INFALLIBILITY AND CANONISATIONS
POPE LIBERIUS DISPROVES PAPAL INFALLIBILITY
POPE VIGILIUS AND OTHER PAPAL HERETICS
POPE SIXTUS V AND HIS WORTHLESS BIBLE
The Roman Catholic Church claims that Jesus Christ who was the only person ever to have been God in human flesh made the apostle Peter the head of the Church and the first pope and infallible. The popes are the successors of Peter endowed with the same powers. However history speaks of popes who used their infallibility and still erred. Papal infallibility - only made a dogma for Catholics in 1870 - is refuted by history.
Please look up Papal Infallibility on Wikipedia and New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia.
“We decree and define that Blessed Padre Pop is a saint and we inscribe in the catalogue of saints and order that his memory be devoutly and piously celebrated.”
This is the formula the pope uses to canonise saints.
Strangely, despite Jesus saying only a few would be saved, the pope claims no power to know if a person is in Hell forever. If he is able to define that somebody is a saint it should be able to do the opposite as well.
Most theologians hold that the pope is infallible in issuing a decree of canonisation. The wording of the decree is similar to that used by the popes when they made the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption of Mary a doctrine that Catholics are bound to accept as revealed by God.
St Thomas Aquinas said that it was to be held as a pious belief that the pope was infallible when making saints.
Some conclude from his words that they can disagree with the belief and be good Catholics.
But Aquinas in the absence of any decree from the Church
that the pope was infallible could have meant that it was a pious belief in the
sense that it was a revealed dogma that hadn’t been recognised fully as
revealed yet. The Church proclaimed
papal infallibility in 1870 at
Even if the pope is wrong that Padre Pio is in Heaven, then the infallibility covers the fact that Padre Pio’s life was heroic and holy even if his death wasn’t. He is still propagating the faith.
The idea that the decree of canonisation says only that a person is a saint or in Heaven is wrong. There is no point in making a saint unless that person is meant to be an exemplar for the Church. There is no need for canonisation if it is just about finding out if somebody is in Heaven. Many Catholics are supposed to go to Heaven after Purgatory anyway while saints go straight to Heaven without Purgatory. You don’t need to know who is in Heaven to be able to call on the prayers of the saints. The decree commands that the person’s MEMORY be kept and revered which is pointless unless the person lived a heroically virtuous life.
Strangely the Church does not proclaim beatifications to be infallible. They are usually the last step towards canonisation though sometimes the Church will have doubts afterwards and the person will never be canonised. Infallibility is just strange inconsistent nonsense. Beatification is not a declaration that the person is in Heaven but a declaration that a person is an exemplar and a model for the Church. Canonisation ratifies this decree and makes it dogma that the person lived a holy life and is in Heaven.
If a sinner gives his life for Christ he could be canonised for the sacrifice cancels out all the bad he did and so he could be regarded as a hero for God and an exemplar in the last moments of life.
If a candidate for sainthood was found to have died having being wilfully unorthodox the canonisation will not proceed. Canonisations are regarded as declarations that the person was orthodox to an exceptional degree in thinking and life and faith so they are infallible. Any heresy must be minor and accidental. Even teachings such as the ban on women priests are regarded as infallible though there is no decree to prove it for they were held true by the whole Church in the past. So it is concluded that a saint accepted by the whole Church must be a true saint.
Theologians believe in infallible teachings that are de fide credenda such as when the pope used the extraordinary magisterium or teaching authority to proclaim that Mary was conceived without sin. Teachings which are equally infallible but which are de fide tendenda are not proclaimed this way but are infallible because the whole Church believes them and they are the constant authorised tradition of the Church. They are safe from error for the Church believes that Christ promised the Church would never be led by error as a whole.
The declaration that somebody is in Heaven or was very holy and so is a saint would be de fide tendenda and so is infallible.
The declaration that the person’s faith as distinct from the person is the true faith which is implicit in canonisation decrees would be de fide credenda. It is like saying, “The beliefs of this person are from God and true and reflect the spirit of the holy Church.” It is not about the person but about the person’s beliefs.
It follows then that Catholic doctrines which are de fide tendenda such as the ban on birth control and women priests become de fide credenda when a saint is made for the saint is to believe in these bans.
Canonisations certainly disprove the infallibility of the Church and papal infallibility.
Karl Keating’s apologetic for Roman Catholicism in Catholicism
and Fundamentalism, page 220 tells us that Pope Stephen VII declared that
the ordinations performed by his predecessor pope Formosus
were invalid and that Formosus was not a real pope.
Typically,
Keating and the Catholic Church pretend that there is no problem with this and
that it does not disprove papal supremacy or papal infallibility. Equally typical is how this is only briefly
discussed and glossed over when it is a complex issue. That is what is done by a religionist when
going in too deep into something will show the fallacy of her or his
position.
