Almost every document concerning the SSPX has referred this danger, though of course they mention no names. I think the fact that the SSPV broke off from the SSPX indicates at least a danger for some folks of stepping out from the Catholic Church.
I think Pope Benedict’s silence in response to the German Bishops’ calls to the Vatican asking if they could excommunicate all those involved with the Ordinations in Regensburg indicates at least a danger that some folks are actually close to stepping out of line from the Catholic Church. No, really. I believe that.
I’m not sure Benedict was completely silent, see this from CNS: catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0902770.htmI think Pope Benedict’s silence in response to the German Bishops’ calls to the Vatican asking if they could excommunicate all those involved with the Ordinations in Regensburg indicates at least a danger that some folks are actually close to stepping out of line from the Catholic Church. No, really. I believe that.
The danger of “some folks stepping out from the Catholic Church” isn’t limited to the Society, though I suppose you are right to say that documents for and about the SSPX would probably be the right place to address these concerns. Are there similar documents in regard to the rest of the church, or certain national churches, such as the American Catholic Church or those of some European countries? Personally I’m more concerned with the clergy who want a free hand to practice hedonism than the ones who want a free hand to practice traditional Catholicism. Perhaps it’s high time the pope both warn of heresy and schism, and enforce the rules. Just a thought.
Hmm, I guess you’re right, though “danger of schism” isn’t limited to the SSPX by any means!
Right. Vatican II can stay, I agree. And yes, I hope they do finally implement it…I mean, it’s been 40 years, hasn’t it!!! All I said was to throw the “spirit” out the window…not the whole council. “Spirit” is synonymous with following the “social fashions of the times” and “do whatever you want”, if my 23 years in the NO is any indication.
Can you give an example of a “fuller explanation” of an older dogma? What I see since the council (and * from * the council, too) is mostly just obfuscation and equivocation and confusion about the dogmas of the Church.
By “radical” I mean “new”. A dogma can be explained more thoroughly, but it can’t be contradicted.
Though I tend to doubt your take on what the SSPX says, I will say this: most modern people probably can be excluded from the “invincible ignorance” argument. I’m pretty sure the SSPX doesn’t deny the possibility of either BOB or BOD.
I thing I tend to doubt this. Did your parents (or their parents) truly believe that “the Jews” are morally stunted and can’t be saved??? Honestly? That’s why I doubt what you’ve said here.
Really!?!? I’ll have to look into that. I’ve never heard of their stance that there was a “curse” on them.
They’re still inside due to their own stance and actions.
Spare me.
But this is prudent.
Good…now let’s make sure all the clergy in “full communion” know it.
And they don’t.
I don’t understand why you say the impediment to their return to full communion is not doctrinal. The Pope has said that it is, and he has a pretty big say in whether tjheir canonical authority is restored. Then you go on to say the problem is in the way the Church is interpreting the documents of Vatican II, which seems like a doctrinal issue.
This is the crux of the issue, isn’t it? You say that Rome’s authority “only extends to teaching the faith as handed down.” But who gets to say whether the teaching is “as handed down”? Isn’t this the same thing every group that has split from the Church has said? I am unware of any denomination that says that the Church is teaching the way Christ and the Apostles intended, but they are going to try something different. Every single Christian denomination alleges that the Church has misinterpreted or otherwise failed to properly preserve the deposit of faith. SSPX’s position on that is not any different than that of the Old Catholics, or of the Lutherans, for that matter.
I’m not sure what you mean by this, but if you mean that a lot of the friction created by Vatican II is the result of an attempt to rapidly move the Church away from its established culture, I agree. I think that is a separate issue from the opposition to the doctrinal disputes over what the Church teaches.
The example that generates the most heat is the doctrine that outside the Church there is no salvation. Vatican II explained that this does not mean that only formal members of the Catholic Church can be saved. It means that all salvation comes through Christ’s Grace. All those that receive Christ’s Grace are members of His Church, even if neither that person or the human hierarchy of the Church on earth are aware of it. This is not exactly the way the doctrine has been taught at all times in Church history, but it is not really a conflict with the old teaching. At times a narrower interpretation has been taught because the Church has not always understood the extent of the Church’s mysterious extension beyond its visible earthly structures. Vatican II helped clarify this doctrine.
My understanding is that SSPX narrows the doctrines to the point that they virtually vanish. But setting aside what SSPX does or doesn’t teach (which seems hard to pin down, anyway), my understanding is that invincible ignorance is broader than you suggest. Invincible ignorance includes, but is not limited to those (1) that have never heard of Christ, and (2) that have had no real opportunity to hear the Gospel and convert. The Catechism says that the doctrine extends to those that “would have desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.” That is pretty broad, for who would not desire Baptism if they knew they needed one?
My parents didn’t believe this, and the vast majority of Catholics throughout history did not. But until recently you could read all about it on SSPX’s website. If you search on "blood curse"on these forums you may find some discussion of it.
This is a legitimate way to look at it, but I think its more accurate to say that they are still inside because of the pastoral approach taken by the Pope. If you go to the Roman Catholic Women Priests website you’ll see that they also claim to be still within the Church. I am not saying that they are, or should be, I’m just saying that the SSPX’s insistence that they remain inside is not the controlling factor.
I don’t understand. The Church should tolerate groups that illicitly ordain priests and bishops? How could the Church allow that?
Prudent to reject the Church’s teaching? To be clear, I have no problem with Catholic clergy or laity disagreeing with certain teachings of the Church, or even with groups getting together and petitioning Rome for change. The problem I have is when they say that they get to decide what the Church “really” teaches. If SSPX were an obedient group that constantly said “we ought to teach X, not Y,” I would not have a problem with that. (I think the Vatican would, but I would not.)
