Papal Infallibility and the Ordination of Women

[MarcoPolo]

Cardinal Ratzinger, as Prefect of the CDF, disagreed with you. See the statement from the CDF linked to earlier in this thread.

No, he did not that I can see. In fact you are replying to my post in response to that statement. The CDF statement recalls the 3 criteria for papal infallibility in its very statement. See also this Pope Benedict quote from a homily from my first post of this thread.
*Recently a group of priests from a European country issued a summons to disobedience, and at the same time gave concrete examples of the forms this disobedience might take, even to the point of disregarding definitive decisions of the Church’s Magisterium, such as the question of women’s ordination, for which Blessed Pope John Paul II stated irrevocably that the Church has received no authority from the Lord. (Pope Benedict XVI, April 5, 2012)*That is consistent with the CDF’s emphasis on JP2 invoking all 3 of the necessary criteria for infallibility when it said:*Thus, in the present circumstances, the Roman Pontiff, exercising his proper office of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32), has handed on this same teaching by a formal declaration, explicitly stating what is to be held always, everywhere, and by all, as belonging to the deposit of the faith.*Those are the 3 criteria for papal infallibility: speaking from Petrine office, for all the faithful, on a matter of faith/morals.

And that, as I said earlier, does not preclude the Ordinary Magisterium from having exercised infallibility throughout the centuries in its own way.

 

[Abu]

MarcoPolo #25
Thus, in the present circumstances, the Roman Pontiff, exercising his proper office of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32), has handed on this same teaching by a formal declaration, explicitly stating what is to be held always, everywhere, and by all, as belonging to the deposit of the faith.
Those are the 3 criteria for papal infallibility: speaking from Petrine office, for all the faithful, on a matter of faith/morals.

And that, as I said earlier, does not preclude the Ordinary Magisterium from having exercised infallibility throughout the centuries in its own way.

Exactly right.

Fr Brian Harrison points out a fact which few commentators have realised – that the available translations minimize the gravity of the Holy Father’s language by mistranslating it:

1. *Epistula Apostolica *(Apostolic Epistle) as “Apostolic Letter”
2. “I” declare instead of We declare
3. “my” ministry instead of Our ministry
   Fidelity, Autumn 1999, p 33, John XXIII Co-op Ltd.].

Now why would the Vicar of Christ go to the lengths of a special Apostolic Epistle (mistranslated “Letter”) to merely repeat the established infallible condemnation by the OUM against women priests?

Because the OUM doctrine was disregarded, as expressly mentioned. In fact, as Br Santogrossi shows, “acts by Paul VI and Bl John Paul II had not been sufficient to put an end to the questioning of the tradition received from the apostles. Bl John Paul II says in *Ordinatio Sacerdotalis *4: ‘Although the teaching that priestly ordination is to be reserved to men alone has been preserved by the constant and universal Tradition of the Church and firmly taught by the Magisterium in its more recent documents, at the present time in some places it is nonetheless considered open to debate.’ With these words which precede the decisive phrase cited above, John Paul II indicates that the doctrine of the reservation of the priesthood to men belongs to the ordinary and universal teaching of the Church already in force. My emphasis].
Homiletic & Pastoral ReviewIgnatius Press, February 1999
Ordinatio Sacerdotalis: A definition ex cathedra
By Ansgar Santogrossi

That is just why the OUM infallible teaching is carefully acknowledged and the new emphasis “to be held definitively” now required:

1. It “has been”, that is already “infallibly proposed by the ordinary and universal Magisterium.”
2. “Therefore” – precisely because the Holy Father knew that the doctrine had been taught already by the ordinary and universal Magisterium that he felt obliged to reassert it by a “formal declaration”.
3. The Pope’s own words in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis: *definitive tenendum *mean precisely “requiring to be held definitively.”

From Ad Tuendam Fidem #9:
“In the case of a defining act, a truth is solemnly defined by an “ex cathedra” pronouncement by the Roman Pontiff…”
The defining act has been pronounced by Bl John Paul II in O.S.

It is already part of the constant and universal Tradition of the Church.
**The ex cathedra doctrine in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis has six emphatic parts:
“Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance,
a matter which pertains to the Church’s divine constitution itself,
in virtue of our ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk. 22:32)
we declare that
the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women
and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.”

