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Saturday, July 30, 2011

Must the pope be Catholic?

You might imagine the pope is a paradigm-case of a high-profile Catholic. You might even assume it’s a job requirement that the pope be Roman Catholic. Presumably Richard Dawkins or John Piper lacks one of the necessary qualifications to assume the Pontificate.

But we live in a surprising world. You see, Dave Armstrong has raised the bar for who’s truly Catholic and who’s not.

But back to D'Souza. Why would I deny that he was a "high profile Catholic"? I do so based on his own report in the very article that Hays sent his readers to. He was never firmly in the Catholic camp to begin with...
Moreover, on his own More About Dinesh D'Souza page (from Rosey Grier's book of 1992), he stated that he was a "believing Catholic but a poorly practicing one."
Well, I think devoted partisans of either side think it is a very important question and business and issue (as Francis Beckwith himself noted in a critique article of D'Souza). The fact that D'Souza does not, plausibly gives some indication, I think, of his less than total commitment to theological maters of great importance.


Suppose we apply these criteria to some of the Renaissance popes. Were they real Roman Catholics? Well, to judge by Dave’s criteria, they clearly fell below the magic threshold.

So you don’t have to be Roman Catholic to be the Bishop of Rome. And that certainly widens and deepens the potential pool for the next conclave. Perhaps the Dali Lama or Bill Maher will be the next pope.

16 comments:

  1. Dave Armstrong's response made me wonder whether he was ever a Calvinist in the past and if he continues to preserve some Calvinist tendencies. That wouldn't help contribute to being a very good Catholic now would it?

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  2. I just stumbled across this blog so I really have no understanding about your argument here, but being a Catholic (former Evangelical) I have to admit that both of you are being unfair to the other's position. The fact is that no one ever truly knows what "knowledge" others have of a particular faith. I can say that I became Catholic after reading CS Lewis ironically enough, but I will also admit that I did not have the firmest foundation in Protestantism. Having gone to the Air Force Academy, my background was in science and engineering, not theology. As far as I can see, God doesn't care if you are an expert in theology, the Bible or really anything of natural reason. What he does care about is whether or not you follow the will of His Son, Jesus Christ. Personally, that led me to the Catholic Church, but I can imagine that if one is hung up on what people percieve as man-made "tradition" then perhaps one will find their true and honest calling in Protestantism. Personally, I think they're wrong, but just because I do doesn't mean I can prove it in a way using natural reason. Faith is the only language God uses to communicate his divine will. True, reason can get you to the steps of heaven, but only faith will allow you to step through the door.

    Anyways, that is my two sense. You seem like a man who hates Catholics for all the wrong reasons. I agree with Dave Armstrong on principle, but not on method. I think both of you could do with a little bit more understanding of the other side. Specifically, the mystery of faith.

    I leave you with St. Francis of Assisi. "Preach the gospel at all times, and when neccessary use words."

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  3. "I can say that I became Catholic after reading CS Lewis ironically enough, but I will also admit that I did not have the firmest foundation in Protestantism."

    Neither did C.S. Lewis.

    "Having gone to the Air Force Academy, my background was in science and engineering, not theology. ... Anyways, that is my two sense."

    heh

    "You seem like a man who hates Catholics for all the wrong reasons. "

    That is not a very charitable or correct interpretation of this post or Steve in general.

    "I agree with Dave Armstrong on principle, but not on method."

    You will notice that it is Mr. Armstrong's method that gets him in trouble quite often.

    But Rome is not shutting him up. One of the selling points of Rome is, in theory, it's top-down management style. But in practice, that top-down management Rome provides allows loose cannons like Armstrong to do what they do, even when what they do is technically in violation of canon law.

    -TurretinFan

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  4. I wasn't trying to be uncharitable, and I am sorry that CS Lewis and the US Air Force Academy offend you. I was merely trying to reveal that I did not go to a Bible school or Christian University, so I was not firmly grounded in any sort of theology, and saying that CS Lewis was not firmly grounded in Christian theology is more than a little disingenuous. Personally, I love reading John Calvin. "The Institutes," I must admit I have not finished it, is an incredible Christian work.

    As for Rome's authority, well, it's very hard for the small Roman Curia to police 1.2 billion Catholics, and Dave Armstrong is a lay Catholic, not a part of the Catholic “hierarchy” as you say. But I agree with you, it would be a great thing if Christians could work more closely together in this day and age and stop our harsh rhetoric. We are not each other's enemies; the enemies are those who deny God. Please, do not think that I meant to be uncharitable. I didn't mean to come across that way.

