hide than the gates of hell prevailing against the church.

 

[MariaG]

Actually I was not referring to the pope sinning. If Pope Benedictus gets up on the wrong side of bed some day and yells at a Cardinal, I could care less. I assume he would go to confession and get it right.

I am talking about gross lapses in conduct that spoil the testimony of the church in the world. Examples (from both sides of the house so I am not picking on anyone are)

• Priest sex abuse scandals
• Televangelist scandals
• The inquisition
• The persecution of the anabaptists (by everyone)
• Killing of Catholics in England
• Pastors of megachurches resigning because of a male hooker and crystal meth.
• A pastor defrauding an elderly couple of money and killing them when they find out (I visited this pastor’s church in Maine once…he is serving a life sentence in Florida).

These are not the gates of hell prevailing? Yet being wrong on something is? I don’t get it.

Yet these, while very large and gross examples, they ultimately still are gross examples of personal sin carried out by men. This concerns impeccability of behavoir and not infallibility of doctrine.

The Church does not Teach that it is okay for a priest to abuse someone. The Church does not teach that it is okay to lie about things that happened. The Church did not teach error, men sinned by lying and abusing.

Televangelist scandals are not Catholic Church scandals Yet still, it is not the fault of all Evangelicals that Jim Baker committed adultery. Evangelicals do not teach that adultery is okay. And in this case, Jim Baker did not teach that adultery is okay so, even if he had been the Pope it would be a perfect example of not practicing what he preached. Impeccable and infallible.

Each case we could go down the list and see that the Church never taught that it was okay to sin, they just did so by their actions.

Infallible teaching, fallible behavoir.

Christ never promised that those who will lead the Church will never fail. We can see that Peter and the apostles failed repeatedly and sinned in a simple reading of Scripture. But Christ did promise that the Gates of hell shall not prevail. So how do we reconcile this?

By the fact that there is a difference between the behavior, no matter how large the sin, and the doctrine of the Church which is a pillar and foundation of truth.

Gotta go.

Your sister in Christ,
Maria

 

[RNRobert]

Hi mozart-250,

I think mercygate and colliric answered your question pretty well. Lapses in morals are not the same thing as lapses in doctrine. Remember what Jesus said about those “sitting on the seat of Moses?” We are to obey our leaders, no matter how unedifying their conduct was. Should our church leaders be holy? You betcha! Will God call those who scandalize his flock to account for their stewardship? Without a doubt! Dante Aligheri was a devout Catholic, but in his book The Divine Comedy he had no qualms about placing a couple Popes in Hell.

Here’s another issue: If we reject the authority of Church leaders because of the bad conduct of some of them, what does that do for the claims of Christianity in general? Christians, whether Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant, believe that Jesus was God Incarnate, the creator of the universe became man to save us. We believe this to be the true fact, the true faith. Yet, what about the conduct of many who call themselves Christian. Many non-Christians look at the behavior of man who call themselves Christian, and think to themselves, “well, if Christians act no better than anyone else, it must not be true.” Or as a bumper sticker I saw put it, “Lord, save me from your followers.” (I think Mahatma Gandhi said something to that effect).

 

[mercygate]

Then you can understand me reading this passage and believing (based on this passage) that being wrong about something is more likely satan taking a hunk out of our hide than the gates of hell prevailing against the church.

Uh-huh. But it stil makes more sense that in teachcing on matters of faith and morals the Church be protected from error. Even the Orthodox cling to the doctrine of the indefectibility of the Church (which is the umbrella concept that shelters the subset of infallibility). If the Church can err, then it is not the Body of Christ.

Actually, the doctrine of infallibility is something all Christians MUST believe if they accept that the Church is the Body of Christ. And they kind of do. Sort of. That’s where the foggy idea comes from that the church is made up of “all true believers” – whatever that is supposed to mean. Catholics include even not-so-true believers. Look at the Catechism and see that explanation about imperfect communion . . .

I don’t know if it was on this thread or elsewhere, but I finally collapsed on the doorstep of Rome when I realized that the matter of Peter, of indefectibility and a visible, historically identifiable, earthly focus for the Body had to be the real deal and that my querulous objections to the necessity of believing in the Immaculate Conception were just that: querulous.