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Author Topic: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?  (Read 4190 times)

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Offline Johannes

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I am sure this has come up before, so I will understand if few reply, but if one could direct me to the thread, I would be appreciative. If not here goes.

Example questions:

Dogmatic Fact: Was the Vatican II Council a legitimate ecuмenical council?

VS.

Theological Censure: Has the doctrine of Religious Freedom as taught by Vatican II been previously condemned (see below)?
 
"...men, possess the civil right not to be hindered in leading their lives in accordance with their consciences. Therefore, a harmony exists between the freedom of the Church and the religious freedom which is to be recognized as the right of all men and communities and sanctioned by constitutional law". 
Dignitatis humanae


If the dogmatic fact of Vatican II is beyond all dispute...

then it must be proven beyond all doubt that Paul VI was a true pope - for a general council must be ratified by a true pope. 

But, if Paul VI attempted to ratify even a single previously condemned theological censure into the doctrinal teachings of a legitimate council, what does this say about the legitimacy of said council and said pope?

In this exercise I am pitting secondary objects of infallibility against each other. What comes first - dogmatic facts as they appear to human senses, or previous condemnations of error? 

[Consideration] In order to maintain logical consistency in reasoning, must not one do both simultaneously.

a) Move in a linear fashion historically (i.e. what came first the dogmatic fact in question or the theological censure?).

b) Compare objects that have greater degree of certainty with those in dispute that are of a lesser degree of certainty (i.e. what is more necessary for transportation the horse or the cart? Or, put another way, what is more necessary to assent to - previous condemnations that are a danger to the faith, or to accept the purported legitimacy of a current pope, bishops, council, etc.?).

What are your thoughts? Thanks in advance!





Offline Stubborn

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Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
« Reply #1 on: November 12, 2024, 01:58:22 PM »
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  • Not to be facetious but, what's the point?

    +2000 bishops, 6 or 8 prot ministers and the pope held a meeting at what they said at different times was both (either?) an Ecuмenical Council and a Pastoral Council. Whatever happened in there resulted in a new religion. This is a dogmatic fact because we've been living the aftermath.

     
    "But Peter and the apostles answering, said: We ought to obey God, rather than men." - Acts 5:29

    The Highest Principle in the Church: "We are first of all under obedience to God, and only then under obedience to man" - Fr. Hesse


    Offline Meg

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #2 on: November 12, 2024, 02:12:35 PM »
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  • Yet another incarnation of MarkM, Xavier Nishant, XavierSem, etc.?
    "It is licit to resist a Sovereign Pontiff who is trying to destroy the Church. I say it is licit to resist him in not following his orders and in preventing the execution of his will. It is not licit to Judge him, to punish him, or to depose him, for these are acts proper to a superior."

    ~St. Robert Bellarmine
    De Romano Pontifice, Lib.II, c.29

    Offline NishantXavier

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #3 on: November 12, 2024, 02:27:31 PM »
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  • I am not Johannes and have no idea who he is. Different people have different takes on the subject.

    Offline Meg

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #4 on: November 12, 2024, 02:28:55 PM »
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  • I am not Johannes and have no idea who he is. Different people have different takes on the subject.

    Uh huh. Right. 
    "It is licit to resist a Sovereign Pontiff who is trying to destroy the Church. I say it is licit to resist him in not following his orders and in preventing the execution of his will. It is not licit to Judge him, to punish him, or to depose him, for these are acts proper to a superior."

    ~St. Robert Bellarmine
    De Romano Pontifice, Lib.II, c.29


    Offline Ladislaus

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #5 on: November 12, 2024, 03:38:02 PM »
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  • Dogmatic Fact: Was the Vatican II Council a legitimate ecuмenical council?

    As soon as you frame it as a question, it's no longer dogmatic fact.  If there is any question, then it cannot be dogmatic fact and you could no more question it than you could question the Holy Trinity.

    So, the legitimacy of an Ecuмenical Council depends on the legitimacy of the Pope, so you're over kindof over the target, but missing the mark just a bit.  We've had Councils in the Church where they could have been considered Ecuмenical, except the Pope did not confirm it, and rejected it.

    So it all comes down to the dogmatic fact of papal legitimacy.

    There's an opinion that Universal Peaceful Acceptance renders the legitimacy of a Pope to be a dogmatic fact, dogmatically certain, so that if you were to deny the legitimacy of, say Pius XII, someone whom everyone peacefully accepted as Pope, you'd be a heretic.

    There's something to be said for that, since if you can doubt the legitimacy of Pius XII, you can, for instance, then, doubt also the Dogma of the Assumption.

    At the same time, some theologians (and I agree with them) hold that the legitimacy of any given pope can only be known with moral certainty PER SE.  During the Great Schism, nobody really had dogmatic certainty regarding who the legitimate pope was ... but most theologians agree that there was in fact a legitimate pope the entire time.  So the Pope was legitimate quoad se even if there was uncertainty quoad nos.

    This is a very complex question.

    Offline Ladislaus

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #6 on: November 12, 2024, 04:31:00 PM »
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  • It's debatable whether Religious Liberty is heresy in the strict sense or just a grave error, perhaps approximating heresy.

    But your attempt to pit theological notes against one another is invalid.

    Ecuмenical Councils are not protected merey from teaching heresy, but from teahing grave error of any kind, and some would argue any error, absolutely speaking.  You're almost imagining that the Council is a person, who has to be guilty of heresy in the strict sense to lose membership in the Church (and not of some error with a lesser theological note).  That's a fallacious perspective.

    It's also an incredibly myopic view of the situation.

    If nothing else happened other than Dignitatis Humanae ... no New Mass, no bogus canonizations, no teaching of religious indifferentism, etc. ... I'm certain there would be no Traditional movement.  Nobody would become a Traditional Catholic over an isolated error in Vatican II.  They would have simply remained as they were, attending the Tridentine Mass at their local parish, sending their kids to the local Catholic school, entering the seminaries and convents ... while perhaps questioning Religious Liberty, etc.

    So your attempting to reduce the entire error of the Conciliar Church to the single proposition of Religious Liberty is entirely invalid.

    As Bishop Williamson points out, the entire thing is thoroughly imbued with subjectivism.  Even where Traditional truth is being reiterated, it's done so in the context of this being the "fullness" of truth, so it's a RE-presentation of Catholic doctrine in a subjectivist and relativistic framework (rather than as absolutes).

    Really, the core heresy is in fact the new ecclesiology (along with the new soteriology) ... and Liberty is merely one offshot of that core error.

    But the Conciliar Church really is a new religion, with new teaching (ecclesiology / soteriology), presented in a relativistic / subjectivist framework rather than as absolutes and objective truths, its new public worship (non-Catholic syncretism with Protestants), and its new catalog of saints, many of whom were political selections due to "woke" criteria rather than based on proven heroic virtue ... not the least of which were the degenerate V2 papal claimants, the greatest wreckers of the Church in history.  Never has a series of popes wrecked the Church so badly and yet not since the time of the early martyr popes have we had such an unbroken series of "saint" popes in the history of the Church.  We really should have set the world on fire with Catholic faith with such saintly popes at the helm.  No, they were canonized merely as attempts to canonize Vatican II itself, which is a new Church, representing a rupture from the old ... where many of its adherents believe that their Church was founded at Vatican II and ignore anything prior to it.

    Offline 2Vermont

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    Re: What is Weightier - A Disputed Dogmatic Fact, or a Theological Censure?
    « Reply #7 on: November 21, 2024, 12:33:35 PM »
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  • Uh huh. Right.
    I think it's safe to say that MarkM was not the "new" member Johannes (although he does start almost as many threads).