Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site bbncc5.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxn!ihnp4!qantel!dual!lll-crg!seismo!bbnccv!bbncc5!sdyer From: sdyer@bbncc5.UUCP (Steve Dyer) Newsgroups: net.religion.christian Subject: Re: Religious question Message-ID: <160@bbncc5.UUCP> Date: Sun, 8-Sep-85 01:15:43 EDT Article-I.D.: bbncc5.160 Posted: Sun Sep 8 01:15:43 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 11-Sep-85 04:56:31 EDT References: <144@graffiti.UUCP> <57@bbncc5.UUCP> <811@aluxe.UUCP> <2112@burdvax.UUCP> <3574@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman, Cambridge, MA Lines: 24 > It is true that there is no formal way to prevent a Pope > from creating a crazy doctrine out of whole cloth and declaring it > infallible. However none have yet done so, and the whole theory > behind Papal infallability is that they will not. Of course, the ongoing assumption is that the Spirit working through the Church would prevent anything like this from happening, but I have heard theological speculation which would indicate that the Pope can make an infallible pronouncement on faith and morals only insofaras the Church receives it positively. Which is to say that the pronouncement would be a confirmation of what is presently accepted by the faithful and is consonant with existing Church teaching. I am sure that if a Pope ever went bonkers, this speculation would become quickly become precedent. I should also mention (Chuck Hedrick knows this, but Tom Albrecht obviously does not) that there have only been two "infallible" pronouncements since the doctrine of Papal infallibility was formally codified, the Marian dogmas of the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption. Ordinary preaching by the Pope, even in the form of an encyclical, is not considered an infallible pronouncement. -- /Steve Dyer {harvard,seismo}!bbnccv!bbncc5!sdyer sdyer@bbncc5.ARPA