I think they most do, the problem is that some deny that the current teaching is in accord with the deposit of faith.
Given all of the above, I don’t know how you can say they don’t pick and choose. Certainly they assert that they get to pick which councils have teaching authority. And if you don’t agree with that, certainly they reject the Catechism, or at least many parts of it. Isn’t that picking and choosing?
True. In fact, there are many ways one can place himself in danger of schism or excommunication. Many of these, however are handled more locally, like the rainbows-sashers or Medigorjie. Perhaps the international nature of the SSPX means that this situation is best addressed between them and the Vatican. Also, since their current predicament came about as a result of papal action, then the solution must be at an equal level.
I think the difference here is that all of the groups you mention took issue with an infallibly defined dogma of the church - Old Catholics, Lutherans, etc. The Second Vatican Council produced no infallibly-defined dogma. The (purpopsely) imprecise documents of V2 have led the church, in some cases, to teach contrary to their immediate predecessors. It is not hard, for instance, to read the Syllabus of Pius IX and see how the church has strayed from the former Magisterium to produce a new one, in many cases.
Whether particular documents from particular councils, or parts or themes drawn from those documents are or are not infallible is something that could be argued about, but its not relevant to the current topic. The Church has many doctrines that are not infallibly defined yet must be adhered to. The issue is that the Church has teaching authority, and Ecumenical Councils have the authority to promulgate Church doctrine. Lumen Gentium is the Dogmatic Constitution of the Church and it is no less authoritative than the Dogmatic Constitution published by Vatican I.
Not true. There is a very specific formula that is to be used to denote an article of faith that must be believed. None of the V2 documents invoke infallibility.
Sure, a classic example is in LG speaking of the church:
I disagree. As far as I know, the Church has not published any special formula that it uses to invoke infallibility. If they have, can you refer me to it? The Church has also never published a list of what is or is not infallible. I have never seen any Church document that said that Vatican II lacked the same authority as other Ecumenical Councils or any Church document that says that nothing in the Vatican II documents is infallible, or that Vatican II’s teachings are not binding. Besides, even the “non-infallible” parts of the Church’s teaching are to be believed by Catholics, and surely you would agree that the Dogmatic Constitution and the Catechism are the teachings of the Church?
I have seen this referenced as vague or imprecise or meaningless by others. I don’t disagree that this could be explained better, and maybe with different or fewer words, but I don’t think that the passage is imprecise. Even if it might be, the same principles are well explained in the Catechism in CCC 813-822.
This is from the Catholic Encyclopedia:
* what is claimed for the pope is infallibility merely, not impeccability or inspiration (see above under I).
* the infallibility claimed for the pope is the same in its nature, scope, and extent as that which the Church as a whole possesses; his ex cathedra teaching does not have to be ratified by the Church's in order to be infallible.
* infallibility is not attributed to every doctrinal act of the pope, but only to his ex cathedra teaching; and the conditions required for ex cathedra teaching are mentioned in the Vatican decree:
o The pontiff must teach in his public and official capacity as pastor and doctor of all Christians, not merely in his private capacity as a theologian, preacher or allocutionist, nor in his capacity as a temporal prince or as a mere ordinary of the Diocese of Rome. It must be clear that he speaks as spiritual head of the Church universal.
o Then it is only when, in this capacity, he teaches some doctrine of faith or morals that he is infallible (see below, IV).
o Further it must be sufficiently evident that he intends to teach with all the fullness and finality of his supreme Apostolic authority, in other words that he wishes to determine some point of doctrine in an absolutely final and irrevocable way, or to define it in the technical sense. These are well-recognized formulas by means of which the defining intention may be manifested.
o Finally for an ex cathedra decision it must be clear that the pope intends to bind the whole Church. To demand internal assent from all the faithful to his teaching under pain of incurring spiritual shipwreck (naufragium fidei) according to the expression used by Pius IX in defining the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin. Theoretically, this intention might be made sufficiently clear in a papal decision which is addressed only to a particular Church; but in present day conditions, when it is so easy to communicate with the most distant parts of the earth and to secure a literally universal promulgation of papal acts, the presumption is that unless the pope formally addresses the whole Church in the recognized official way, he does not intend his doctrinal teaching to be held by all the faithful as ex cathedra and infallible.I think we are in agreement here and it was great of His Holiness to make that clarification. One must be precise with the faith. If you were to ask me if a certain statement or fact I made was true and I answered “Truth subsists within my statement”, as opposed to “My statement is true”, certainly the latter is less-ambiguous and preferential to the former.
You have provided a several paragraph description of papal infallibility, and then said that Vatican II does not “come close” to the description. Even setting aside that it is not clear that the description of papal infallibility applies to statements made by a Council, this description is a far cry from a “formula” for declaring something infallible.
I am glad we agree on something! (I put this in a separate post because of the length restrictions.)
The test V2 doesn’t pass is that there is no declaration attached to LG or any other document from that council where the Pope and Council declare that the document is dogmatic and needs to accepted as necessary to the faith. That would make it infallible. On the contrary, the council was pastoral and meant to give guidance.
Three points.
Agreed.
You’re mistaken on this, T. Infallibility MUST be explicitly invoked.
There is a current thread on this board dealing with limbo. In it you will find cited several Councils and Popes making declarations on Limbo. So are you saying that because these Popes and Councils taught that unbaptised babies go to Limbo, that we MUST take that as an infallible teaching of the church? If not, why not?
Then why is there such disagreement over what is or is not infallible, and why is there no list of what is infallible?
No, I am not sure how you get there from my comments. I think Limbo was always presented as a possibility and not an authoritative teaching. But if it were presented as an authoritative teaching, Catholics would be bound to accept it as the teaching of the Church. Not all teachings put forth by Councils and Popes are infallible, but they are authoritative.