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Papal Infallibility?

An examination of the history of papal infallibility
with references to specific papal documents

Like the Holy Orthodox Catholic Apostolic Church, the Vatican teaches it is infallible and bases this on the teaching of Saint Paul:

the Church ... not having spot or wrinkle or any such [thing], but ... holy and blameless' — Eph 5:27

Add to this the promise of the Lord Jesus Christ that He would be with the Church always [see Matthew 28:20] and that Death itself would never prevail against the Church [Matthew 16:18], it is clear that His Church would be present in the world until the end of time whilst maintaining holiness and blamelessness.

The promises of the Lord Jesus Christ were to the Church as a whole — not to individuals. But, if one were to grant absolute authority over the Church to an individual, it would be necessary, even essential, for that person to have the same infallibility on a personal basis in order to prevent that person from imposing an incorrect teaching on the Church as a whole. And this is precisely what the Vatican has done with its pope: it has made him the Church's head and thus needed to give that head infallibility. In contrast, Orthodox Catholic Christianity recognises no earthly person as head of the Church (not even in a distinction between visible head and invisible head as is done by Vatican teaching). The only head recognised in Orthodox Catholic Christianity is the Lord Jesus Christ, and to Him alone is infallibility ascribed.

An unbiased reading of history reveals that, beginning in the eleventh century, the Roman papacy underwent a tremendous transformation, becoming something it had not previously been. Preludes to this transformation included Old Rome's isolation from the other patriarchates which led to a loss of the communal understanding of the Church and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire and subsequent takeover by Germanic tribes of all the power structures — including the papacy by the early part of the eleventh century. The papacy became one of several political centres in Western Europe seeking to expand its power at the expense of others. One of the focal points of this struggle was the Investiture Controversy (also see here). One of the most powerful and effective tools used by the papacy in its power struggles with kings and princes were the Decretals of Pseudo-Isidore, better known as the False Decretals — a collection of mostly forged documents thought to have been written in the ninth century that claimed to have been written in the third century. These forgeries were instrumental in permitting the pope of Rome to increase his power in Western Europe and to transform the papacy into a monarchy. By the close of the twelfth century, the papacy was fully transformed into a monarchy wielding a tremendous amount of power over Western Europe. It had become something very different from what it had been. This transformation is well explained in the excellent book by Colin Morris (Professor of Mediaeval History, University of Southampton), The Papal Monarchy: The Western Church from 1050 to 1250.

Although the papacy retained its monarchical powers in subsequent centuries, its power was not unlimited. It was commonly held that the pope of Rome was subject to an assembly of the Church's bishops. This was clearly taught by the Council of Constance (1414-1418) when it deposed three popes (Gregory XII, Benedict XIII, and John XXIII) and elected Martin V as the new pope rather than allowing the cardinals of Old Rome to conduct the election. Today, the Vatican regards the latter sessions of the Council of Constance to be an Ecumenical Council, but refuses to grant that status to the earlier sessions which taught that

... a general council, representing the catholic church militant, has power immediately from Christ, and that everyone of whatever state or dignity, even papal, is bound to obey it in those matters which pertain to the faith

This was also the teaching of the Council of Basel (1431-1439):

This holy synod also declares that ... it cannot be dissolved even by a pope, and that a council actually assembled cannot be dissolved or moved from place to place by a Roman pontiff without the express consent of the council itself..
 
... the holy synod determines that the ... Roman pontiff ... if he violates what is contained in this decree ... will subject himself to the judgment of a general council.
 
... this holy synod too renews that necessary declaration on the authority of general councils, which was promulgated in the said council of Constance ...

Even as late as the nineteenth century, Roman Catholic bishops taught that the pope was subject to a General Council (i.e., an Ecumenical Council). Such was the testimony of Roman Catholic bishops to a Parliament Royal Commission in 1825. As long as the pope of Rome was regarded as subject to an Ecumenical Council, as long as a pope could not dictate doctrine solely on his authority, there was no need to grant him the status of infallibility. In 1826, thirty bishops signed the Declaration of the Archbishops and Bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland which affirmed:

The Catholics of Ireland declare on oath their belief that it is not an article of the Catholic faith, neither are they required to believe, that the pope is infallible.