Stephen
was claiming that Formosus was head of a false Church
and that is more than just a problem. If
Formosus was a true pope then Stephen was a
schismatic for not acknowledging him even though he was dead. Stephen accused the Church of being infested
with fake ordinations. Stephen
officially decreed that it was heresy to believe that Formosus
was a real pope even though Keating lies that he did not interfere with
doctrine and contradict the faith of the Church. Keating lies that these two popes did not
dispute the faith and contradict each other in their official teaching for Formosus claimed to be true pope and Stephen denied
it. Stephen denied that the Church under
Formosus was the true Catholic Church for only an
untrue Catholic Church, a counterfeit can be built on
the wrong rock. Stephen even
excommunicated Formosus. Formosus was dead
so he excommunicated his rotting corpse!
You cannot excommunicate the legitimate head of the Church without
dividing from that Church even if the excommunication is null and void. To divide from the head of the Church even a
past one is to commit the sin of schism and excommunicate yourself. Stephen was officially and implicitly saying
that this logic is false which marks him out as a heretic who taught official
doctrine that was wrong and also as somebody that was not infallible. He also committed the heresy of inferring
that Christ’s promise that the Roman Church would never stray or become
apostate was false. His standards for
valid ordinations were so strict that if valid he was right to reject the
validity of those performed by Formosus which would
rule out the validity of most ordinations performed by the Church. The Church cannot approve of Stephen’s
attitude. It is downright insane to say
that doctrine matters and that attitudes towards the
validity of ordinations do not. His
attack on the ordinations is sufficient proof that the claims made for the
papacy are hoaxes.
Protestants
hold that some popes proclaimed doctrines that were contrary to the Catholic
faith which disproves papal infallibility and the infallibility of ecumenical
councils like
The
Catholics say the fact is that Liberius signed a
document containing a statement about Jesus in creed form that could have been
interpreted in an Arian sense or in accordance with Catholic doctrine. Plus, they say that he was in exile so he
could have been forced. Catholics stress
that no pope can give an infallible teaching except in freedom – this is a
bizarre teaching for if God protects his Church from error he will give it the
heroic virtues to help it stand by the truth no matter what like he does for so
many saints. For God not to do this
means God can let Hell win over his Church.
Even if the error is soon corrected it still happened and led people
astray. When the pope is forced he does
not intend the Church to accept his doctrine.
It can’t always be clear if the pope is forced.
Today
there are rumours that cruel cardinals and the Roman Curia used to force Pope
John Paul II to do things against his will and he didn’t have the manpower or
the health to stand up to them. How do
you know then that any pope made a new dogma in freedom? How can you prove that Pius IX was not
blackmailed to make the Immaculate Conception doctrine? I repeat:
it is strange that Catholics hold that the pope cannot teach false
doctrine using his infallibility for the gates of Hell cannot prevail over the
Church like Christ promised and then they say that Liberius
was forced to make a false infallible statement. The gates prevailed with Liberius. Even if the damage was corrected it still
happened and the gates prevailed a little while.
There
was a conflict between Liberius’ contemporaries as to
whether or not he did sign the Arian statement to get his freedom (page 193, Apologetics
and Catholic Doctrine, Question 403, Radio Replies 3). He did not sign the document that clearly
denied the divinity of Jesus but he did sign the one that could be interpreted
in a Catholic or an Arian way and allegedly put a note to make that clear onto
it (page 123, Reasons for Hope).
He certainly believed the equivocal statement was heresy for he refused
to sign it for two years (page 193, Apologetics and Catholic Doctrine). So when he signed it his intention was to
promote heresy.
He knew
the note would be thrown away so it was a waste of time to write it. It seems that this story of the note was
invented because he had a red face. If
there had been a note it would have been destroyed and its existence would
never have been known and the pope certainly didn’t speak about the note. There is no evidence for the existence of the
note for even many Catholic books do not speak of it (page 167, Church and
Infallibility). He knew the document
was ambiguous but still pro-Arian and intended to be and he signed it. He knew he could not sign the equivocal
statement for it was destined to be taken as an Arian statement by the
Arians. You don’t sign a contract and
put a note on it to clarify it or to limit its scope. That is invalid. Note or not the pope signed heresy into
Church dogma.
The
records give no evidence that Liberius was tortured
to make the statement. Pope Fiction page
142-143 confesses that there is evidence that Liberius
was released for signing and evidence that he was released just because it was
seen that trying to force him was a waste of time. He had been exiled for two years over his
belief in the divinity of Jesus which would have toughened him up. Liberius would have
said if he had been compelled but he never did.
When speculation has to be employed to defend papal infallibility the
doctrine is on shaky ground. If he was
really forced then why wasn’t he forced to sign the clearly Arian formula?
Both St
Sulpicius and Pope Athanasius
1 denied that Liberius gave in and signed. But the fact is there was a creed with the
pope’s signature on it and if anybody was going to forge why didn’t they put
his name on the heretical creed rather than on the ambiguous one?
He
probably did sign the statement for he never denied signing it though he got
much criticism for signing it. Some of
the Catholics would have lied and said he didn’t anyway, for the sake of the
doctrine of Jesus’ divinity. And these
days most Catholics say we do not know what he signed or if he signed anything.
