Preview: Saint J.H. Newman and Papal Infallibility (July 18, 1870)

On Monday, July 18, we will celebrate the 152nd anniversary of the proclamation of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility at the First Vatican Council in 1870. Therefore, we'll discuss Saint John Henry and Pastor Aeternus during my usual Monday segment on the Son Rise Morning Show. Either Matt Swaim or Anna Mitchell will be my interlocutor. Listen live here on EWTN Radio, at about 6:50 a.m. Central/7:50 a.m. Eastern.

First, some notes on Newman and the Papacy in general:

On October 6, 1845, just days before he became a Catholic, Blessed John Henry Newman retracted his statements against the Catholic Church and the Papacy. In his Apologia pro Vita Sua, he notes that when he was 15 years old he firmly believed the Pope was the Antichrist. As his religious opinions changed, however, he explains later in the Apologia, how his feelings toward Rome and Papacy changed under the influence of his beloved friend Richard Hurrell Froude, especially regarding some of the medieval popes. Then, while at Littlemore, on his "deathbed as an Anglican" as he put it, and while writing himself into the Catholic Church in his Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine, he noted signs among the Fathers of the Church that argued for Papal Supremacy or Primacy.

Newman met Pope Pius IX while he was studying for the priesthood in Rome in 1846: it was not a promising start to their relationship: when Newman bent down to kiss the Pope’s foot he banged his forehead against the pope's knee. Pope Pius nevertheless, approved Newman's establishment of the Oratory of St. Philip Neri in England, gave him an honorary degree of divinity on August 22, 1850, and approved of him being named the Rector of the Catholic University of Ireland in 1851. When Pope Pius IX was planning the First Vatican Council, he asked Newman to come as an advisor to the bishops. Others requested his presence too: Bishop Felix Dupanloup of Orléans, France (who was opposed to a definition of Papal Infallibility) wanted him to be his personal theologian at the Council and Bishop Joseph Brown of Newport, who had delated Newman to Rome over The Rambler incident in 1859, also asked him to be his personal theologian. He declined all three job offers and remained at the Oratory in Birmingham. He was working on the Grammar of Assent at the time.

In June of 2019 I presented a paper on Newman's reactions to the First Vatican Council and the pending document on Papal Infallibility at Newman University during the Ad Fontes Conference hosted by Eighth Day Institute:

Newman received many letters from concerned converts and other Catholics. His advice was always to remain calm and pray. As he reminded himself and his correspondents, they had become Catholic because they believed “the present Roman Catholic Church is the only Church which is like, and it is very like, the primitive Church.”He recalled the phrase from St. Augustine: securus judicat orbis terrarum! and he relied upon the power of the Holy Spirit to keep the Church from any doctrinal error at a council. As Edward Short points out in Newman and His Contemporaries, he stressed to one of “his converts” when she threatened to leave the Church if Papal Infallibility was defined at the Council, “I say with [Robert] Cardinal Bellarmine whether the Pope be infallible or not in any pronouncement, anyhow he is to be obeyed. No good can come from disobedience . . .” He would make a similar comment in his Letter to the Duke of Norfolk. Newman did not think a decree of Papal Infallibility necessary or timely: he was an Inopportunist against the Ultramontanes. . . 

When Pastor Aeternus was finally voted on, he was pleased to see that Papal Infallibility was narrowly defined; he waited to see how the dissenting bishops responded: securus judicat orbis terrarum! Newman made no public statement except to again deny rumours that he was going to leave the Catholic Church (he had to make these periodically!)

Only when William E. Gladstone, former Prime Minister, published The Vatican Decrees in Their Bearing on Civil Allegiance in 1874 did Newman respond in 1875 with his Letter to the Duke of Norfolk, addressing his counter-argument to the pre-eminent Catholic peer, Henry FitzAlan Howard, scion of a family with two martyrs (Philip Howard and William Howard) in its pedigree. Selecting the 15th Duke of Norfolk as his public correspondent was testing Gladstone’s main contention: that Catholics could not be loyal Englishmen if they accepted Papal Infallibility. Was the Earl Marshall of England, who happened to be a Catholic and a graduate of Newman’s Oratory School, not a loyal Englishman? Did Gladstone really mean that?

Besides, he reminded Gladstone, the Pope’s Infallibility is limited to speaking on matters of faith and morals as abstract doctrine and principles, not on individual decisions of what to do or not to do in a certain situation. . . .