Even as late as the mid-19th century, Roman Catholic catechisms denied papal infallibility. For instance, one of the most popular Roman Catholic catechisms in mid-19th century England was the Controversial Catechism, by the Reverend Stephen Keenan which provides this Q & A:

Q. Must not Catholics believe the Pope in himself to be infallible?

A. This is a Protestant invention; it is no article of the Catholic faith; no decision of his can oblige, under pain of heresy, unless it be received and enforced by the teaching body; that is, by the bishops of the Church.

Similarly, the Vicar Apostolic in England (the primary papal representative), Bishop Baines, stated in 1822:

Bellarmine, and some other divines, chiefly Italian, have believed the Pope infallible, when proposing ex cathedra an article of faith. But in England or Ireland I do not believe any Catholic maintains the infallibility of the Pope.

During the period when the popes of Old Rome lost much of their secular power (in 1860, most of the Papal States seceded and joined the newly-formed country of Italy; in 1866, most of what had remained of the Papal States also joined Italy). In 1870 — only two months before the Italian army occupied what remained of the Papal States (the area around Old Rome itself) — Pope Pius IX pushed through an approval of papal infallibility by bishops gathered for the First Vatican Council. (Due to the political/military situation, the First Vatican Council was halted by bishops fleeing the city and the council was not officially closed until the beginning of the Second Vatican Council nearly one hundred years later.) An extremely interesting account of the process, written by a Latin priest (August Bernhard Hasler) who had access to archives of the Vatican Library, is How the Pope Became Infallible: Pius IX and the Politics of Persuasion (Doubleday & Co., New York, 1981). Hasler presents a great deal of documentation showing how Pius IX railroaded the acceptance of papal infallibility by stacking the council, threatening opponents (to the point of verbal abuse, vindictiveness, and coercive tactics), and rewarding allies. The book is out of print but one ought to be able to procure it from a library, either on the shelves or through interlibrary loan. It is well worth the effort needed to obtain a copy and time to read it.

The definition of infallibility — that the pope when speaking ex cathedra (literally from the chair [of Peter]) about doctrine or morals is preserved from all error — has one enormous flaw: no definition of ex cathedra was made. Here is the actual statement from the First Vatican Council

... the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra — that is, when in the exercise of his office as pastor and teacher of all Christians he defines, by virtue of his supreme Apostolic authority, a doctrine of faith or morals to be held by the whole Church — is, by reason of the Divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, possessed of that infallibility with which the Divine Redeemer wished His Church to be endowed in defining doctrines of faith and morals; and consequently that such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are irreformable of their own nature (ex sese) and not by reason of the Church's consent

Though there is a quasi-attempt to define ex cathedra — when in the exercise of his office as pastor and teacher — this merely shifts the uncertainty to the question as to what constitutes exercise of his office as pastor and teacher. To this day, the pope's followers argue and debate what constitutes ex cathedra. Lacking an accepted definition, there is no agreement on what papal statements are deemed ex cathedra! The manifestations of this are easily seen: a statement by Pope John Paul II on the question as to whether women can be ordained has generated serious debate since 1994 as to whether it was an ex cathedra statement (and the pope has offered no clarification!).

It is interesting to see how fluid and inconsistently applied is the idea of ex cathedra statements. Today, most followers of the pope today insist there are only two papal statements that were made ex cathedra and that are, therefore, infallible. But this was not always the case. In a book published in 1954 by Fathers Leslie Rumble & Charles Carty (of the Radio Replies series, the best-known Roman Catholic apologists of the 1940s and 1950s), That Catholic Church: A Radio Analysis gave the following list (reformatted for readability but otherwise unchanged) of papal statements regarded as ex cathedra (on Question/Answer #314 on page 80):

The two papal statements that seem to be accepted by all followers of the pope (I have never seen or heard their status questioned) as ex cathedra and therefore infallible are Ineffabilis Deus of 1854 and Munificentissimus Deus of 1950. Since papal infallibility was not defined until the First Vatican Council of 1870, these two papal statements that are unquestioned as being ex cathedra and therefore infallible straddle the definition of papal infallibility when speaking ex cathedra. And, according to Rumble and Carty, there were six papal statements made prior to the First Vatican Council that were retroactively determined to be infallible.