The
statement was intended for the whole Church which was nearly wholly Arian at
the time. If the Arians knew of papal
infallibility or believed that the pope was the rock of the Church of the true
faith and it was built on him then they had to get him to freely sign it
meaning that Arianism was the true Church if the
promises of Christ to keep the Church on earth forever were true. They would have done this even if the pope
was only a bishop with great influence.
Also, despite what the Church says (Question 403, Radio Replies 3),
if Liberius signed the document it was meant to
instruct the whole Church which fulfils the criteria for papal infallibility. But he was not infallible so no pope is.
Pope
Fiction says the pope most probably didn’t sign the statement for the emperor
would have boasted about it and he didn’t.
But what would he have to boast about if he forced him to sign it or if
the statement was ambiguous and could be accepted by an Arian or a
Catholic? Liberius
knew that his signing the statement would mean supporting the Arian cause for
he wouldn’t have been asked to sign it otherwise. There can be no doubt that Liberius was teaching Arianism by
signing it for it is not the ambiguous wording of the statement that counts but
its interpretation. Another reason why
the emperor might not have boasted was because Liberius
was just a top bishop of the Church and was not considered to be the infallible
rock the Church was built on. There is
no reason to believe that there was a modern kind of pope in those days.
We know
from Liberius’ own letters which are preserved by St
Hilary of Potiers that he admitted he was a heretic
(page XV, Roman Catholic Claims).
It is also known that Liberius opposed St Athanasius for upholding the Nicene Creed though it was
heresy for him to oppose him (page 127, A Handbook on the Papacy). The Roman Church responds by dismissing the
letters as fakes but even many of its own scholars admit their authenticity
(ibid, page 127).
Pope Vigilius officially taught and supported heresy against the
orthodox doctrine that Jesus is fully God and fully man in one person (page 149,
Pope Fiction). He is said to have
been a fake pope at that time for he deposed a pope and took his place (page
124, Reasons for Hope).
The real pope excommunicated Vigilius. We read in Reasons for Hope page 124 that this pope, Silverus,
was the only member of the Catholic Church for all the rest had apostatised to Vigilius! Jesus
founded an astounding religion if it gets into messes like this! Later, Vigilius was
validly elected pope two years following the appalling death of Silverus who was later proclaimed a saint. The election was bizarre. Reasons
for Hope says that the electors couldn’t choose another pope because he
would go the same way as Silverus so they were forced
to elect Vigilius (page 125). What is obvious from this is that they held
the election not out of a desire to pick a successor for Silverus
but to get rid of the appalling Vigilius but they
found it wasn’t possible because of political blackmail so they were forced to
elect Vigilius.
Another thing that is obvious is that the election contradicts the
Catholic doctrine that if force happens the election
is invalid but still they consider Vigilius a true
pope probably because the Church accepted him at the time.
The
Catholic reasoning is that when Vigilius sealed the
heresy with his approval he was a false pope because no power on earth can
depose a true pope so Silverus was the true
pope. This would mean that Vigilius teaching such heresy officially and approving of
it for the whole Church would not affect papal infallibility. Silverus had no
supporters at all when he was deposed (page 124, Reasons for Hope). Silverus was kidnapped and taken away on a ship when Vigilius deposed him and never seen again. But how could you believe in papal
infallibility when a man considered by the entire Church to be a real pope
leads the Church astray? Isn’t that the
gates of hell winning over the Church despite the Catholic interpretation of
Jesus’ words to Peter that you are Peter and on this rock I will build my
Church and the gates of Hell will not prevail against it? If the gates can do that then why be
confident that the pope cannot lead the Church into false doctrine?
A
Catholic would think Silverus resigned when the whole
Church left him. Would the Holy Spirit
let people leave a true pope? The pope
is a mark that shows where the true Catholic Church is to be found. Catholics say today that the idea of the
visibility of the Church is so important that even if a papal election was
fiddled and invalid the acceptance by the Church of the man presented as the
true pope would validate him as the real pope.
Otherwise you would have the case of the true Church not having the mark
of the true Church the pope. We have no
evidence that Silverus did or didn’t resign. If he had resigned Vigilius
didn’t need to tell anybody for he had all the support he wanted. That Silverus
didn’t resign rather than be forced out of the papacy in such an undignified
way is just something the Church assumes because if he did resign then Vigilius was never an antipope and the Church doesn’t want
to admit that. As for
deposing, the Church at the time accepted it as valid when the pope was thought
to depose himself if he fell into heresy. That is obvious from the eager acceptance Vigilius got from the whole Church. Strictly speaking Vigilius
could never say he deposed the pope but that the pope deposed himself by
heresy. He had to say something to
justify getting rid of Silverus and taking his place
as pope the next day. Vigilius was probably a real pope from the start.
It is
argued that Vigilius knew too little about theology
to manage to make an infallible dogma out of his heresy. So, if he tried to be infallible he was
not. But this is just pure Catholic
craftiness for he did not need to be an expert in theology to be able to back
up the heresy. All he needed to know was
that Jesus was fully God and was also fully man which is a mystery so there is
nothing to be learned about it anyway.
