Thank you for your answer. As I said before, the Oriental Churches have a unique situation and I’m not an expert in Oriental law. I can only speak about the papacy from the Roman perspective. I do agree that truth is a holy thing. I’m trying very hard to understand the Oriental perspective here.
I think for the most part you are right, however in the last few days I did find myself having a very interesting talk with a seminarian about papal infallibility. It was started over the recent news issue. My take on it was over the weekend until we actually knew what the Pope actually said in it’s entirety it and it met the requirements for infallibility then it we could not jump on that band wagon. Meanwhile this person was making statements like anything the Holy Father says is 100% correct. I believe he is correct but that we need to be careful that he actually said it and before we jump on an infallibility bandwagon without a statement meeting the infallibility requirements. So that is my take on why this stuff may have resurfaced in the last few days. One word: condoms.Allow me to ask a question at this point. What’s in it for the posters who come here to limit the power of the papacy over dioceses? Does it add anything to their life of faith? Does it enrich their life of prayer? Does it stear them away from sin and closer to the perfection of charity?
I’m asking, because I often find that many of these threads don’t really nurture the spiritual life. When the rubber meets the road, the call is to holiness. If one is just out to “dethrone” the papacy, that certainly works against the call to holiness. If one is simply out to kill time, that’s OK too. Entertainment can be a good thing. But we should then be open and tell people that this is just a “fun” question, not really something pertinent to holiness.
We have to show how something is either necessary for holiness or necessary for relaxation and entertainment, which can help us be holier people. I believe that stressed out Christians are not always very holy.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
That’s an interesting insight. I had not given much thought to this, because the Pope’s statement didn’t rattle me at all. I understood what he was talking about and I understood the method that he was using to get there. It’s a very Bonaventurian method, which Franciscans use as second nature.
I posted something before and then asked the moderator to delete it. It didn’t make sense to me, after I read it and I ran out of deleting time. Let’s see if this works.
OK, so Brother, help me to understand the part that I bolded in red. In the Roman Church, there is an understanding that the pope need not explain himself when he uses his ordinary authority. For example, he can pull a bishop from a diocese and wave off the questions. Granted, it would not be the most diplomatic thing to do, but he can do it. He has that kind of power No one can appeal to a higher authority, because there is no higher authority.
These canons I posted are from the Eastern Code so while the hierarchy (and some of the laity) might not like it, it is written as it is written. The pope has such power over the whole of the Catholic Church. As it says, he has “a primacy of ordinary power over all the eparchies and groupings of them by which the proper, ordinary and immediate power which bishops possess in the eparchy” and that “There is neither appeal nor recourse against a sentence or decree of the Roman Pontiff.”OK, so Brother, help me to understand the part that I bolded in red. In the Roman Church, there is an understanding that the pope need not explain himself when he uses his ordinary authority. For example, he can pull a bishop from a diocese and wave off the questions. Granted, it would not be the most diplomatic thing to do, but he can do it. He has that kind of power No one can appeal to a higher authority, because there is no higher authority.
Do the Oriental Catholics, especially the hierarchy, accept that the pope has this kind of power in the Eastern Churches or is his authority limited and if so, who monitors and regulates him?
Thanks for your help.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
What Pope Benedict XVI actually said made great sense to me once I got a chance to read it - Tuesday morning.I posted something before and then asked the moderator to delete it. It didn’t make sense to me, after I read it and I ran out of deleting time. Let’s see if this works.
Your proposal tha tthis has to do with the pope’s statement on condoms is an interesting one. I had not thought about it that way, because what he said made perfect sense to me.
I can understand how it would not make sense to some people, unless they can think in Augustinian and Franciscan systems. Pope Benedict is very Augustinian and Franciscan in his thinking. He often speaks like Augustine and Bonaventure, which is not what most Catholics are used to. He’s not saying anything new. He’s just saying it in “Augustinian and Franciscan Italian,” if these were a language.
That makes more sense, even to me.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
That’s what I was thinking too. But then, given that I was accused of being wrong (see above), I thought, “Well maybe it’s my Franciscan mind at work here. Our rule is very specific. It actually says that he we must obey the pope, without questioning.” Bonaventure, later wrote, that the pope does not owe anyone an explanation. He is the final authority and the only time that he can be questioned is when he either is “nuts” or “a heretic”. Barring insanity and heresy, he can do whatever he pleases and the rest of the Church must march to the tune that he plays. That’s how Bonaventure explained it. To me, this question about his authority and jurisdiction was like a “non question”. I was reading it and saying to myself, “How is this helpful? Why would anyone even ask this? It’s a given. He’s the highest temporal authority.”
Well, we must remember to that at the Last Supper all but twelve walked away and returned to their former way of lives. And even one of those twelve was a traitor. If the followers of Christ of yesteryear will do it to Christ - they will surely do it to Peter and his successors; I guess the question is what can we do to defend this in a logical way that makes sense rather than seems sensationalized?That’s what I was thinking too. But then, given that I was accused of being wrong (see above), I thought, “Well maybe it’s my Franciscan mind at work here. Our rule is very specific. It actually says that he we must obey the pope, without questioning.” Bonaventure, later wrote, that the pope does not owe anyone an explanation. He is the final authority and the only time that he can be questioned is when he either is “nuts” or “a heretic”. Barring insanity and heresy, he can do whatever he pleases and the rest of the Church must march to the tune that he plays. That’s how Bonaventure explained it. To me, this question about his authority and jurisdiction was like a “non question”. I was reading it and saying to myself, “How is this helpful? Why would anyone even ask this? It’s a given. He’s the highest temporal authority.”
Do you see how and why I am stunned by these questions?
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
Yes I can and I was also stunned which is why I looked up the actual canons and provided them when I found that they supported your statements.That’s what I was thinking too. But then, given that I was accused of being wrong (see above), I thought, “Well maybe it’s my Franciscan mind at work here. Our rule is very specific. It actually says that he we must obey the pope, without questioning.” Bonaventure, later wrote, that the pope does not owe anyone an explanation. He is the final authority and the only time that he can be questioned is when he either is “nuts” or “a heretic”. Barring insanity and heresy, he can do whatever he pleases and the rest of the Church must march to the tune that he plays. That’s how Bonaventure explained it. To me, this question about his authority and jurisdiction was like a “non question”. I was reading it and saying to myself, “How is this helpful? Why would anyone even ask this? It’s a given. He’s the highest temporal authority.”
Do you see how and why I am stunned by these questions?
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
When I was a formator for our men I always told them, “The pope does not have to invoke infallibility anymore than your mother does. Authority has rights and when it speaks, you had better take it seriously and follow directions, unless you can prove, without a doubt, that it is being abused.”
I’m afraid you cannot appeal to the highlighted portion of brother ByzCath’s post to justify your position. You need to take that canon in the context from which it originated.
You ask about “this kind of power.” Most of us are just laymen here, but I, personally, believe the positions I have expressed about the power of the Pope is more faithful to V1, V2 and the Canons than what you have so far proposed.
You have faithfully described an archbishop/metropolitan in the Latin Catholic Church. But an archbishop/metropolitan in the Eastern and Oriental Catholic Churches is a different animal.
Then shouldn’t you use the commentary on the current Codes of Canon Law rather than the commentary on the old code?
I know but my post was in response to another description of the Latin Church. I am aware that the hierarchy in the Chaldean, Eastern, and Oriental Catholic Churches is different. I meant no slight to the Eastern Churches.
But it sort of is out of context when you attempt to use a commentary for the 1917 code on the 1983 code.