    My family is made up of great Evangelicals, and Lutherans. Since my family is from California, most of them attend Calvary Chapels. After quickly reviewing this blog, I would assume that their theology is pretty close to yours (I might be wrong). Either way, we have our disagreements, but we have plenty more agreements. We wish for our family to make it to heaven, and to live the best life that Jesus has planned for them down here, and so we debate, but in love. If we were to take that charitable attitude towards complete strangers, all of us, I think it would be of great profit for the Kingdom of God.

    - PAX CHRISTI

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  5. "Author,"

    Your comment has no appreciable connection with what I wrote in my post.

    To recap, Armstrong has backed himself into a dilemma.

    On the one hand he doesn't want to concede that D'Souza is a high-profile defector from Rome. So he tries to disqualify D'Souza by arguing that D'Souza was never a true blue Catholic in the first place.

    But by that criterion, a number of popes weren't really Catholic either.

    So this leads to a simple question: do you have to be Catholic to be pope?

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  6. Author said...

    "Anyways, that is my two sense. You seem like a man who hates Catholics for all the wrong reasons."

    I didn't say anything about "Catholics" in my post. I was simply addressing Armstrong's argument on its own terms.

    In addition, your accusation is rather odd. Are you suggesting it's okay to hate Catholics for all the right reasons?

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  7. "I am sorry that CS Lewis and the US Air Force Academy offend you"

    Don't worry. They do not.

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  8. Author said:

    I was merely trying to reveal that I did not go to a Bible school or Christian University, so I was not firmly grounded in any sort of theology

    I take it the main point is your admitted poor grounding in theology would seem to be correlated with why you left evangelicalism and embraced Catholicism. Yet your story isn't a total surprise or anything. In fact, many evangelicals who embrace Catholicism do so out of weaker theological backgrounds too.

    My family is made up of great Evangelicals, and Lutherans. Since my family is from California, most of them attend Calvary Chapels. After quickly reviewing this blog, I would assume that their theology is pretty close to yours (I might be wrong).

    I'm also from California. I'm quite familiar with Calvary Chapel. I've attended various branches on numerous occasions in the past. My friends and family who have as well. Anyway, inasmuch as Calvary Chapel has a stated theology, we're quite different. Broadly speaking most of us are either Reformed Christians or sympathetic to Reformed Christianity.

    Either way, we have our disagreements, but we have plenty more agreements.

    It's not so much the quantity of agreements or disagreements that's the problem. Rather it's the quality (as it were). Where we agree may be well and good. But where we disagree is hugely problematic with repercussions in how we live our lives and, perhaps, where we'll end up when we die. For example, official Catholic soteriology is fundamentally different to Reformed soteriology.

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  9. Your original post is a non sequitor in the usual analysis, because the Pope, in this particular instance, is "special".

    St. Robert Bellermine (whose works I wish were all translated from the Latin - he's got some really good counter soi-disant "Reformation" arguments that have been lost to modernity) wrote pretty definitively, in his role as a theologian: "The manifestly heretical pope ceases per se to be pope and head as he ceases per se to be a Christian and member of the Church, and therefore he can be judged and punished by the Church. This is the teaching of all the early Fathers." On the flip side, both Bellermine, as well as Ligouri, have suggested that we must never _presume_ that God has permitted a Pope to fall into heresy.

    The presumption must be the other way, until at least a subsequent Pope (via, for instance, an Ecclesaistical trial) or Ecumenical Council declares it has happened. "This opinion (that the Pope could not become an heretic) is probable and easily defended . . . Nonetheless, in view of the fact that this is not certain, and that the common opinion is the opposite one, it is useful to examine the solution to this question, within the hypothesis that the Pope can be an heretic."

    In the history of the Church, we have examples of horrific jackasses who became Pope - but none positively and formally taught manifest heresy, by the grace of God. (Even several of the Antipope controversies, the guys themselves weren't really heretics, or even particularly bad men: thankfully, those lamentable times are now largely over, with the College of Cardinals).

    Anyway, given the clear tradition of the Church's greatest theologians, I fail to see how what you said in any way answers Armstrong (who is usually good, and seems spot on in this instance, although in other cases I will grant I disagree with him, on occasion).

    D'Souza admitted multiple times to have had nothing of an adult Catholic faith, and found an (more) adult (generic) Christian faith via his wife. Had his wife been a good Catholic, chances are he would have become one too: it's sort of the way it works, which is one of the reasons why we've prohibited intermarriage, technically termed "disparity of cult", for which an indult from the norm must be gained (which is all too sadly commonly granted, to the detriment of souls, I think, since even the best of protestantism contains pernicious errors which can work to undermines domestic tranquility).

    (You know, I don't know the answer, but it occurs to me to ask what the rate of divorce for disparity of cult is compared to two-Catholic marriage. But, to resume...)