Also the Church has no rules or guidelines about how much research a
pope needs to do or how much information he needs to be able to exercise
infallibility.
Vigilius issued a Constitutum which was addressed to the whole Church and to
all the bishops that if anybody contradicted the Three Chapters they were
refuted by the authority of the apostolic see which was given by the grace of
God (page 187, A Handbook on the Papacy). The Three Chapters taught heresy. This statement was addressed to the whole
Church and it says that its being made is sufficient refutation of attacks on
the Three Chapters because it is made with full authority given from God. If that is not an infallible statement then
what is? It is certain that when he
condemned as true pope, in a decree called the Judicatum,
the orthodoxy of the ecumenical Council of Chalcedon
that he intended to use his full authority which would include infallibility if
he had it (page 56, Reason and Belief).
He also defied the Council of Constantinople which took place
later. If you use the popes
alleged lack of research or bad reasoning as an excuse for rejecting doctrines
he proclaims infallible then what good is infallibility?
And how
could a person who had separated himself from the Church by heresy and by
harming a pope and becoming an antipope that led the whole Church into schism
against the true pope
become a true pope later?
This question doesn’t seem to perturb Catholics who believe that Vigilius was guilty of these sins. It was believed up until the time of Pius XII
that a heretic couldn’t become pope except in outward appearances. That was the law until the pope changed it.
Vigilius when he
was considered a valid pope after the death of Silverus
kept changing his mind about the heretics he condemned. He flipped flopped with official
condemnations. The Church assumes
without documentation from anyone involved at first hand or anybody that he was
pressured into harming Church teaching this way (Pope Fiction page 150). If
he was really infallible the Lord God would make sure this could be clarified
and not only clarified but proven but when it wasn’t we can be sure that Viligius could have misled the Church with his
condemnations. It’s
evidence not guesses we need.
Pope Zozimus (417-418) approved of Pelagius a heretical teacher
until Augustine put him right. Then he
condemned the heretic. The Church
explains, “Zozimus was only sanctioning the orthodox
parts of the heretic’s doctrine and was ignorant of the unorthodoxy. Zozimus never
opposed Roman dogma intentionally. The
doctrine of infallibility says the pope can err like that.” But he must have known something. He had to have known that Pelagius was a
controversial figure. And to say that
when a pope approves of heresy that it is only the orthodox parts of the heresy
that he approves of makes the idea of papal infallibility unfalsifiable
and ultimately unconvincing.
Pope Paul V
and Urban VIII condemned the teaching of Galileo that the sun does not move and
the earth revolves around it. They
thought it was contradictory to the Bible so the Catholic Church brushes that
blunder off and says that the Church is not infallible in matters of science
and never thought it was. The doctrine
of the virgin birth and the six days of creation is scientific material but
also doctrinal. Don’t say then that the
attack on Galileo’s statements was simply scientific. The popes condemned through the Holy Office
and the Index. The Church says an
infallible statement is made directly to the Church unlike these popes. But surely if the pope was dying and wished
to make an infallible statement it would be valid though relayed through the
authorities under him? It is certain the
popes wanted the whole Church to hear and heed their decree of condemnation.
You
must read chapter 12 of Vicars of Christ.
There you can find a quote from Adrian VI in 1523 who declared that
many popes were heretics. He named John
XXII as one. John XXII implicitly denied
that the saints could intercede for the living when he denied that anybody goes
to Hell or Heaven until the final judgement.
Pope
Leo X who died in 1521 stated that all papal bulls were infallible (page 271, Handbook
to the Controversy with
Pope Sixtus V (1585-1590) rewrote the Bible and stated that the
result was to be unquestioned and regarded as infallible by the fullness of his
apostolic authority in his name and in the name of the Church (page 304, Vicars
of Christ). St Robert Bellarmine covered up the scandal that ensued with this
polluted Bible for the sake of making sure the pope did not lose his
credibility (page 309). Some saint.
Pope
Fiction admits that the pope was arrogant and believed that he had the competence
to revise the Bible and give out an accurate translation (page 247). Undoubtedly, the pope was certain that God
would inspire him to do the revision.
The pope believed he was infallible.
In 1590
he showed his new Bible to the cardinals and it was promptly found to be a
disgrace. The book also confesses that Sixtus V fulfilled all the conditions for making the pope
infallible laid out by
Who in
their right mind would say the pope is infallible when he researches and comes
to a conclusion to be held binding on the Church but only when he gets the
chance to reveal it? When Pius IX
infallibly declared the Immaculate Conception of Mary in
Pope
Fiction tells us that the useless Sixtine Bible that
the pope had “fixed” but which in fact was only a little better than the
dreadful first attempt was given to the cardinals with the Bull printed in full
saying the Bible was an infallible unerring translation of the original
scriptures and was invested by the fullness of papal apostolic authority (page
250-251).