In a later chapter, on “The Vatican Definition” Newman emphasizes that the Pope speaks infallibly only under certain conditions:

He speaks ex cathedrâ, or infallibly, when he speaks, first, as the Universal Teacher; secondly, in the name and with the authority of the Apostles; thirdly, on a point of faith or morals; fourthly, with the purpose of binding every member of the Church to accept and believe his decision.

When the Pope is speaking his mind on any subject like the interpretation of scripture, economics, history, etc., he is not infallible because “he is not in the chair of the universal doctor.” Even if the Pope makes dogmatic statements in an encyclical, as Pope John Paul II did in The Gospel of Life, reiterating Catholic teaching against abortion, for example, those are not exercises of Papal Infallibility. 

Since the definition of Papal Infallibility in 1870, only one Pope has used this power: Pope Pius XII when defining the doctrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in 1950. 

In spite of his reservations about the First Vatican Council's conduct, Newman accepted the work of the Council, but he knew that the Church--the whole Church, including the laity and the theologians, needed time to understand the theology and practice of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility. The First Vatican Council was abbreviated by the Franco-Prussian War and the cause of Italian unity, as the Italian Army was soon at the gates; the Papal States were lost and the long period the Pope as "the prisoner of the Vatican" began. 

Newman was always ready to obey the Pope and pray for the Pope as this 1866 Sermon preached at the Birmingham Oratory shows. He also helped Catholics and non-Catholics understand Papal Infallibility, providing an explanation that Father John O'Malley, in his book Vatican I: The Council and the Making of the Ultramontane Church, says “soon achieved almost canonical status” by answering Gladstone's objections.

Image Credit: (Public domain): Papa Pio IX fotografato da Adolphe Braun in commemorazione dell'83° compleanno di Sua Santità (I'm not sure which knee Newman bumped!)

Image Credit: (Public domain): Henry Fitzalan-Howard, 15th Duke of Norfolk (1847-1917)

1870: Vatican I and the Siege of Paris

As previewed, I'll be talking to Anna Mitchell or Matt Swaim about the connection between the First Vatican Council and the Siege of Paris 150 years ago in 1870 this morning on the Son Rise Morning Show about 6:50 a.m. Central/7:50 a.m. Eastern.

Please listen live here; the podcast will be archived here!

As The World Digital Library of the Library of Congress describes the Siege of Paris:

escription

The Franco-Prussian War was brought about by rising tensions between France and Prussia in the 1860s. France, under Emperor Napoleon III, was determined to check the growth of Prussian power and avenge what it saw as a series of diplomatic humiliations. Prussia, under Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, believed that a Prussian-led war of the German states against France would be a decisive act leading to creation of a unified German empire. The conflict began on July 19, 1870, when France declared war. The French army proved woefully unprepared and suffered a disastrous defeat at the Battle of Sedan, leaving open the road to Paris. By September 19, the Germans had completely surrounded the city and begun a siege that was to last more than four months. Cut off from supplies from the countryside, the Parisians held out by eating dogs, cats, and even most of the animals in the Paris zoo. The trees on the Champs-Elysées and in parks were cut down and burned for fuel. On January 5, the German armies began a bombardment of the city, which lasted several hours each night for a period of 23 nights. About 12,000 shells fell on Paris neighborhoods, killing some 400 people. Paris surrendered on January 28, effectively ending the war. The French defeat was followed by a popular uprising and the establishment, in March 1871, of the Paris Commune, a revolutionary government formed in accordance with anarchist and socialist principles. The Commune was bloodily suppressed in May 1871 by French troops under the government of Adolphe Thiers. During the brief period in which the communards controlled Paris, they dismantled the imperial column in the Place Vendôme. The suppression of the Commune resulted in further extensive damage to the city, as the communards set fire to the Tuileries Palace, the Louvre, and other buildings, and as desperate fighting between the communards and counterrevolutionary forces destroyed or damaged many other structures.

The Second French Empire had fallen with the surrender of Emperor Napoleon III after defeat at the Battle of Sedan. The Third Republic, the Government of National Defense, continued fighting the Prussians and defending Paris until January of 1871. Then the Germans, as part of the Armistice negotiations, brought food and medicine and other supplies to the people of Paris. Under the Third Republic, from 1871-1940, Paris was restored yet again.

