OUR LADY OF FATIMA
CATHOLIC CHURCH
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OUR LADY OF FATIMA CATHOLIC CHURCH |
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The Tail that Wags the Dog.
March 19, 2007
One blogster posted these comments after Cardinal Castrillón's recent interview:
Always there is this fierce affirmation that the Second Vatican Council was the work of the Holy Spirit. This is the point which can admit of no denial, and it is precisely this point which cannot but move the Church deeper and deeper into a state of crisis. It is clear that the Society of St. Pius X cannot agree to such an assertion, for can the Holy Ghost be the Author of conflicting teachings? (...)
Can we expect the Society of Saint Pius X to overlook reality in order to embrace the principle of complementarity of new and old, to embrace a pluralism of spiritualities and theologies which would destroy Tradition simply to enjoy the benefits of canonical approval? One fears the Motu Proprio is simply the means to bring Tradition within the context of the Council and its novel teachings, to empty it of all meaning, to be the anti-thesis to the Concilar thesis, and thus to allow a novel synthesis of contradictory principles. That is not the meaning of development of doctrine in the traditional sense.
Thus despite all his good intentions, His Eminence Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos reveals the present dilemma for traditional Catholics, and demonstrates that for the Society of St. Pius X there can only be the way of submission to the divine Council. It is the same message that the Society has been given for thirty years, but with a new and attractive wrapper. The answer must be the same:
Just say NO to the N.O.
Clearly we have a major problem: the SSPX is the arbiter of all things traditional. In the next few days I will post an extensive critique of a wonderful essay in the latest Homiletic and Pastoral Review that takes the Trad movement apart for the grab-bag of kooks, cranks and know-it-alls that many have become. There is a healthy Traditional Catholicism, and there is the cultist "private opinion" approach of Trads who seclectively pick and choose from what the Pope and his hierarchy say and do.
Okay - Ecumenical Councils - AGAIN !!!! What does the CHURCH teach ? (And by "Church" we do not mean the SSPX). The theology manuals:
MYTH
1/ Vatican II was an ecumenical council and taught errors such that the
universal body of bishops with a few exceptions lost the Catholic Faith.
Bishop Vincent Gasser
(Expert Theologian at Vatican I)
“Further, we do not separate the Pope
infallibly defining from the co-operation and concourse of the Church, at any
rate in this sense, that we do not exclude such co-operation and such concourse
of the Church. The end is the preservation of truth in the Church, generally
when some controversy arises, and some question is referred to the Holy See for
settlement. Here we do not exclude the co-operation of the Church, because the
Pope's infallibility does not come to him by way of inspiration or revelation,
but by way of divine assistance. Hence the Pope is bound by his office and the
gravity of the matter to take the means apt for ascertaining the truth and
enouncing it; and such means are Councils, or the counsel of bishops, cardinals,
theologians, etc. These means will be different in different cases; and we ought
piously to believe that in the divine assistance given to Peter and his
successors by Christ there is included a promise as to the means necessary and
apt for making an infallible judgement by the Pope.
Finally,
we do not in the least separate the Pope from the consent of the Church,
provided that consent be not put as a condition, be it antecedent or consequent
consent. We cannot separate the Pope from the consent of the Church because this
consent can never be withheld. As we believe the Pope to be by divine assistance
infallible, we thereby believe also that the assent of the Church. can never be
wanting to these definitions; as it is not possible that the body of bishops
can be separated from their head, nor can the universal Church fail.”
The
Vatican Council Volume 2,
Dom Cuthbert Butler OSB, New York, 1930 pp 136 & 7
So
an Ecumenical council, since it consists in the gathering together of the
Church's bishops, cannot teach error because the universal Church cannot fail.
This idea is echoed in another work:
The
mission of the Holy Ghost is so to guide the leaders of the Church that they do
not fall into error, and with them the whole Church of Christ.
They are not, however, thereby in the smallest degree released from their duty
to think, and a General Council (at which is presented the teaching of the
Church as a whole) does not make its decisions at random, as might some Delphic
oracle, nor work in a sort of trance. The preparations for such a Council follow
a perfectly businesslike and matter-of-fact course.
Bishops from all over the world, accompanied by their
theologians, meet together, and only after much prayer, and study, and
discussion, do they come, under the guidance of the Pope, to some final
conclusion: that is to say to a considered judgment of the Church as a whole.
On
such an occasion one may be infallibly assured of the presence of the Holy
Ghost, since otherwise it would be possible for the entire Church to fall into
error.
When reached, such a final conclusion, which is usually expressed in a short,
clear formula, is called a dogma.