The
Church says that because Sixtus died and didn’t get
the chance to do the official public launch of the Bible and the Bull it
doesn’t disprove papal infallibility. It
does simply because when the pope promulgates a doctrine it doesn’t become
infallible there and then. He
promulgates it because the Holy Spirit led him in his research to see that it
is infallible. To say a doctrine does
become infallible when taught publicly and not before is to say that
infallibility must be the same as divine inspiration. It denies the official Catholic teaching that
infallibility is only protection from drawing the wrong conclusion while
undertaking research and not inspiration.
Catholic teaching says papal infallibility must be exercised before he
reveals his conclusion. His revealing is
only to do with revealing what his infallibility has already led him to
conclude.
The
pope did officially promulgate the Bible when he gave it and the Bull to the
cardinals for the cardinals are next in charge of the
Church and the future pope would be among them.
He gave them the Bull. He gave
them the final product. All he had left
to do was carry out a further official promulgation.
Sixtus intended to
have the Bull put on the door of St John Lateran and
Are we
to believe that Sixtus V who wrote the Bull falsely
declaring his pathetic Bible infallible was not infallible until the Bulls were
put up by his assistants and what if they threw them away and poisoned the
pope? Doesn’t his intention to
promulgate stand for anything? The Bull
is promulgated the moment anybody gets it.
If nobody knows about the promulgation that isn’t the pope’s fault and
an infallible teaching has still taken place.
Pope
Fiction wants us to believe that the cardinals getting the
Bible and the Bull was not a promulgation and putting a paper on two
doors was! That is ridiculous.
Pope Pius IX had his infallible declaration of the Immaculate Conception written weeks before he proclaimed the dogma. When he proclaimed all he did was read it out. There is absolutely no honesty or commonsense in Catholic apologists doing what Pope Fiction does in pretending that a papal declaration is not infallible until its put out. God can't make the declaration infallible or preserved from error when it is put out. It is not the putting out that makes it infallible. It has to be infallible or correct in itself. If the decree is wrong then is it made infallible just by being put out? The question is preposterous. The declaration needs to be put out for it is infallible and it can't be made infallible by being made public.
Another tactic used by Catholic defenders of the faith is to say that Sixtus V was infallible but only in matters of faith and morals and not in what Bible was correctly translated or not or misleading or not (page 37, Catholicism and Fundamentalism). But in that case, the Church would have no authority to say what books should be listed as God's word. It would have no authority to say that the versions it has now are the word of God. The Church claims such powers and claims to have infallibly declared what books belong to the Bible and that these books are written by God as they are now and have no error. That cannot be done unless the Church infallibly has the power to correct the text or see that it is correct. The Church excommunicates anybody who argues that the books that the Church claims are the word of God are corrupt. It considers it heresy to hold that the books are God's word but after God wrote them they were tampered with and so we can't depend on them. The Church has proclaimed an infallible interpretation for some Bible texts. The Church decreed that the proper interpretation of a verse where Jesus says that a man must be born of water and the spirit before he can enter the kingdom of God is that baptism in water is a sacrament and necessary for salvation and forgiveness of sin. If the Church can interpret texts infallibly that by implication is infallibly declaring that the text is God's word and worded as God wants it worded. The Church then must have the power to fix the Bible if it is corrupted. The defenders of the faith lie to defend the doctrine of papal infallibility. They pretend to believe things they don't.
Sixtus V is the
perfect disproof of papal infallibility.
Pope Honorius is used as proof of papal fallibility for he allegedly taught the Monothelite heresy in his letter to Sergius, who was Patriarch of Constantinople. This doctrine said that Jesus had just one will while Catholic doctrine said that Jesus had two, a human and a divine will. Sergius subscribed to the heresy.
Honorius wrote a letter to Sergius which still exists. A second letter exists but only in fragments (page 30, The Church in the Christian Roman Empire, Studies in Comparative Religion, Rev Phillip Hughes, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1964).
Catholics
use one of these lies to cover up the fact that Honorius
is proof that papal infallibility is one of
# Lie
One, Honorius was orthodox but just wrote
ambiguously. He was misunderstood (page
159, Pope Fiction).
They
say Honorius wrote in such a way that it could have
been understood in an orthodox or Monothelite way
which gave rise to the accusation of heresy.
Monothelites said that Jesus had one
will. But a person believing he has two
can say that he has one in the sense that the two wills are in union and are
one. Pope Fiction says that Sergius was a Monothelite. It says that Honorius
was ambiguous and condemned the idea that there are two operations or wills in
Christ. But it fobs us off by saying
that he meant to condemn the idea of two wills in Christ going against one
another. Then why didn’t he write that? Why write that he condemned the two
wills? He knew he could write two
contrary wills and would have done that had he meant that. The pope condemned the idea of one operation
or will in Christ as well but he agreed with it. The reason he condemned the one and two will
ideas was because he was declaring the issue unimportant and something people
could make up their minds about. This is
heresy for the Church says it is important to have the right doctrine to
safeguard the divinity and full humanity of Jesus Christ.
