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To: ebb tide
My Catholic friends, isn't it clear that the Pope has just issued a wholly heretical document, at least if we will judge by the consistent Church doctrine of the past 2,000 years. So, if the Pope just fell into heresy, what does that do to the Catholic belief that God will keep the Church from heresy and that the Pope has a special charism in ensuring that Church doctrine is pure?

I really don't get how at this point one could say on the one hand that the Pope's officially promulgated doctrinal teachings are infallible, and on the other that the recent Exhortation is heretical.

Somebody please explain this to me.

I'm sure there must be an argument out there but I'm at a loss as to what it might be.

5 posted on 04/20/2016 7:45:04 PM PDT by Gluteus Maximus
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To: Gluteus Maximus
I really don't get how at this point one could say on the one hand that the Pope's officially promulgated doctrinal teachings are infallible, and on the other that the recent Exhortation is heretical.

Because papal utterances aren't automatically infallible. The popes aren't empowered by God to make things up as they go along. The duty of the Pope is to transmit and to guard the Deposit of Faith entrusted to us by Our Lord Jesus Christ, who is Head of His Church.

Vincentian Canon:

The famous threefold test of Catholic orthodoxy expressed by St. Vincent of Lérins (400-50) in his two memoranda (Comonitoria): "Care must especially be had that that be held which was believed everywhere [ubique], always [semper], and by all [ab omnibus]." By this triple norm of diffusion, endurance, and universality, a Christian can distinguish religious truth from error.

https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/dictionary/index.cfm?id=37106

6 posted on 04/20/2016 8:20:55 PM PDT by BlatherNaut
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