Tomorrow, on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, we'll follow up with the story of how the Empress Eugenie, the Emperor Napoleon III's devoutly Catholic wife, played a role in the The Song of Bernadette--in real life and in the 1943 movie based on Franz Werfel's 1941 novel. Same time, same station.

Preview: Papal Infallibility and the Siege of Paris: 150 Years Ago

On Monday, February 10, we'll discuss two interconnected anniversaries on the Son Rise Morning Show: The dogmatic definition of Papal Infallibility at the First Vatican Council on July 18, 1870 and the Siege of Paris at the end of the Franco-Prussian War beginning on September 19, 1870.

The First Vatican Council was convened by Pope Pius IX (Blessed Pope Pius IX, whose feast is February 7) on December 8, 1869 (the feast of the Immaculate Conception, celebrating the dogma Pope Pius IX had declared in 1854 via the Papal Bull Ineffabilis Deus). 

The purpose of the First Vatican Council was to clarify the Church's teaching about the Church itself. The bishops met, not in the Lateran Basilica like previous councils held in Rome, but in St. Peter's Basilica. As the bishops met in council, Pope Pius IX was already the "Prisoner of the Vatican", as Victor Emmanuel of Sardinia had conquered the Papal States. Troops from the French Empire, ruled by Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon III, protected the Pope in Rome, which had not yet been taken by the Italian revolutionaries.

Although the First Vatican Council is most famous for the proclamation of Papal Infallibility, there was another document issued, Dei Filius, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith, on April 24, 1870. It has four chapters: 1. God, Creator of All Things; 2. Revelation; 3. Faith; 4. Faith and Reason. It begins (in translation):

The holy, Catholic, Apostolic, Roman Church believes and confesses that there is one, true, living God, Creator and Lord of heaven and earth, omnipotent, eternal, immense, incomprehensible, infinite in intellect and will, and in every perfection; who, although He is one, singular, altogether simple and unchangeable spiritual substance, must be proclaimed distinct in reality and essence from the world; most blessed in Himself and of Himself, and ineffably most high above all things which are or can be conceived outside Himself.

This sole true God by His goodness and "omnipotent power," not to increase His own beatitude, and not to add to, but to manifest His perfection by the blessings which He bestows on creatures, with most free volition, "immediately from the beginning of time fashioned each creature out of nothing, spiritual and corporeal, namely angelic and mundane; and then the human creation, common as it were, composed of both spirit and body" [Lateran Council IV, can. 2 and 5]

But God protects and governs by His providence all things which He created, "reaching from end to end mightily and ordering all things sweetly" [cf. Wis 8:1]. For "all things are naked and open to His eyes" [Heb 4:13], even those which by the free action of creatures are in the future.

The document on the nature of the Church, which included the role of the Papacy, faced more opposition and therefore, Pope Pius IX decided the bishops should define only the role of the Pope in that document, which became known by its first words, Pastor Aeternus, defining Papal Infallibility as one of its topics. Pastor Aeternus was finally adopted on July 18, 1870 with two dissenting votes. One of those dissenting votes was cast by the Bishop of Little Rock, Arkansas: Edward Fitzgerald, whose family had left Ireland during the Irish Potato Famine! He was concerned--as was St. John Henry Newman in England--that the declared definition of the doctrine would hamper his efforts to evangelize. Like Newman, he agreed that the Pope exercised magisterial infallibility in declaring dogma in certain limited occasions; he just thought the public definition was inopportune. The other dissenter was Aloisio Riccio of Sicily. Both accepted the doctrine after it had been declared.

With two documents completed, and after the bishops had been in Rome for seven months, the bishops were to return to their home dioceses for a summer break and then come back to the Vatican for further consultations, taking up the document on the nature of the Church, for example, on the role of the bishops. That's when the Franco-Prussian war intervened.

Prussian troops were advancing in France quickly, so Napoleon III had to recall the French troops garrisoned in Civitavecchia in August of 1870. When the French were defeated at the Battle of Sedan at the beginning of September that year, the new Kingdom of Italy invaded Rome and took over the city, removing it from Papal jurisdiction. On September 20, 1870, Pope Pius IX suspended the First Vatican Council indefinitely. It was formally closed in 1960, before the Second Vatican Council convened.

So while the unification of Italy proceeded apace, so did the Franco-Prussian War, and the French were losing. Just as the Kingdom of Italy needed to take Rome to be unified, the Prussian-German nation needed to take Paris to be victorious. Thus, the Siege of Paris beginning on September 19, 1870.

