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For the early music choir and ensemble based in Birmingham, England, see Ex Cathedra.
In Catholic theology, the Latin phrase ex cathedra, literally meaning "from the chair", refers to a teaching by the pope that is considered to be made with the intention of invoking infallibility. The "chair" referred to is not a literal chair, but refers metaphorically to the pope's position, or office, as the official teacher of Catholic doctrine: the chair was the symbol of the teacher in the ancient world, and bishops to this day have a cathedra, a seat or throne, as a symbol of their teaching and governing authority. The pope is said to occupy the "chair of Peter", as Catholics hold that among the apostles Peter had a special role as the preserver of unity, so the pope as successor of Peter holds the role of spokesman for the whole church among the bishops, the successors as a group of the apostles. (Also see Holy See and sede vacante: both terms evoke this seat or throne.) Support for infallibility in ScriptureThe church doctrine is traced back historically to Scripture. Within Scriptural passages, the doctrine supports the Pope's infallibility, including:
Primacy of the Roman Pontiff
Doctrine-based religions evolve their theologies over time, and Catholicism is no exception: its theology did not spring instantly and fully formed within the bosom of the earliest Church. "The doctrine of the Primacy of the Roman Bishops, like other Church teachings and institutions, has gone through a development. Thus the establishment of the Primacy recorded in the Gospels has gradually been more clearly recognised and its implications developed. Clear indications of the consciousness of the Primacy of the Roman bishops, and of the recognition of the Primacy by the other churches appear at the end of the 1st century" (Ott, Fund., Bk. IV, Pt. 2, Ch. 2, §6). St. Clement of Rome, c. 99, stated in a letter to the Corinthians: "Indeed you will give joy and gladness to us, if having become obedient to what we have written through the Holy Spirit, you will cut out the unlawful application of your zeal according to the exhortation which we have made in this epistle concerning peace and union" (Denziger §41, emphasis added). St. Clement of Alexandria wrote on the primacy of Peter c. 200: "...the blessed Peter, the chosen, the pre-eminent, the first among the disciples, for whom alone with Himself the Savior paid the tribute..." (Jurgens §436). The existence of an ecclesiastical hierarchy is emphazised by St. Stephan I, 251, in a letter to the bishop of Antioch: "Therefore did not that famous defender of the Gospel [Novatian] know that there ought to be one bishop in the Catholic Church [of the city of Rome]? It did not lie hidden from him..." (Denziger §45). St. Julius I, in 341 wrote to the Antiochenes: "Or do you not know that it is the custom to write to us first, and that here what is just is decided?" (Denziger §57a, emphasis added). It is apparent, then, that an understanding among the Apostles was written down in what became the Scriptures, and rapidly became the living custom of the Church. From there, a clearer theology could unfold. St. Siricius wrote to Himerius in 385: "To your inquiry we do not deny a legal reply, because we, upon whom greater zeal for the Christian religion is incumbent than upon the whole body, out of consideration for our office do not have the liberty to dissimulate, nor to remain silent. We carry the weight of all who are burdened; nay rather the blessed apostle PETER bears these in us, who, as we trust, protects us in all matters of his administration, and guards his heirs" (Denziger §87, emphasis in original). Many of the Church Fathers spoke of ecumenical councils and the Bishop of Rome as possessing a reliable authority to teach the content of Scripture and tradition. Theological historyMiddle AgesIn the Middle Ages and the Renaissance the doctrine of papal infallibility first developed. The first theologian to systematically discuss the infallibility of ecumenical councils was Theodore Abu-Qurrah in the 9th century. Several medieval theologians discussed the infallibility of the pope when defining matters of faith and morals, including Thomas Aquinas and John Peter Olivi. In 1330, the Carmelite bishop Guido Terreni described the pope’s use of the charism of infallibility in terms very similar to those that would be used at Vatican I. Dogmatic definition of 1870In the conclusion of the fourth chapter of its Dogmatic Constitution on the Church Pastor Aeternus, solemnly promulgated by Pope Pius IX, the First Vatican Council in 1870 declared the following, with bishops Aloisio Riccio and Edward Fitzgerald dissenting:[3]
According to Catholic theology, this is an infallible dogmatic definition by an ecumenical council. The infallibility of the pope was thus formally defined in 1870, although the tradition behind this view goes back much further, as described above. The Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, which was also a document on the Church itself, explicitly reaffirmed the definition of papal infallibility, so as to avoid any doubts, expressing this in the following words:
