“I trust in the mercy of God forever,” Psalm 52:10
Having finished the Luis Rocha novel, The Last Pope, which underscores a brilliant conspiracy theory regarding the circumstances of the death Albino Luciani, who chose to be called John Paul I; I find that I am even more interested in Church history. The book is a thrilling read as it was gripping from the very first pages. It is the Da Vinci Code with much more turns in a shorter span. While I praise the creativity and captivation of this novel, I must also note where its fiction separates from fact. The book has its many accuracies and creative view of the facts but it also takes liberties to assume that the Holy Father before his death would have changed some doctrines within the Church. The story assumes some current day trends would have been normalized by a liberal Pontiff. As such, I digress into full support of the teachings of the Church and guidance of the Holy Spirit in that the will of God and the trust that the teachings of the Church would have always been safeguarded by the Magisterium.
While the Chair of Saint Peter has been occupied by men with questionable intents, we believe that the will of God for his Church is done. Even more so we trust in the mercy of God as the Church is led by fallible men and all too often, the concept of papal infallibility is misunderstood, misinterpreted or outright mistaken. The aforementioned novel also misunderstands infallibility. The novel supposes a conversation between a senior, corrupt, cardinal and the Holy Father where the Holy Father suggests that infallibility should not have a place for the pontiff and the cardinal makes a remark about how the Successor of Peter is protected and this leads to Humanae Vitae being brought up as being inaccurate though the cardinal argues for its infallibility. The key understanding the truth to this is that papal infallibility has been invoked only once in the history of the Church and that was in the document, Munificentissimus Deus, promulaged by Pope Pius XII in 1950, and that was regarding the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The Pope is subject to fallibility, however, when in accordance with the College of Bishops under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Father can proclaim a teaching as infallible. A note: The Holy Father does not need the accordance of the College of Bishops to make an infallible statement, he need only 1) speak ex cathedra, 2) on a matter of faith or doctrine, and make a pronouncement of dogma. Given that this has only happened once in 2000 years, we can see that it is a very rare phenomenon. The process itself is rather interesting.
When the Holy Father makes an infallible statement, he goes to his cathedra (chair) to speak ex cathedra. The Holy Father’s chair is not in St Peter’s Basilica, though many believe it is, but rather is in the Archbasilica of Saint John Lateran in Rome. The Holy Father during the ceremony will sit at his cathedra and pronounce “"By the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma..”
What happens next is that all (and it is ALL) the ordinaries (bishops and archbishops of all dioceses, archdioceses and ordinariates) will go to their respective cathedras and pronounce the very same proclamation as the Holy Father.