The
pope knew that ambiguity in papal bulls had to be avoided at all costs. He meant what he wrote.
Some
would say that if Honorius was a heretic we cannot
prove it and if he failed to condemn the heresy of Sergius
that was a human error based on his misunderstanding and lack of proper
information. They tell us that the
doctrine of infallibility says that the pope is only infallible when he knows
what he is doing unlike Honorius. But if you write a letter to a heretic in
which you seem to agree with him and you with all the help you have at hand and
you write more than one letter in which you do the same thing it is obvious the
Catholics who say we cannot prove anything are lying. The letters were written to express the truth
according to Honorius and when he didn’t do that he
obviously agreed with Sergius.
Pope
Fiction admits that Honorius forbade the doctrine
that Jesus had two wills which is the accepted doctrine of the Christian faith
but adds that he forbade the one will doctrine as well
(page 161). So it confesses that he
forbade the orthodox doctrine that Jesus had two wills. The pope was only saying then that it
shouldn’t be discussed. So Pope Fiction
says then that his sin was not in teaching heresy but in refusing to settle the
dispute.
So if
Pope Fiction is right, he made a dogma that either of the two doctrines was acceptable. This is a fact that the book refuses to face.
Honorius freely
refused to condemn the one will doctrine though he could have. This tells us a lot. Though he refused to
settle the dispute it is clear that he agreed that Jesus had only one will.
# Lie
Two, Honorius was not writing as pope but as a
private theologian so he was not infallible but erred. Catholics teach that the pope can sin and
make mistakes but cannot err when he uses his infallibility which Honorius was not using.
The pope can err as a private theologian. Pope Fiction page 162 however admits that his
letter was official. He was trying to
answer a query for Sergius and his part of the Church
which was a big part for the Constantinople Patriarch was a major leader in the
Church. He was not teaching as a private
theologian.
The
Church says that Honorius just thought it didn’t
matter if Jesus had one will or two.
“And Honorius, so far from pronouncing an
infallible opinion in the Monothelite controversy,
was ‘quite extraordinarily not’ (as Gore used to say) pronouncing a decision at
all. To the best of his human wisdom, he
thought the controversy ought to be left unsettled, for the greater peace of
the Church. In fact, he was an inopportunist. We,
wise after the event, say that he was wrong.
But nobody, I think, has ever claimed that the Pope is infallible in
not defining a doctrine” (Difficulties, page 126-7). But in fact Honorius
was making a dogma of the doctrine that we can believe that Jesus had one will
or the orthodox doctrine that he had two.
He proclaimed this to the whole Church for in his letter he told Sergius but this is heresy too. Honorius ignored
those who wrote to him trying to correct him and in response to them he called
his dogma a dogma of the Church meaning an infallible teaching to be accepted
by the whole Church and addressed to the whole Church so again papal
infallibility is refuted (page 196, A Handbook on the Papacy).
Honorius used the
words, “We confess,” which means the Church and faith he is speaking for and
himself meaning the right Church were declaring these things about Jesus that
he had one will. He did make a decision
and it agreed with that of Sergius. He agreed with the heresy of Sergius.
Honorius was posthumously condemned by the Sixth General Council
which took place in
Leo wrote that he accepted the Sixth Session
which condemned Honorius as a heretic. A heretical Church man to spread his heresy
must first permit the heresy so the quote does not support the Catholic cause.
Pope Leo II placed Honorius under the deepest
excommunication of the Church the one that makes one “aeterna
damnatione mulctati”. Leo accused Honorius
of being a traitor who subverted the faith as did the Sixth Council of
The Council declared, “Having learned that
the letters of Honorius are in total disagreement
with the doctrines of the apostles and the definitions of the sacred councils
and of all the fathers that are approved and that on the contrary they lean to
the false teachings of the heretics we absolutely reject and condemn these
letters. They are poison for the
soul. We also state that Honorius who was once pope of the old Rome had also been
rejected from God’s holy Church and is being accursed on account of the letters
he sent to Sergius and in which he accepted Sergius’s beliefs in all things and reaffirmed his unholy
doctrines”.
The Church today says that Leo II clarified
this condemnation which was never approved by any pope (page 160, Pope Fiction)
to say that Honorius was excommunicated and condemned
for neglect not heresy. Leo is quoted as
writing that Honorius didn’t do his job but fostered
heresy by negligence (ibid page 160).
But the Church is unable to quote anything that proves that Leo meant
that when Honorius
The Church should agree with the original
decree for it says ecumenical councils make binding decisions under the help of
infallibility. Now would how could the
Church have the right to excommunicate and condemn any dead pope for
neglect? Would it do such a thing, of
course not! Any pope can be accused of
criminal neglect in many things. The
Church is making out that Leo II was a lying rascal. Ecumenical councils and popes are infallible
and here we have a pope denying that ecumenical councils are infallible and
even correcting their decisions after they were made. Not even an infallible pope can have that
right. The infallible cannot correct the
infallible and if the Church isn’t infallible how can the pope be? If the council was right to excommunicate and
condemn the pope as even Leo says though he denied Honorius
was a heretic how can the pope really be the head of the Church and if the pope
is not the head how can he be infallible?