Because the 1870 definition is not seen by Catholics as a creation of the Church, but as the dogmatic revelation of a Truth about the Papal Magisterium, Papal teachings made prior to the 1870 proclamation can, if they meet the criteria set out in the dogmatic definition, be considered infallible. Ineffabilis Deus is an example of this. A detailed analysis of the First Vatican Council, and how the passage of the infallibility dogma was orchestrated, is contained in the book by the Catholic priest August Bernhard Hasler: How the Pope Became Infallible: Pius IX and the Politics of Persuasion, Doubleday (1981) [translation of Wie Der Papst Unfehlbar Wurde: Macht und Ohnmacht eines Dogmas, R. Piper & Co. Verlag (1979)]. Roger O'Toole identifies the distinctive contributions of Hasler as follows:[4] "(1) It weakens or demolishes the claim that Papal Infallibility was already a universally accepted truth, and that its formal definition merely made de jure what had long been acknowledged de facto. (2) It emphasizes the extent of resistance to the definition, particularly in France and Germany. (3) It clarifies the 'inopportunist' position as largely a polite fiction and notes how it was used by Infallibilists to trivialize the nature of the opposition to papal claims. (4) It indicates the extent to which 'spontaneous popular demand' for the definition was, in fact, carefully orchestrated. (5) It underlines the personal involvement of the Pope who, despite his coy disclaimers, appears as the prime mover and driving force behind the Infallibilist campaign. (6) It details the lengths to which the papacy was prepared to go in wringing formal 'submissions' from the minority even after their defeat in the Council. (7) It offers insight into the ideological basis of the dogma in European political conservatism, monarchism and counter-revolution. (8) It establishes the doctrine as a key contributing element in the present 'crisis' of the Roman Catholic Church." Instances of papal infallibilityIt is incorrect to hold that doctrine teaches that the Pope is infallible in everything he says. In reality, the invocation of papal infallibility is extremely rare. Catholic theologians agree that both Pope Pius IX's 1854 definition of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, and Pope Pius XII's 1950 definition of the dogma of the Assumption of Mary are instances of papal infallibility, a fact which has been confirmed by the Church's magisterium [1]. However, theologians disagree about what other documents qualify. Regarding historical papal documents, Catholic theologian and church historian Klaus Schatz made a thorough study, published in 1985, that identified the following list of ex cathedra documents (see Creative Fidelity: Weighing and Interpreting Documents of the Magisterium, by Francis A. Sullivan, chapter 6):
For modern-day Church documents, there is no need for speculation as to which are officially ex cathedra, because the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith can be consulted directly on this question. For example, after Pope John Paul II's apostolic letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (On Reserving Priestly Ordination to Men Alone) was released in 1994, a few commentators speculated that this might be an exercise of papal infallibility (for an example, see [2]). In response to this confusion, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has unambiguously stated, on at least three separate occasions [3] [4] [5], that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis was not an ex cathedra teaching, saying that the content of this letter has been taught infallibly by the ordinary and universal magisterium. The Vatican itself has given no complete list of papal statements considered to be infallible. A 1998 commentary on Ad Tuendam Fidem, written by Cardinals Ratzinger (the later Pope Benedict XVI) and Bertone, the prefect and secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, listed a number of instances of infallible pronouncements by popes and by ecumenical councils, but explicitly stated that this was not meant to be a complete list. The number of infallible pronouncements by ecumenical councils is significantly greater than the number of infallible pronouncements by popes. Disagreement with this doctrineDissent within, and schisms that break away from the Catholic ChurchFollowing the first Vatican Council, 1870, dissent, mostly among German, Austrian, and Swiss Catholics, arose over the definition of Papal Infallibility. The dissenters, holding the General Councils of the Church infallible, were unwilling to accept the dogma of Papal Infallibility, and thus a schism arose between them and the Church. Many of these Catholics formed independent communities in schism with Rome, which became known as the Old Catholic Churches. A few present-day Catholics, including priests and bishops, refuse to accept papal infallibility as a matter of faith, such as the theologian Hans Küng, author of Infallible? An Inquiry, and historian Garry Wills, author of Papal Sin. A recent (1989–1992) survey of Catholics from multiple countries (the USA, Austria, Canada, Ecuador, France, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Peru, Spain and Switzerland), aged 15 to 25 who may not yet fully understand the theology of infallibility, showed that 36.9% accepted the teaching on papal infallibility, 36.9% denied it, and 26.2% said they didn't know of it. (Source: Report on surveys of the International Marian Research Institute, by Johann G. Roten, S.M.) Many scholars within the church consider the Cadaver Synod an anomaly, something that stands entirely outside church experience and which, therefore theologically speaking, never happened. However dissenters outside the church have argued compellingly that the 'nullification' of Formosus's ordinations has never been reversed and that raises momentous and troubling questions for the present-day papacy. In particular it challenges the whole doctrine of papal infallibility. Defined during the nineteenth-century reign of Pius IX but held to apply to popes throughout history, this doctrine