But, upon further examination, one finds virtually no difference between the language of Ineffabilis Deus issued in 1854 by Pius IX and the language of Unam Sanctam issued in 1302 by Boniface VIII to stress the solemnity and essentiality of their respective statements:

... we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff. [from Unam Sanctam]

The phrasing we declare, we proclaim, we define that followed by the teaching which is being declared, proclaimed, and defined must certainly have served as a model for the statement by Pius IX:

We declare, pronounce, and define: the doctrine that maintains that the most Blessed Virgin Mary in the first instant of her conception, by a unique grace and privilege of the omnipotent God and in consideration of the merits of Christ Jesus the Saviour of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore must be firmly and constantly held by all the faithful. [from Ineffabilis Deus]

The formula here is quite similar: We declare, pronounce, and define followed by the teaching which is being declared, pronounced, and defined. In fact, it is nearly identical!

Although Rumble and Carty listed Unam Sanctam as an ex cathedra statement and therefore infallible in their book of 1954, today one will find little or no support among the followers of the papacy for regarding it as ex cathedra or infallible. But where is the real difference? I can find only one: Rumble and Carty were writing prior to the Second Vatican Council and there was no official teaching of the papacy that contradicted Unam Sanctam. There was, therefore, nothing to prevent Rumble and Carty from listing Boniface VIII's statement. But, today, after the Second Vatican Council, there is good reason to exclude it as an ex cathedra statement. What did the Second Vatican Council teach?

... the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Moslems: these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day. Nor is God remote from those who in shadows and images seek the unknown God, since he gives to all men life and breath and all things (cf. Acts 17:25-28), and since the Savior wills all men to be saved (cf. 1 Tim. 2:4). Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience — those too many achieve eternal salvation. Nor shall divine providence deny the assistance necessary for salvation to those who, without any fault of theirs, have not yet arrived at an explicit knowledge of God, and who, not without grace, strive to lead a good life. Whatever good or truth is found amongst them is considered by the Church to be a preparation for the Gospel and given by him who enlightens all men that they may at length have life. [from Constitution on the Church, 16]

Since councils defined by the Vatican as Ecumenical Councils are deemed infallible the teaching just quoted is deemed infallible and any statement that contradicts this infallible teaching cannot be infallible. (It would too foolish to have infallible teachings which contradicted each other!) Thus, Unam Sanctum can no longer be regarded as an ex cathedra statement.

Obviously, the only way to make such a determination is in hindsight. Orthodox Catholic Christianity has no problem with labelling a statement infallible after it has been tested by the Church with the clarity of hindsight. Most Orthodox Catholic Christians would agree that anyone making the statement that the Lord Jesus Christ was fully God and fully Man was teaching infallibly. Orthodox Catholic Christians will unanimously agree that Lectis Dilectionis Tuae (the first entry in the above table) is an infallible statement — because it was subjected to an examination and analysis by a synod of bishops (Chalcedon, 451) which in turn was subjected to examination by the Church as a whole and accepted as the Fourth Ecumenical Synod (Council). Because the teaching, upon examination, was found consistent with that which had been believed everywhere, always, and by all (i.e., antiquity, universality, and consent), it was and can be regarded as infallible. But there is an enormous difference between making such a judgement after an examination by the Church as a whole and insisting that a person holding a particular office can a priori be regarded as infallible.

In other words, the great flexibility of the application of papal infallibility presents a convenient escape for the Vatican and its apologists. Even should a statement at one time be regarded as infallible (e.g. Unam Sanctum), if it becomes inconvenient, or embarrassing, or is contradicted by a later teaching, its infallibility can be re-assessed and its infallible status revoked.

