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From: sdyer@bbnccv.UUCP (Steve Dyer)
Newsgroups: net.religion.christian
Subject: RR's ignorance of Catholic teaching
Message-ID: <25@bbnccv.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 21-Feb-85 18:12:17 EST
Article-I.D.: bbnccv.25
Posted: Thu Feb 21 18:12:17 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 26-Feb-85 07:16:37 EST
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> Catholicism has come right out and
> claimed infallibility for their clerical leadership (though that's changing),
> but Protestant sects do much the same.

This kind of co-opting of Catholic teaching is about as meaningful (and no less
annoying) than those who take, say, Einstein's theory of Relativity and start
using it as a metaphor for society saying "everything is relative."  These
are statements based on ignorance mixed with a good deal of arrogance.

Rosen, admit it.  You know nothing about what Catholicism has claimed.
If you had, you would know that:

	Only the Pope can make an "infallible" statment, and only when
	explicity speaking "ex cathedra" on issues of faith and morals,
	and only when the assent of the Church at large is given.
	There have been very few "ex cathedra" pronouncements since the
	doctrine emerged out of tradition in the 19th century;
	only two, I believe.

	Priests and bishops cannot make "infallible" pronouncements.
	Popes, as a rule, do not.  None of the current controversial
	pronouncements, for example, the ban on artificial birth control,
	are "infallible."  It is highly questionable whether the Church
	at large would consider a pronouncement "infallible" which was
	out of line with current Catholic belief.  Indeed, it is the
	seriousness of such an "ex cathedra" pronouncement which reserves
	its use to well-accepted matters.  (So what is the "Assumption of
	the BVM" doing there?  I don't know!)  Such a statement is not
	a club to be held over believers, rather it is a tool to strengthen
	individual faith.

	Naturally, because a teaching has not been claimed "infallible"
	does not mean that Catholics are not expected to follow it.
-- 
/Steve Dyer
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