These six emphatic parts of the doctrine each contributes to the gravity and significance of this doctrine and together reveal it as ex cathedra. “The Holy Father declares a divine thing (or an act of Christ) and he declares that this thing is definitive tenendam.” (Br Ansgar Santogrossi, O.S.B.).

 

[DavidFilmer]

I think we can all agree that the teaching of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (that the Church lacks authority to ordain women to the priesthood) is Catholic Doctrine.

I think we can all agree that the infallible nature of this teaching was made known beyond all doubt by St. John Paul the Great.

What seems to be in question is whether St. John Paul the Great exercised the charism of Papal Infallibility when making this teaching known, or whether he was simply “passing on” a teaching which had already been identified as infallible.

I (and almost everyone else) has said that he did NOT exercise this charism, but was merely the messenger.

HOWEVER, I will admit that I do not understand how the Church could define a teaching (even of the ordinary and universal Magesterium) as infallible apart from the Pope, such that this teaching would be “manifestly evident”

No doctrine is understood as defined infallibly unless this is manifestly evident. [Code of Canon Law, #749 §3]

Without Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, could anyone say FOR SURE that its teaching was infallibly defined by the Church?

 

[edwest2]

Yes, since Jesus established it Himself.

jimmyakin.com/library/womens-ordination-its-infallible

Ed

 

[Abu]

DavidFilmer #27
Without Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, could anyone say FOR SURE that its teaching was infallibly defined by the Church?

Certainly, by the Ordinary and Universal Magisterium – John Paul II had reiterated that the doctrine on the reservation of the priesthood to men belongs to the ordinary and universal teaching of the Church already in force.

Post #20 showed the confirmation of the infallible teaching:
“11……regarding the doctrine that priestly ordination is reserved only to men. The Supreme Pontiff, while not wishing to proceed to a dogmatic definition, intended to reaffirm that this doctrine is to be held definitively,32 since, founded on the written Word of God, constantly preserved and applied in the Tradition of the Church, it has been set forth infallibly by the ordinary and universal Magisterium.33 As the prior example illustrates, this does not foreclose the possibility that, in the future, the consciousness of the Church might progress to the point where this teaching could be defined as a doctrine to be believed as divinely revealed.
Notes:
32 Cf. John Paul II, Apostolic Letter [Epistle] Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, 4: AAS 86 (1994), 548.
33 Cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Response to a Dubium concerning the teaching contained in the Apostolic Letter [Epistle] “Ordinatio Sacerdotalis”: AAS 87 (1995), 1114.”

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis then raised that infallible doctrine to the level of an *ex cathedra *doctrine, as Dr David Gregson of EWTN was quoted as affirming in post #15.

 

[MarcoPolo]

jimmyakin.com/library/womens-ordination-its-infallible

There is another statement by Cardinal Ratzinger in the above link, regarding Ordinatio Sacerdotalis from 1995 that says, *“In this case, an act of the ordinary Papal Magisterium, in itself not infallible, witnesses to the infallibility of the teaching of a doctrine already possessed by the Church.”*This statement indicates he does not believe JP2 exercised the charism of infallibility in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. Unfortunately, he does not expound on why that would be so in light of JP2 invoking all 3 necessary criteria for infallibility in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. It also does not seem to explain why he said in a 2012 homily, some 17 years after making the above statement, that the question of women’s ordination was stated “irrevocably” by JP2 and not the Ordinary Magisterium if he indeed believed the matter to be infallibly closed prior to JP2. It is possible that his position changed by 2012. Or perhaps he is invoking some nuance between “infallible” and “irrevocable.” If he does not believe JP2 exercised “infallibility” in OS, he must believe him to have exercised something very much like it, otherwise, why would the CDF statement call to mind the 3 criteria for infallibility?

I think valuable here is Bishop Gasser’s official Relatio to Vatican I’s definition of papal infallibility. The Church’s mentality behind the scenes was described by him thusly:*[T]here belongs to the Roman Pontiff a separate infallibility. But in saying this we do not separate the Pontiff from his ordained union with the Church. For the Pope is only infallible when, exercising his function as teacher of all Christians and therefore representing the whole Church, he judges and defines what must be believed or rejected by all. He is no more able to be separated from the universal Church than the foundation from the building it is destined to support.*In other words, even when exercising infallibility, the Pope is never an island, but stands upon a preceding foundation. I would argue that is the case here in OS.

Suffice it to say, the teaching is infallibly taught.