Before continuing, it ought to be noted that there are some, particularly sedevacanists (those who believe the seat of the papacy is vacant because it lacks a valid pope) and those who reject the Second Vatican Council (the latter usually also being sedevacanists) or interpret it in such a way as to effectively eviscerate it (e.g. those who insist the Second Vatican Council was a pastoral council and therefore could not establish dogma as could a dogmatic council like the Council of Trent) who may yet regard Unam Sanctum to be an infallible statement. (There were many traditionalist Latins who regarded the teachings of the Second Vatican Council as inconsistent with the traditional teaching of their religion.) Due to the structure of the Vatican's religion, such people have been marginalised and cannot be realistically regarded as within the church from a Vatican perspective.

Scholars — even those who follow the pope of Old Rome — agree the doctrine of papal infallibility was not overtly proclaimed in the early Church. Proponents of papal infallibility, unable to find positive arguments in the teaching of the early Church, engage in an argument from silence that there is an implicit belief of papal infallibility based upon the actions of the Church. They conveniently ignore the condemnation by the Fifth Ecumenical Synod (Council) of Pope Vigilius I as a heretic (which is positive and explicit evidence there was no belief of papal infallibility in the early Church) by arguing Pope Vigilius I was not teaching ex cathedra but only as a private person (ignoring the fact that the condemnation was based on an official epistle from the pope to the patriarch of Constantinople — which many proponents of papal infallibility argue was a forgery). In the debate on the status of Pope Vigilius I, the proponents of papal infallibility always seem to create excuses as to why they should not accept the facts of history in order to avoid admitting papal infallibility was a late invention. Similarly, in the case of Pope Honorius I who was explicitly anathematised by the Sixth and Seventh Ecumenical Synods (Councils) for teaching heresy, proponents of papal infallibility continually create excuses as to why they ignore the facts of history. These apologists for papal infallibility even dismiss the teachings of the Councils of Constance and Basel (presented above) because they did not receive papal approval and are thus not ecumenical (a classic case of a circular argument!).

Clearly, any reasonable and unbiased examination of history demonstrates the idea of papal infallibility was not without opposition for a long time. If one were to apply the litmus test of Saint Vincent of Lerins (antiquity, universality, and consent), it is clear that the belief is not 'catholic'.

The Roman Catholic scholar Brian Tierney, although certainly no friend of traditionalist Christians, let alone traditionalist followers of the papacy, has done a great deal of research on the origins of papal infallibility. The following, taken from the Introduction (pp. 2-5) of his book, Origins of Papal Infallibility: 1150-1350, explains this inconsistency well:

If the popes have always been infallible in any meaningful sense of the word — if their official pronouncements as heads of the church on matters of faith and morals have always been unerring and so irreformable — then all kinds of dubious consequences ensue. Most obviously, twentieth century popes would be bound by a whole array of past papal decrees reflecting the responses of the Roman church to the religious and moral problems of former ages. As Acton put it, "The responsibility for the acts of the buried and repented past would come back at once and for ever." To defend religious liberty would be "insane" and to persecute heretics commendable. Judicial torture would be licit and the taking of interest on loans a mortal sin. The pope would rule by divine right "not only the universal church but the whole world." Unbaptized babies would be punished in Hell for all eternity. Maybe the sun would still be going round the earth.

All this is impossible of course. No one understands the fact better than modern theologians of infallibility. If past popes have always been infallible — again, we must add, in any meaningful sense of the word — then present popes are hopelessly circumscribed in their approaches to all the really urgent moral problems of the twentieth century, problems involving war, sex, scientific progress, state power, social obligations, and individual liberties. The existence of this dilemma helps to explain the rather eccentric development of the doctrine of infallibility during the past century. Since Vatican Council I, Catholic theologians have felt obliged to defend some form of papal infallibility. Real infallibility has regrettable implications. In the years since 1870, therefore, theologians have devoted much ingenuity to devising a sort of pseudo-infallibility for the pope, a kind of Pickwickian infallibility.

Their usual technique has been to raise endless, teasing, really unanswerable questions about the meaning of the term ex cathedra as used in the decree of Vatican Council I and about the phrases "ordinary magisterium" and "extraordinary magisterium" that came to be associated with it in discussions on papal infallibility. Already in 1874 Gladstone could write, "... There is no established or accepted definition of the phrase ex cathedra and (the Catholic) has no power to obtain one, and no guide to direct him in his choice among some twelve theories on the subject, which, it is said, are bandied to and fro among Roman theologians, except the despised and discarded agency of his private judgment."