asserts that the pope, under the guidance and protection of the Holy Spirit is incapable of making an error when pronouncing on matters of faith and morals ex cathedra or 'from the chair'. This is a matter of vital importance to millions of Catholics who wait to hear what their leaders have to say on subjects such as birth control, women in the priesthood, homosexuality and the like. Popes selling indulgences or plotting with political conspirators are not generally held to have been speaking ex cathedra. But in the case of the Cadaver Synod, Pope Stephen VI can be seen to have been acting in an official capacity. And Stephen not only declared the entire reign of his predecessor void, he even proclaimed every priest ordained by Pope Formosus to be invalid. As a result some commentators hold that Stephen's actions call into question the entire doctrine of infallibility, and thus the bedrock of the modern church. Some say that the Cadaver Synod casts doubt on the belief in apostolic succession. A line of 263 popes leads all the way back to St Peter, the first vicar of Christ. According to Catholic beliefs, the popes don't replace Peter the way a president or prime minister replaces another; they only succeed Peter. Each of them is to carry on the work of Peter to bring 'truth and unity' to their flocks. The nullification of Formosus's ordinations could be seen to break this apostolic succession since we can't be sure which Bishops, and consequently popes, were ordained by 'nullified' priests. If this is true the sanctity of Petrine succession, which reaches back all the way to Jesus Christ himself, has been broken...' - FROM National Geographics 'History's great untold stories' Page 18-19 Historical objections to the teachings on infallibility often appeal to the important work of Brian Tierney, Origins of Papal Infallibility 1150-1350 (Leiden, 1972). Tierney comes to the conclusion, "There is no convincing evidence that papal infallibility formed any part of the theological or canonical tradition of the church before the thirteenth century; the doctrine was invented in the first place by a few dissident Franciscans because it suited their convenience to invent it; eventually, but only after much initial reluctance, it was accepted by the papacy because it suited the convenience of the popes to accept it".[5] See also Ockham and Infallibility. The Rome-based Jesuit Wittgenstein scholar Garth Hallett argued that the dogma of infallibility was neither true nor false but meaningless; see his Darkness and Light: The Analysis of Doctrinal Statements (Paulist Press, 1975). In practice, he claims, the dogma seems to have no practical use and to have succumbed to the sense that it is irrelevant. In the nineteenth century, before the 1870 definition, two catechisms in use in Ireland explicitly denied the doctrine of Papal Infallibility. In answer to the question of whether the pope was infallible they suggested that such an idea was a protestant invention made to discredit Roman Catholics. After the formal declaration of the Pope's Infallibility by Pius IX, this question and answer were quietly dropped in subsequent editions, with no explanation for the change.[citation needed] It is also argued that since the apostle Peter himself was not regarded as infallible in the Bible, and was corrected--albeit in a matter regarding his personal behavior and failure to live by his own teachings--by the apostle Paul (referenced in Galatians 2:11), that it makes little sense to regard current popes as infallible. Orthodox churchesThe dogma of Papal Infallibility is rejected by Eastern Orthodoxy. Orthodox Christians hold that the Holy Spirit will not allow the whole Body of Orthodox Christians to fall into error[6] but leave open the question of how this will be ensured in any specific case. Eastern Orthodoxy considers that the first seven ecumenical councils were infallible as accurate witnesses to the truth of the gospel, not so much on account of their institutional structure as on account of their reception by the Christian faithful. Furthermore, Orthodox Christians do not believe that any individual bishop is infallible or that the idea of Papal Infallibility was taught during the first centuries of Christianity. Orthodox historians often point to the condemnation of Pope Honorius as a heretic by the Sixth Ecumenical council as a significant indication. However, it is debated whether Honorius' letter to Sergius met (in retrospect) the criteria set forth at Vatican I. Other Orthodox scholars[7] argue that past Papal statements that appear to meet the conditions set forth at Vatican I for infallible status presented teachings in faith and morals are now acknowledged as problematic (e.g. Exsurge Domine). Anglican churchesThe Church of England and its sister churches in the Anglican Communion, having seceded from the Roman Church centuries ago, reject papal infallibility, a rejection given expression in the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion (1571):
MethodismJohn Wesley amended the Anglican Articles of Religion for use by Methodists, particularly those in America. The Methodist Articles omit the express provisions in the Anglican articles concerning the errors of the Church of Rome and the authority of councils, but retain Article V which implicitly pertains to the Roman Catholic idea of papal authority as capable of defining articles of faith:
Reformed churchesPresbyterian and Reformed churches also reject papal infallibility. The Westminster Confession of Faith [6] which was intended in 1646 to replace the Thirty-Nine Articles, contains the following:
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