The popes then didn’t think they were the rocks the Church was built on
and infallible. Nobody did.
Suppose Honorius
was not expelled for heresy but for agreeing with Sergius,
Patriarch of Constantinople, that the orthodox Christians and the heretics who
believed that Jesus had only one will should stop quarrelling and get on with
it. Catholics think this gets them off
the hook because he did not define anything.
But he defined that the Church can hold faith with heretics. It is not good enough to say that he was not
declaring to the whole Church for he only wrote to Sergius. He was making a decision for the whole Church
to embrace heretics as brothers for his decision makes no sense if it was not
directed to the whole Church.
Honorius made a decision to bind the Church and said it was the
true faith so he was a true example of papal fallibility. He fulfilled all the conditions for making an
infallible statement that were spelled out at
# Lie Three, Honorius didn't understand the dispute and thought it was not about how Jesus as God could have God's will and as man could have a separate human will but about what Jesus willed to do (page 30, The Church in the Christian Roman Empire, Studies in Comparative Religion, Rev Phillip Hughes, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1964). The pope said that when Jesus willed to do something the divine faculty of the will and the human faculty of the will agreed and so they were one will in the sense that they were the one intention. Thus he ended up being misunderstood and accused of saying Jesus didn't have a separate divine will faculty and a human will faculty but just had one faculty.
So the pope is said to have thought that the Lord Jesus had a divine will and a human will and the two wills were separate faculties but they were one will in the sense that they agreed together. The heretics were saying there was no separate human and divine will but only one will in Jesus as a faculty. All sides agreed that Jesus' divine side and human side were in agreement when he willed to do something.
There is no way the pope could have misunderstood such a simple point. His knowing that the heretics were not saying there was conflict of wills in Jesus when he did something proves that.
Conclusion
The errors and heresies of the popes prove that the popes did attempt to lead the Church astray while claiming to be infallible and that therefore papal infallibility is just another Roman Catholic lie.
BOOKS CONSULTED
A CONCISE HISTORY OF THE
A
HANDBOOK ON THE PAPACY, William Shaw Kerr, Marshall Morgan & Scott,
A WOMAN
RIDES THE BEAST, Dave Hunt Harvest House Eugene Oregon 1994
ALL ONE
BODY – WHY DON’T WE AGREE? Erwin W Lutzer,
ANTICHRIST
IS HE HERE OR IS HE TO COME? Protestant
Truth Society,
APOLOGIA
PRO VITA SUA, John Henry Newman (Cardinal),
Everyman’s Library,
BELIEVING
IN GOD, PJ McGrath,
BURNING
TRUTHS, Basil Morahan, Western People Printing, Ballina, 1993
CATHOLICISM
AND CHRISTIANITY, Cecil John Cadoux, George Allen
& Unwin Ltd, 1928
CATHOLICISM
AND FUNDAMENTALISM, Karl Keating, Ignatius Press,
CHRISTIAN
ORDER Number 12 Vol 35 Fr Paul Crane
DAWN OR TWILIGHT?
HM Carson, IVP, Leicester, 1976
DIFFICULTIES,
Mgr Ronald Knox and Sir Arnold Lunn, Eyre & Spottiswoode,
ENCOUNTERS
OF THE FOURTH KIND, Dr RJ Hymers, Bible Voice, Inc,
FROM
FUTURIST OR HISTORICIST? Basil C Mowll, Protestant Truth
Society,
HANDBOOK TO THE CONTROVERSY WITH
HANS
KUNG HIS WORK AND HIS WAY, Hermann Haring and Karl-Josef Kuschel,
Fount-Collins,
HITLER’S
POPE, THE SECRET HISTORY OF PIUS XII, John Cornwell, Viking,
HOW
SURE ARE THE FOUNDATIONS? Colin Badger,
Wayside
INFALLIBILITY
IN THE CHURCH, Patrick Crowley, CTS,
INFALLIBLE? Hans Kung, Collins,
IS THE
PAPACY PREDICTED BY
LECTURES
AND REPLIES, Thomas Carr, Archbishop of Melbourne,
NO
LIONS IN THE HIERARCHY, Fr Joseph Dunn, Columba
Press,
PAPAL SIN, STRUCTURES OF DECEIT, Garry Wills, Darton Longman and Todd, London, 2000
PETER
AND THE OTHERS, Rev FH Kinch
MA, Nelson & Knox Ltd,
POPE FICTION, Patrick Madrid, Basilica Press,
PUTTING
AWAY CHILDISH THINGS, Uta Ranke-Heinemann,
HarperCollins,
REASON
AND BELIEF, Brand Blanschard, George Allen & Unwin Ltd,
REASONS
FOR HOPE, Editor Jeffrey A Mirus,
ROMAN
CATHOLIC CLAIMS, Charles Gore MA, Longmans,
ROMAN
CATHOLIC OBJECTIONS ANSWERED, Rev H O Lindsay, John T Drought Ltd,
ROMAN
CATHOLICISM,
SECRETS
OF ROMANISM, Joseph Zacchello, Loizeaux
Brothers,
ST
PETER AND
THE CHURCH
AND INFALLIBILITY, B C Butler, The Catholic Book Club,
THE CHURCH IN THE CHRISTIAN ROMAN EMPIRE, Studies in Comparative Religion, Rev Phillip Hughes, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1964
THE
EARLY CHURCH, Henry Chadwick, Pelican, Middlesex, 1987
THE
LATE GREAT PLANET EARTH, Hal Lindsay,
THE