Things have not improved since. To be sure, modern apologists often insist that the conditions needed to guarantee the infallibility of a papal pronouncement were set out, once and for all, simply and clearly, in the decree of Vatican Council I. But then they find it impossible to agree as to which particular papal pronouncements actually satisfy these supposedly simple and clear requirements. There is no authoritative or agreed list of the infallible pronouncements made before 1870. The uncertainty as to what is and what is not infallible extends to papal declarations touching the most fundamental issues of public and private morality. Concerning the Syllabus of Pope Pius IX, for instance, the Catholic Encyclopedia declared in 1912, "Many theologians are of the opinion that to the Syllabus as such an infallible teaching authority is to be ascribed... Others question this." [see The Syllabus of Pius IX - trv] The New Catholic Encyclopedia, recording the theological progress of half a century, tells us that things remained exactly the same in 1967.

The one papal definition made since 1870 which has been commonly accepted as infallible is Pope Pius XII's proclamation of the dogma of the Assumption. But if, in due course, Catholic theologians find it desirable to retreat from the view that this late-blooming dogma forms an intrinsic part of the Christian faith, there will be no lack of theological argumentation devoted to proving that Pius XII (in spite of his best efforts) did not succeed in making an infallible pronouncement after all. The one consistent rule of interpretation we can be sure of encountering is this: whenever a theologian disagrees with some old teaching or new ruling of a pope he will find good theological grounds for deciding that the papal pronouncement was "not infallible." The whole modern doctrine of infallibility in its Pickwickian form might be summed up in the general principle, "All infallible decrees are certainly true but no decrees are certainly infallible."

To be sure this is not the only position open a contemporary Catholic theologian. During the 1950s Pope Pius XII's encyclical Humani generis stirred a strange eddy of controversy in academic theological circles. In this document the pope declared, "It is not to be thought that matters proposed in Encyclical Letters do not in themselves command assent because (in Encyclicals) the pontiffs do not exercise the supreme power of their magisterium. For these things are taught by the magisterium, to which also the words apply, 'He who hears you, hears me'."[footnote: Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 42 (1950), p. 568.] Pope Pius' reference to the authority of the "ordinary magisterium" led some theologians to insist once again that the decree of Vatican Council I actually meant what it said — that the pope was infallible whenever he pronounced on matters of faith and morals "in discharge of the office of pastor and doctor of all Christians." [footnote: This controversy concerning the infallibility of the pope's ordinary magisterium is described in G. Thils, op. cit., pp. 181-185 and, more fully, in P. B. Bilaniuk, De magisterio ordinario summi pontificis (Toronto, 1966).] The difficulty in this position is that the pronouncements of popes, even of modern popes, sometimes contradict one another (notably, for example, in the matter of religious toleration). Some theologians therefore have upheld the infallibility of contemporary decrees without giving serious consideration to the possibility of their conflicting with preceding ones. In effect, they are content to pretend that the past did not happen. There is at least a beguiling innocence in this approach. Other theologians, more reprehensibly (from a historian's point of view), have devised hermeneutical principles so ingenious that the documents of the past can never embarrass them. By applying such principles, they can reinterpret any doctrinal pronouncement, regardless of its actual content, to mean whatever the modern theologian thinks that its framers ought to have meant. [footnote: A good introduction to the hermeneutical problems that arise when theologians try to reconcile doctrinal statements from different ages of the church's past that are really irreconcilable with each other is provided by H. Riedlinger, "Hermeneutische Ueberlegungen zu den Konstanzer Dekreten" in Das Konzil von Konstanz, ed. A. Franzen and W. Müller (Freiburg, 1964), pp. 214-238.] The infallible doctrine of the past remains infallible but it is deprived of all objective content. This procedure seems based on a kind of Alice-in-Wonderland logic. One is reminded of the Cheshire Cat — the body of a past pronouncement disappears but its grin of infallibility persists. The general principle underlying this second major approach to the problem of infallibility might be summarized in the formula, "All infallible pronouncements are irreformable — until it becomes convenient to change them." It seems only fair to add that most Catholic theologians have continued to opt for some version of the relatively simple and straightforward Pickwickian position.