A
declaration of this kind is never a matter of surprise to the Faithful for, as
has already been said, the germ of every dogma of the Church is already
contained in divine Revelation. Thus a newly formulated dogma has necessarily
already been a matter of general belief within the Church. It is however
possible, of course, that some people still had an open mind upon the subject;
but, after a solemn pronouncement of this kind by the Pope, either alone or in
conclave with the bishops, every doubt is removed. Should anyone, after such a
formal statement, still obstinately and against his better judgment, continue to
deny the truth of that dogma, he would be called a heretic and place himself
outside the communion of the Faithful.
The
Triptych of the Kingdom - A Handbook of the Catholic Faith
Dr. S.G.M.
Van Doornik, Rev. S. Jelsma, Rev. A. Van de Lisdonk,
Glasgow 1954, p 122
Indeed another great theologian
makes a rather similar observation:
205 PROPOSITION. The college of bishops, whether
gathered in an ecumenical council, or dispersed throughout the world but morally
united to the supreme pontiff, in its teaching on matters of faith and morals,
is infallible.
This
proposition is of faith.
In
the analysis of this proposition, keep in mind the principles laid down above
(see nos. 77-99) about the object, nature, and conditions of infallibility.
The
first part of this proposition states that the college of bishops is endowed
with the charism of infallibility when it is assembled together somewhere in an
ecumenical council. What is required to constitute an ecumenical council will be
explained in detail below (no. 207). Here we emphasize simply one point: there
cannot be an ecumenical council without the consent and cooperation of the
supreme pontiff (CIC 222).
The
second part of the proposition states that the college of bishops is also
endowed with infallibility when dispersed throughout the world, but morally
united with the Roman pontiff. In other words, when the individual bishops,
residing in their home dioceses, unanimously propose the same doctrine as the
pope and impose that doctrine in unqualified fashion, they are infallible.
The
doctrinal agreement of the bishops dispersed throughout the world can be
discerned in a variety of ways: for example, from the catechisms they allow to
be published for the instruction of the faithful; from the pastoral instructions
the bishops issue to oppose some erroneous doctrine which is beginning to
spread; from the decrees of local councils held in various parts of the world;
from the fact that a given doctrine is normally preached throughout the entire
Catholic world in sermons to the people, or is found regularly in prayerbooks
possessing episcopal approbation, and so forth.
It
hardly needs stating that the unanimity of the bishops does not have to be
mathematically universal, as though the dissent of one or two bishops would
cripple the teaching power of the rest of the episcopal college. What suffices
is a morally universal unanimity which in most instances will not be difficult
to determine, even though it is impossible to fix mathematically the minimum
requirements for such unanimity. On the other hand, no matter how unanimous the
agreement of bishops might conceivably be, such unanimity would never suffice
for infallibility if the Roman pontiff were to be in opposition to it. We
deliberately use the phrase, "might conceivably be," because the more
probable opinion of theologians maintains that factually it could never happen
that a majority of the bishops would depart from the doctrine of the pope.
Even
though the proposition as laid down above has never been explicitly defined, it
is a dogma of faith in both its parts. For ecumenical councils have really been proclaiming their own
infallibility every time they exercised it; and they have exercised it every
time they have handed down a definitive decree condemning heresies. As for the
second part of the proposition, the infallibility of the episcopal college
dispersed throughout the world was implicitly asserted by the Vatican Council
when it stated: «By divine and Catholic faith must be believed all those
matters which are contained in the written or handed-down word of God and which
are proposed by the Church to be believed as divinely revealed, whether she does
so by a solemn judgment or by her ordinary and universal magisterium" (DB
1792).
Proof:
Proof
of the proposition is contained in all the arguments given previously (no. 79
ff.) to prove the infallibility of the Church's magisterium; for the magisterium
of the Church, viewed concretely, is the body of the bishops united to their
head.
The following
three brief theological arguments will pinpoint the reasons why the Catholic
episcopate, when united to the pope, is endowed with infallibility in teaching
matters on faith and morals. Although these arguments speak formally of an «ecumenical
council," they are equally applicable to the college of bishops dispersed
throughout the world.
1.
It has been proven: (a) Christ instituted an infallible magisterium in the
apostolic college; (b) this magisterium was to be perpetual or continued in the
legitimate successors of the apostles; (c)
the apostolic college is continued by the episcopal college; (d) but an
ecumenical council is the episcopal college together with its head. Consequently
we have present in an ecumenical council the infallible magisterium instituted
by Christ.
2.
If the teaching Church in an ecumenical council could fall into error, the
universal Church would also err in believing. But the universal Church cannot
err in believing, otherwise (contrary to the promise of Christ), "the gates
of hell would prevail against her."
3.