PAPACY IN PROPHECY! Christadelphian
Press,
THE
PAPACY ITS HISTORY AND DOGMAS, Leopold D E Smith, Protestant Truth Society,
THE PETRINE CLAIMS OF ROME, Canon JE Oulton DD, John T Drought Ltd,
THE
PRIMITIVE FAITH AND ROMAN CATHOLIC DEVELOPMENTS, Rev John A Gregg, BD, APCK,
THE SHE-POPE, Peter
Stanford, William Hienemann, Random House,
THE
VATICAN PAPERS, Nino Lo
TRADITIONAL
DOCTRINES OF THE
VICARS
OF CHRIST, Peter de Rosa, Corgi,
WAS
PETER THE FIRST POPE? J Bredin, Evangelical Protestant Society,
WHATEVER
HAPPENED TO HEAVEN?, Dave Hunt, Harvest
House,
This
book is a goldmine for the person who wants to shake off the guilt of
disobeying the pope. It is liberty to
the slavery the pope wants to subject them to.
It is basically a collection of hard to come by official Church texts
that show that the popes did not always teach the same thing.
The
book proves that ecumenical councils regarded some popes as heretics and
excommunicated them (page 13). We are
informed that statements from the early Church that seem to indicate the bishop
of Rome is the head of the Church and keeps to the truth may have been forged
for in the mid-eighth century a lot of forging and interfering with texts by
copyists took place in order to help the papacy take over the Church (page
12). The book quotes the decree of the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that states that Pope John Paul II
made a statement that belongs to the faith and which is therefore without error
and irreformable and irreversible when he said the
Church had no authority to ordain women (page 17). The doctrine of St Thomas Aquinas and Pope
Innocent III that you should deny Christ if your conscience commands it but you
will still be damned for doing so is spelled out in this book (page 27). Very reasonable and kindly men these
two! Chapter 4 contains commands from the
popes who wanted heretics persecuted.
Innocent III said this was to be a perpetual law and that even the house
a heretic lived in was to be burned down.
Pius VI in 1791 condemned encouraging people to think for themselves and
St Pius X opposed the separation of Church and State in 1906. Benedict XIV forbade Jews and Christians to
live in the same cities in 1751 in his encyclical A Quo Primum
(page 71). Pius XI in Mortalium Annos in 1928 said that
Catholics cannot attend Protestant worship and unity can only happen if the
Protestants return to the true Church.
The papacy used all its power, secular and spiritual, to maintain the
practice of buying and selling slaves even if they were Catholics (page 88). The Holy Office of the evil Blessed Pope Pius
IX in 1866 stated that slavery was acceptable in divine and natural law and
should be (page 84).
One
omission in the book is that Pope John Paul II now forbids capital punishment
though tradition and the Bible command it.
Catholics say that he is not saying capital punishment is wrong full
stop but only that it is not necessary today and the Bible regulations are only
meant to be carried out if the Church runs the state which it does not. The capital laws of the Bible were never
necessary and God could not object to Christians using the state to kill people
their God wants dead like heretics, homosexuals and adulterers. For him to object now,
would be the same as saying he was wrong to go so far. If killing those people was right then, then
it is always right. And especially today
when we have tremendously better resources for establishing the guilt of a
felon than what existed in the days God demanded liberal executing by stoning
of certain kinds of “sinners”. Also when
he demanded death not by strangulation but by stoning – an exceptionally cruel
method – it shows God’s full and unhesitant approval of capital
punishment. It is not a necessary evil
but something DESIRABLE. The pope is
both condoning the crime of capital punishment and saying he does not – another
crime. The Catholic view that capital
punishment was encouraged by God to protect the state and its members is not
true because the Bible laws could have done that without commanding the killing
of those people and also because the Bible says these killings are
punishment. Now could they be punishment
if you need them to protect others? That
would not be punishment but self-defence.
The laws of the Bible had nothing to do with protecting but about
showing the people who was boss, God and about God getting his own back on
those who ignored his law.
THE WEB
Pope
John Paul II condemned as an immoral and traitorous and heretical pope
Here is
a site that shows how Catholic scholars lie and distort the facts about how
history disproves their religion
This
site exposes Catholic lies to cover up how the case of Pope Honorius
refutes infallibility
http://aomin.org/failuretodocument.html