By the time of Vatican Council II the Catholic theology of infallibility had become a tangle of paradoxes and evasions. The theologians had worked themselves into a complicated cul-de-sac. But the council refrained from any thorough-going reconsideration of this question and merely repeated with minor variations the doctrine of 1870. In the years since Vatican Council II, however, a new development of thought has occurred. Very recently — while this book was being written — a few Catholic scholars have begun overtly to challenge the validity of the doctrine that was defined at Vatican Council I and reaffirmed at Vatican Council II. [footnote: F. Simons, Infallibility and the Evidence (Springfield, Ill., 1968); F. Oakley, Council Over Pope? (New York, 1969); H. Küng, Unfehlbar? Eine Anfrage (Zurich, 1970).] It remains to be seen whether their point of view will establish itself as a viable position that can be held within the Roman Catholic church.

To believe in papal infallibility requires many long leaps of faith that are directly opposed to historical evidence and common sense.

1. It is necessary to abandon our common awareness that, due to God's gift of free will, men can and do say no to God. We recognise all men are fallible. We instinctively recoil from the idea that any individual can be infallible, even under limited circumstances. It seems that the claim that, under certain circumstances, God guarantees that a man cannot say no, cannot fall into error, is a denial of this God-given free will. One cannot help but wonder why, if God would overcome a person's free will in order to prevent a fall into error, why would He not keep all people from error? (Of course, this would mean a revocation of free will and would be contrary to what God has revealed to us.) The historical facts clearly support this common awareness: history is littered with incidents of individuals falling into error — Pope Vigilius I and Pope Honorius I of Old Rome condemned by Ecumenical Synods, Pope Celestine III declared a heretic by Pope Adrian VI, and numerous patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, Jerusalem and Antioch, plus countless clergy. As long as there is free will, there will always be people who say no to God and remove themselves from His Church.
2. It is necessary to abandon our common awareness that there is safety in numbers. There is good reason for the clichéd warning about not placing all our eggs in one basket. It is far, far easier for a single person to fall away from truth and into error than for everyone to fall into error. History supports this awareness. The vast majority of the bishops fell into error during the height of the Arian heresy, but there was a faithful remnant within the Church which maintained the True Faith. It was this faithful remnant that eventually overcame Arianism. We find throughout the history of the Church that when a heresy threatened the Church, there was always a faithful remnant led by heroic bishops who preserved the True Faith. These leaders came from various places (e.g. Athanasius of Alexandria against the Arians, Flavian of Constantinople against the Monophysites, Zachariah of Jerusalem against the Monothelites) just as the Lord raised up prophets at various times from various places to combat error amongst His chosen people in Old Testament times.
3. It is necessary to ignore the historical fact that papal infallibility fails the test of catholicity as explained by Saint Vincent of Lerins in his Notebooks (written 434), namely that of antiquity, universality, and consent, or that which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all. Clearly, the idea of papal infallibility was not held in antiquity but was a rather late invention. Neither did the idea of papal infallibility have common consent as can be seen from the opposition it engendered — besides the opposition from Protestantism and Orthodox Catholic Christianity, it gave birth to a schism from the Vatican that adopted the name Old Catholics
4. It is necessary to ignore the circumstances leading to the proclamation of papal infallibility in 1870. To believe this invention, one must either ignore the fact that the papacy established its power through the use of forgeries, uncharitable and unchristian behaviour (not the least of which was the use of strong-arm tactics which included verbal abuse, vindictiveness, and coercion) in a grab for earthly glory rather than Christian humility
5. It is necessary to believe that, despite all the evil means used to attain the definition of infallibility, the end itself was good — in other words, the end justified the means.

There is, of course, a far more plausible viewpoint. One can believe the Faith does not change in content, that new dogma will never be created, that changes need the approval of the entire Body of Christ, that any person can fall into error but there will always be a faithful remnant, that the Church has but one infallible Head — the Lord Jesus Christ. This viewpoint is historically consistent and agrees with common sense and experience.

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