    Therefore, a "high profile Catholic" is not really an accurate assessment. He was a "high profile" person, and a baptized Catholic, but I fail to see why he should be considered any more Catholic than those CINO types manifestly outside of communion (probably in fact, but manifestly under Canon Law) due to public sin, who still claim Catholicism for some cultural or political reason. Would anybody really be surprised if Nancy Pelosi, Andrew Cuomo, or Joe Biden decided to start going to a abortion-supporting Episcopal Church? I certainly wouldn't - nobody in their right mind would think they have 'newly defected' from the Church: they left years ago. Just because the guy is a conservative doesn't mean he's a conservative because he's Catholic: it might be liberatarian tendencies, for instance.

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  10. In the history of the Church, we have examples of horrific jackasses who became Pope - but none positively and formally taught manifest heresy, by the grace of God.

    That's simply not true. Pope Zosimus reaffirmed twice, the heresy of Pelagius. And the church was only kept from error by the work of the Holy Spirit through the work of a secular emperor.

    And Liberius affirmed Arianism. I'm sure other examples are available, too.

    Peace.

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  11. It is very true that Pope Zosimus failed to recognize the heresy of Pelagius right away. That being said, it does not make him a heretic, nor discount the Dogma of Papal Infallibility. Personally, the better argument would be the only truly heretical pope, Pope Honorius I. In fact, he was condemned by an ecumenical council as such. However, Pope Leo overwrote the ecumenical council’s declaration and declared him merely a heretic in the fact that he neglected to teach the orthodox faith, not that he personally believed the heresy.

    However, a pope can, in fact, fall into error in his personal life. He is not an all-knowing oracle. However, the Holy Spirit will not allow him to teach error to the Universal Church. I know that sounds like a cop-out to most Protestants. It did to me when I first read it, but then I realized that if a pope had truly taught error by declaring something as true that was not, then it would be all over the web. The fact is that many popes have been suckered into allowing bad teachings to persist, either by failing to be diligent, or simply not understanding what was at stake. But this is not formal heresy in the positive sense.

    Take for an example Pope John Paul II kissing the Koran, something I personally feel was gravely wrong. It is wrong because it causes scandal by making some think that the Pope reveres the Koran as a holy book. However, JPII was not a heretic, nor did he believe the Koran was a holy book. But even if JPII did believe that, and retired to his room afterwards and told a fellow bishop he believed the Koran was a holy book that merely means that he has personally fallen into error. The Holy Spirit will NOT allow him to teach that, however. Hopefully, that sheds some light. If it doesn't, the question will always come down to if the Church in Rome does not have the truth, then who does? Is it the Baptists, the Lutherans, the Orthodox, the Anglicans? Maybe you believe that one of these churches does have the truth. Perhaps, you believe that one of them has understood the Bible perfectly correct in all their teachings. If so, at the very best that is simply your opinion, even if it is an educated one. How can any of us say our opinions are more right than the next man? Is it merely a game of who is the smartest? That sounds like Gnosticism to me.

    No, there has to be a clear Church in my mind. Yet, even if it turns out that I am wrong, how could I have possibly known different. I read the Bible, I read the Church Fathers, and honestly it sounds pretty Catholic to me. Maybe I am wrong, but I am at least honest in my assessment. If you have come to a different conclusion, then who is to say who is right?

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  12. "Pope Leo overwrote the ecumenical council’s declaration and declared him merely a heretic in the fact that he neglected to teach the orthodox faith, not that he personally believed the heresy."

    Where is the documentation for this?

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  13. J.R.P.,

    Your comments are tangential to my post. My argument wasn’t predicated on heretical popes. Was D’Souza a heretic? Was I analogizing from one heretic to another?

    No. That’s not the issue. The issue is how Armstrong set the bar to be a real Catholic. By his criteria, a number of popes (e.g. some of the Renaissance popes) weren’t even Catholic.

    That’s the dilemma he backed himself into. If, on the one hand, you raise the bar so high that you exclude D’Souza, then you also exclude a number of impious popes.

    But if you lower the bar, then D’Souza is a high-profile defector from Rome.

    However, another problem is the way laymen like you and Armstrong presume to define what makes a Catholic Catholic in a way that goes against the policy of the Magisterium. You don’t think Nancy Pelosi, Andrew Cuomo, and Joe Biden aren’t real Catholics, but they haven’t been sanctioned, much less excommunicated, by their religious superiors.

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  14. Author said...

    "If so, at the very best that is simply your opinion, even if it is an educated one. How can any of us say our opinions are more right than the next man?"

    So it's just your opinion that Roman Catholicism is the one true faith. And it's just Bin Laden's opinion that Islam is the one true faith.

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  15. AUTHOR SAID:

    "No, there has to be a clear Church in my mind."

    If your church is so clear, why do you and so many other lay Catholics turn to other lay Catholics (e.g. lay Catholic epologists) for moral and theological advice?

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  16. Is this where the Anti-Catholic pool party is? Hello!

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