Need help refuting an argument against Papal Infallibility

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HomeschoolDad said:
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phil19034:
Btw- we also do not know that exact moment of soul implantation. But based on the science we can assume that it happens within the first 8 days. Because thats when identical twins happen.
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That is true, we do not know. That is why to say “abortion is certainly murder from the first instant of conception” takes only a probable opinion and treats it as though it is dogma. Some pro-life people fall into this trap. We have to make the assumption, even if we are wrong, but we cannot prove it.

As far as identical twins are concerned, that’s far above my pay grade, and far above anybody’s pay grade. It could be that one soul is infused at the moment of conception, and then Almighty God infuses the second soul when the embryo separates into two distinct persons. To speculate “which twin has the original soul?” is the ultimate unanswerable question.

And then there is the question of whether frozen embryos have souls, and whether those are human souls or something less. No way to know. No way to say they do, no way to say they don’t.
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Correct. Which is why we have to be consistent. We say, “I/we believe that abortion is immoral from the moment of conception.”
 
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We should clarify and say that while we don’t know for certain, the scientific evidence shows that there is a very good chance that abortion is murder from the moment of conception which is why it should be illegal.
 
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What caused you to leave the Catholic Church and join the schismatic Eastern Church that does not recognize the fact that Christ gave the Apostle Peter authority over the church?
 
EZweber said:
Your points are valid, but I am not saying I don’t have a definition of murder. I am saying that there are multiple possible definitions of murder and we don’t know which one the Pope used.
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But chances are the Church’s definition of murder is one of the following:
  1. The deliberate and direct killing of an innocent human life.
  2. The deliberate and direct killing of an innocent human person.
#2 includes #1 insofar as “every human person is a human life”
(just as “every apple is a fruit”)

What is debated is whether #1 includes or is identical to #2.

In other words, are “human life” and “human person” the same?
And that is precisely the relevance of “ensoulment”.
 
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That your view of belief not mine. I would consider you a schismatic and it was your group that left the One True Church. I left your Church just like the 1/3 of Catholics have left, I think that should be about 35,000,000 since your troubles began.
 
But the Catholic belief is backed up by scripture and history. Matthew 16:18 says that Christ gave Peter authority over the church and Irenaeus and Tertullian said that Peter started the church in Rome.
St. Irenaeus, writing his famous “Against Heresies” after 180 A.D. noted, It is possible, then, for everyone in every Church, who may wish to know the truth, to contemplate the tradition of the Apostles which has been made known throughout the whole world. And we are in a position to enumerate those who were instituted bishops by the Apostles, and their successors to our own times . . . . The blessed Apostles [Peter and Paul] having founded and built up the Church [of Rome] handed over the episcopate to Linus. Paul makes mention of this Linus in the epistle to Timothy [2 Tim 4:21] To him succeeded Anencletus; and after him in the third place, from the Apostles, Clement."
Tertullian, a Church Father writing about 200 A.D. in his work, “The Prescription Against the Heretics” notes, “Moreover, if there be any [heresies] bold enough to plant themselves in the midst of the apostolic age, so that they might seem to have been handed down by the Apostles because they were from the time of the Apostles, we can say to them: let them show the origins of their Churches, let them unroll the order of their bishops, running down in succession from the beginning, so that their first bishop shall have for author and predecessor some one of the Apostles [Titus 1: 7; 1 Tim 3: 1-2] or the apostolic men who continued steadfast with the Apostles. For this is the way the apostolic Churches transmit their lists: like the Church of the Symrnaeans, which records that Polycarp was placed there by John; like the Church of the Romans, where Clement was ordained by Peter. In just this same way the other Churches display those whom they have as sprouts from the apostolic seed, having been established in the episcopate by the Apostles.”
http://www.catholicfaithandreason.org/papal-supremacy-in-the-bible-and-church-fathers.html
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Ana_v said:
But chances are the Church’s definition of murder is one of the following:
  1. The deliberate and direct killing of an innocent human life.
  2. The deliberate and direct killing of an innocent human person.
#2 includes #1 insofar as “every human person is a human life”
(just as “every apple is a fruit”)

What is debated is whether #1 includes or is identical to #2.