More about that Monday!!

Papal Primacy in Pastor Aeternus

As today is the anniversary of the definition of the Church's teaching on Papal Primacy and Papal Infallibility at the First Vatican Council on July 18, 1870, here are some comments from Father John Trigilio  at Legatus:

Papal primacy is the concept that the bishop of Rome (the pope) is the universal pastor and supreme head of the Catholic Church. He has full, supreme, immediate, and universal jurisdictional authority to govern the Church.

This means that no bishop, synod, or council of bishops can override his authority. His teaching authority is defined in the doctrine of papal infallibility. His governing authority is contained in papal primacy.

The Eastern Orthodox Church considers the bishop of Rome to have a primacy in honor among the five patriarchs of Jerusalem, Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Rome. They do not recognize his primacy in jurisdiction, however.

Every bishop in the Catholic Church must be approved by the pope and receive a papal mandate before being ordained and consecrated to the episcopacy, and it is the pope who confers on that bishop the authority to govern the diocese to which he has been appointed.

The First Vatican Council defined papal infallibility and papal primacy. “All the faithful of Christ must believe that the Apostolic See and the Roman Pontiff hold primacy over the whole world, and that the Pontiff of Rome himself is the successor of the blessed Peter, the chief of the apostles, and is the true Vicar of Christ and head of the whole Church and faith, and teacher of all Christians.”

The charism of infallibility is exercised only when the pope issues an ex cathedra statement on faith and morals or when he proposes a teaching united with all the bishops of the world. Unlike divine inspiration of scripture, where God directed the sacred authors to write only what he wanted them to write, infallibility means there are no moral or doctrinal errors present in the statement.

And here's a conversation on these doctrines on Thinking With the Church:

These teachings – of an Ecumenical Council – are to be held by all the faithful on pain of mortal sin: to deny them is to separate oneself from the Body of Christ.

Only, what do these teachings mean?

More importantly, what don’t they mean?

Where did they come from?

Why did the Fathers of the I Vatican Council bother with them at all, and why do we bother with them today, when the Papacy as an institution often appears rather to be an impediment to Christian unity than anything else (and don’t be upset with me – I didn’t say it, Pope St. John Paul II did in Ut unum sint, 96).

This week, we explore these questions and others with Christopher Wells, a theologian doing Doctoral work at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, who has written extensively on both subjects, especially their treatment in the thought and writings of the great 19th Century theologian and Churchman, Henry Edward Cardinal Manning.

Among other comments, Christopher Wells contrasts Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, noting that the former did not use his primacy or authority as much as he could have, while the latter uses his primacy and authority as much as he can.

I'm still reading--in between assigned reading for my summer school classes at the Spiritual Life Center's Christendom Academy--Adam DeVille's Orthodoxy and the Roman Papacy: Ut Unum Sint and the Prospects of East-West Unity.

Papal Infallibility and Florovsky Week

The fathers of the First Vatican Council voted on July 18, 1870 to approve the statement on Papal Infallibility published in Pastor Aeternus. This dogmatic constitution states that the Pope has "full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the whole Church" (chapter 3:9); and that, when he

speaks ex cathedra, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals [chapter 4:9]

On the back of the program of the inaugural Florovsky Week, which I attended (parts of it) last week, the Eighth Day Institute announces the topic for next year's meeting, "returning to the sources for Christian unity": THE PATRISTIC VIEW OF CHURCH AUTHORITY: BIBLE, POPE OR PENTARCHY?

Last week I attended the Banquet Tuesday night, gave my own talk on "Reformation and Counter-Reformation: The Catholic Mission in England and Why It Failed" on Wednesday afternoon, attended one evening Plenary Lecture, another afternoon session of three papers (all held in different buildings at Newman University), and the Saturday Plenary lectures at St. George's Orthodox Cathedral (three lectures and lunch). Although Martin Luther's doctrine of Justification by Faith Alone was the title focus, matched by the image, most of the discussion I heard was about the Patristic View of Salvation, theosis or divinization or participation in the divine nature. The Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes the First Letter of St. Peter, two Fathers of the Church and St. Thomas Aquinas in paragraph 460:

"For this is why the Word became man, and the Son of God became the Son of man: so that man, by entering into communion with the Word and thus receiving divine sonship, might become a son of God."79 "For the Son of God became man so that we might become God."80 "The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods."81 

78 2 Pt 1:4.
79 St. Irenaeus, Adv. haeres. 3, 19, 1: PG 7/1, 939.
80 St. Athanasius, De inc. 54, 3: PG 25, 192B.
81 St. Thomas Aquinas, Opusc. 57, 1-4.