If an ecumenical council were to err, so too would the pope speaking ex
cathedra. But the pope when speaking ex cathedra cannot err, as was previously
demonstrated. The conclusion is clear.
First
of all, then, the Roman Catholic episcopate exercises infallibility when
assembled in conciliar fashion, for a definition by an ecumenical council is the
clearest and most solemn way in which the magisterium instituted by Christ can
exercise its prerogative. That is why St. Athanasius stated in reference to a
decree of the Council of Nicaea: "The word of the Lord expressed through
the ecumenical Council of Nicaea will remain forever" (Epistula ad Afros
2); and St. Gregory the Great stated: "For just as I accept and venerate
the four books of the Holy Gospel, so, too, do I accept and venerate the four
councils. And I likewise equally venerate a fifth council [i.e., should there be
a fifth council]" (Epistulae i. 25).
Second,
the Roman Catholic episcopate exercises its infallibility when dispersed
throughout the world. For Christ's promise of divine assistance to the
magisterium of the Church was given in unqualified fashion. Consequently there
are no grounds whatsoever to support the restriction of Christ's promise
exclusively to the extraordinary case of an ecumenical council. Indeed, in
saying: "And mark: I am with you at all times," Christ declared in
very plain terms that His help would primarily pertain to that daily and
ordinary exercise of teaching power carried on by the episcopacy dispersed
throughout the world.
Dogmatic Theologogy Vol II - Christ's Church
Monsignor G. Van Noort, Cork, 1958 pp 330-32
MYTH
2/ I am free to disagree with the decisions of an Ecumenical Council.
Bishop Josef Fessler
(Expert Theologian at Vatican I)
Bishop Fessler wrote that if an individual bishop (or several) has /
have a problem with what a Council teaches, it is his / their duty to study the
question and conform his / their mind to the Council. Now that was precisely
what happened at Vatican I. Some bishops disagreed with Papal Infallibility, but
once it was passed and ratified by the Pope it was Catholic teaching to which
intellectual assent was required.
If even up to this point in the last General
Congregation before the Solemn Session a bishop is not satisfied as to all his
difficulties, or if he thinks it better that the decision should not yet be
pronounced on such and such a doctrine, he may in the interval between the last
General Congregation and the Solemn Session acquire a full conviction on the
subject by discoursing with other theologians, by study of the subject, and by
prayer, and may thus overcome his last difficulties, and see that it is well
that the definition should be made. Nay, even if he cannot attain this full
conviction and insight into the matter by any exertion of his own, he will wait
for the decision of the Council with a calm trust in God, without himself taking
part in it, because up to this point he lacks the necessary certainty of
conviction. When, however, the Council by its decision puts an end to the
matter, then at length his Catholic conscience tells him plainly what he must
now think and what he must now do; for it is then that the Catholic bishop, whom
hitherto unsolved difficulties have kept from participation in the public
session and from the solemn voting, says: ‘Now it is undoubtedly certain that
this doctrine is revealed by God, and is therefore a portion of the Catholic
faith, and therefore I accept it on faith, and must now proclaim it to my clergy
and people as a doctrine of the Catholic Church. The difficulties which hitherto
made it hard for me to give my consent, and to the perfect solution of which I
have not even attained, must be capable of a solution; and so I shall honestly
busy myself with all the powers of my soul to find their solution for myself and
for those whose instruction God has confided to my care.’ Then those
bishops who in the last General Congregation voted with the non placets, only
because they really thought it was not a good thing, not necessary, not for the
benefit of souls in countries well known to them, and who for this reason
abstained from taking part in this decision, may, after the solemn decision, if
they think it advisable, represent to the faithful of their dioceses the
position which they previously adopted towards the doctrine, in order that their
conduct may not be misunderstood. But they must now themselves unhesitatingly
accept the doctrine which has been decided, and make it known to their people in
its true and proper bearings, without reserve, and in such manner that the
injurious effects which they themselves apprehended may be as much as possible
obviated and removed; for it is not permitted to the bishop, as the
divinely-appointed teacher of the clergy and people, to be silent about or to
withhold a doctrine of the Faith revealed by God, because he apprehends or
thinks that some may take offence of it. Nay, rather it is his business so
prudently to bring it about in the declaration of that doctrine, that its true
sense and import may hereafter be clearly represented, all erroneous
misrepresentations of it be excluded, the reasons for the decision of the
doctrine brought out plainly, and all objections to it zealously met and
answered.
The
True and the False Infallibility of the Popes, Dr. Joseph Fessler, London, 1875 pp. 19-21
Once a Council has decided a point, those Council Fathers with
difficulties must resolve them in favor of the Council and accept them.
MYTH
3/ Ecumenical Councils solve doctrinal problems they don’t cause
them !