In other words, are “human life” and “human person” the same?
And that is precisely the relevance of “ensoulment”.
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The Church has never defined this last issue. We don’t know what the Pope meant without more context.
 
Do you need this because you want to refute him or because this has shaken you, and you’re looking for a quick answer for yourself?
 
You have Saints that tote your Church line and the Orthodox Christian Church has Saints that preach against what you believe So here we sit at a stalemate to one another. Second you can misinterpret any passage in the Bible to make it say what ever want.
 
This is a reply to the original post, @JacobHarrison.

Have you accepted this man’s claims, or anybody’s claims, using only citations of documents from hundreds of years ago? I certainly hope not. Demand, always demand, full and complete quotations.

A quick Internet search demonstrates that the claims your interlocutor made are fairly easy to find. The actual texts of the documents, not so much. I would not trust anybody’s synopsis of what a centuries-old bull says or does.

Do not allow people to get away with making broad claims without backing them up in detail.

BTW, those who say that the Church has never made any official, authoritative pronouncement on the time of “ensoulment” are correct. Anybody who says otherwise is making it up.
 
I remember that you said that you had disputes with others at the seminary about morals which eventually caused you to leave the faith because God’s moral law doesn’t make sense to you. So I am saying that people here can help it make sense.
 
You don’t understand that our finite minds cannot fully grasp the omniscient mind of God so we don’t fully understand his reasons for certain rules.
 
ftron said:
The moral laws of Yahweh are very clear in their reasoning; “I’m the most powerful, I make the rules” i.e: Might makes right.
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You refer to that alleged position, as if it were obviously wrong, so you don’t try to explain why it is wrong.
In other words you assume some standards have been infallibly communicated to us.

Whether that is, or isn’t, the Catholic position can still be debated. But for now, your assumption that at least some universal absolute truths exist makes a good truths point for discussion .
 
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35 million isn’t anywhere close to one third of Catholics.
The Orthodox Churches have their own troubles and scandals… think of the millions of Orthodox Christians in Russia who don’t practice. Think of Russia’s alarming abortion rate (though this has improved). Think of the Greek archbishop who was caught with a young mistress sharing his bed. Think of the quasi-schism between Moscow and Constantinople. Pointing fingers and making self-righteous and snide declarations of superiority is completely at odds with Christian charity.
Thankfully the Orthodox Christians I know in real life don’t have the chip on their shoulder that you do.
 
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Roman Catholics are leaving in large numbers and it’s not stopping anytime soon. I find RC Church a place a person waste his or her trying to get closer to God. The most of people who hold your religion is about at max 600 million at best , not fictional number 1.2 billion that you claim. I take anytime my Chuches troubles over the eye roll i had in your religion.
 
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The lack of Christian charity and contempt continues I see.

You are clearly not interested in dialogue.
I find that many of the Orthodox “online” are like this. In person, I’ve found Orthodox Christians to be generally wonderful people who are sincerely interested in dialogue and unity with Catholics. Thank God for that.
 
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The Orthodox Christian Church can never ever dialogue away the belief and faith of the Church past down since the early years of the Church . They will never ever change not then , not now or far future to the end of the world. We are very patient we will wait for you to return to communion with Mother Church. Orthodox Christian are good people but we don’t change for anyone it’s just facts laid down. If you think that the Orthodox Christian Church is going to change I wouldn’t hold your breath…
 
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The Eastern Church changed the belief and faith of the Church past down since the early years of the church when they rejected the authority of the pope. I showed you that papal authority was a belief in the early years of the Church when I quoted two fathers including Irenaeus who is venerated as a Saint in both the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Church.
 
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First here you have that the Roman Church only papal infallibility a dogmatic belief in the year 1870 at Vatican 1
 
Second the Orthodox Christian Church has never ever trashed her Divine Liturgy and replaced it with not with a not so good of a replacement.
 
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