Every event I attended was excellent and I look forward to next year's Florovsky Week.

In the meantime, the organizers are researching ways to publish the papers presented: three Plenary sessions by the designated Catholic (Kenneth Howell), Orthodox (Bradley Nassif), Protestant (Hans Boersma) with responses by the other two main speakers from Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday at Newman; three more Plenary presentations by those speakers on Saturday at St. George's; the opening banquet speech by Erin Doom, and 26 (twenty-six) academic papers!! I submitted my academic paper to the EDI for consideration, so we'll see what happens!

144 Years Ago Today: "Pastor Aeternus" Proclaimed

On July 18, 1870, the Doctrine of Papal Infallibility was declared at the First Vatican Council in the First Dogmatic Constitution on the Church of Christ. Pastor Aeternus actually made four doctrinal statements about the Office of the Pope: 1. St. Peter's primacy over the Church conferred by Jesus; 2. The permanence of that primacy in the pontiffs succeeding St. Peter; 3. The power and authority of the pontiffs in teaching dogma and morals, discipline, and governance of the Church; and what everyone remembers, 4. Papal infallibility:

Therefore, faithfully adhering to the tradition received from the beginning of the christian faith, to the glory of God our savior, for the exaltation of the Catholic religion and for the salvation of the christian people, with the approval of the Sacred Council, we teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma that when the Roman Pontiff speaks EX CATHEDRA, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals. Therefore, such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the Church, irreformable.

Father Juan Velez explained Blessed John Henry Newman's reactions to the definition in this article for ZENIT in 2010:

[In his Letter to the Duke of Norfolk] Cardinal Newman repeated the teaching of the constitution "Pastor Aeternus" of Vatican Council I, which asks Catholics for obedience to the Pope only in matters of faith and morals, and in matters of discipline and ecclesiastical government. Cardinal Newman explained that by obeying the Pope in such matters, the moral conscience is neither eliminated nor substituted by the Pope's authority.

Papal infallibility

As Vatican I asserted, the Pope's authority extends only to matters of doctrine and morals. We are obliged to believe, for example, what he teaches about the Holy Eucharist or marriage. His teaching does not extend on how to organize the water supply of a city, raise taxes, run elections, etc.

Cardinal Newman explained to his fellow Englishmen, who out of prejudice considered the teaching of the Pope's infallibility as a threat to English government or sense of pride, that this doctrine does not make Catholics puppets: did the Pope speak against Conscience in the true sense of the word, he would commit a suicidal act. He would be cutting the ground from under his feet. His very mission is to proclaim the moral law, and to protect and strengthen that "Light which enlighteneth every man that cometh into the world." On the law of conscience and its sacredness are founded both his authority in theory and his power in fact…I am considering here the Papacy in its office and its duties, and in reference to those who acknowledge its claims.

Cardinal Newman pointed out that so many types of acts by a Pope, such as the excommunication of a person in error or the Pope's blessing of the Spanish Armada, are not a matter of exercising his pontifical authority in an infallible manner, which would bind the faithful in conscience. Cardinal Newman wrote that Catholics are not bound by the Pope's personal character or private acts, but by his formal teaching (although it should be pointed out that, in the case of a person excommunicated, that is a canonical act that is indeed binding, whether or not it is infallible).

Difficult cases

If a scholar were to disagree with a doctrinal or moral teaching of the Church he should submit his judgment to the Church's teaching out of humility and obedience. Here too Cardinal Newman offered advice and good example. A theologian or for that matter a pastor should not create unrest among the faithful, much less confusion. Such a person should have the humility to admit that his opinion is likely mistaken, especially if the magisterium has already pronounced on the matter.

Upon being received in the Church Cardinal Newman accepted all its teachings, including the ones he did not fully understand. As the declaration of papal infallibility drew near, Cardinal Newman accepted this teaching, even if he thought that despite its truth it was not an opportune moment to make it. The English hierarchy had only just been restored in England in 1850, and there was a lot of prejudice against Catholics in England. In that country the so-called Ultramontane Catholics who advocated a temporal power by the Pope were making matters worse. In sum, Cardinal Newman thought this was not the best time for such a declaration, but he submitted to it.