Pentecost Sunday, Year B
First Reading: Acts 2:1–11
Second Reading: Gal 5:16–25
Gospel Reading: Jn 15:26–27; 16:12–15
Thank God for the Church on her birthday this Sunday, the feast of Pentecost!
“You are Rock, and on this rock I will build my Church,” Jesus told Peter. He declared that God in heaven would bind whatever Peter bound on earth, thus promising that Peter’s binding would be inerrant, for God cannot confirm error.
Moreover, Jesus said “the jaws of death” would not prevail against his Church, meaning that Peter’s office would survive Peter. Accordingly, Peter’s successors in this office understood that they possessed his primacy and inerrancy.
Finally, Jesus promised his Church his Holy Spirit. “I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now,” he told his apostles. “When he comes, however … he will guide you to all truth.”
Vatican I summarized: the primacy that Christ gave Peter is possessed by the bishops of Rome. We must therefore obey the Pope in matters of faith, morals, and Church government.
Accordingly, at ordination, bishops were formerly asked, “Are you resolved to be loyal in your obedience to the successor of St. Peter?” Today, they promise to “be faithful to the Catholic Church and to the Roman Pontiff, her supreme pastor, vicar of Christ, successor in primacy of the blessed apostle Peter, and the head of the College of Bishops”; “submit to the free exercise” of his “primatial power” in “the universal Church”; and “take pains to advance and defend his rights and authority.” By canon law, “withdrawal of submission to the supreme Pontiff” constitutes “schism.”
Vatican I also defined the “divinely revealed dogma” that the Pope, speaking ex cathedra, possesses the infallibility that Christ willed “in doctrine concerning faith or morals” — “through the divine assistance promised him in the person of St. Peter.” He speaks ex cathedra when, “acting in the office of shepherd and teacher of all Christians, he defines, by virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the universal Church.”
Apparently, God’s purpose is to give us a simple but sure test for truth in faith and morals: conformity to papal teaching. That purpose would be defeated if we always had to judge for ourselves whether a particular papal teaching was indeed ex cathedra.
Vatican II explained: even when papal teaching is not clearly ex cathedra, we must give it “loyal submission of the will and intellect,” respectfully acknowledging the Pope’s “supreme teaching authority.” We must “sincerely adhere” to his decisions according to his “mind and intention,” expressed by the decision’s character, frequency, or formulation.
To claim the right of private judgement about the truth of papal teaching is to be a Protestant. For example, Martin Luther said, “I do not accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other.”
(In contrast, Pope St. John Paul II said that we should never reject Church teaching, but accept it loyally and try to understand it through “intense and patient reflection” — ready, if necessary, to revise our own opinions.)
Protestants claim for private the infallibility they deny in papal teaching. “I know that a Christian should be humble,” Luther wrote, “but against the Pope I am going to be proud and say to him, ‘You, Pope, I will not have for my boss, for I am sure that my doctrine is divine.’”
The first Pope, Peter, failed in understanding, loyalty, and courage. Nevertheless, at the end, Jesus confirmed his promises to build his Church on Peter and guide it to all truth through his Holy Spirit. Therefore (paraphrasing St. Augustine), we can say confidently Roma locuta; causa finita est! or, as a parishioner said, “The Pope has spoken; that’s it!”
“If a man does not hold fast to this oneness of Peter, does he imagine that he still holds the faith?” St. Cyprian asked. “If he deserts the Chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, has he confidence that he is in the Church?”
Father Hawkswell is again teaching “The Catholic Faith in Plain English,” with new insights, in both print and YouTube form, at beholdvancouver.org/catholic-faith-course. He is also teaching the course in person on Sundays (2–4 p.m. at the John Paul II Pastoral Centre, 4885 Saint John Paul II Way, 33rd Avenue and Willow Street, Vancouver) and Mondays (10 a.m.–noon in St. Anthony’s Church Hall, 2347 Inglewood Avenue, West Vancouver). The title of next week’s talk is The Question of Suffering.
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