Sunday, November 21, 2010

Rejecting the Truth with Clement XI

Some of Rome's rejections of Scriptural truth are more clear than others. One particularly clear set of examples comes from the dogmatic Constitution, "Unigenitus,"dated Sept. 8, 1713, and authorized by Clement XI. I've previously posted a full list of the 101 "errors" condemned (link to full list).

There many alleged errors identified. I've taken the liberty to highlight a few of them. Remember, these are what the Roman church has officially proclaimed to be errors.

Scripture
  • 79. It is useful and necessary at all times, in all places, and for every kind of person, to study and to know the spirit, the piety, and the mysteries of Sacred Scripture.
  • 80. The reading of Sacred Scripture is for all.
  • 81. The sacred obscurity of the Word of God is no reason for the laity to dispense themselves from reading it.
  • 82. The Lord's Day ought to be sanctified by Christians with readings of pious works and above all of the Holy Scriptures. It is harmful for a Christian to wish to withdraw from this reading.
  • 83. It is an illusion to persuade oneself that knowledge of the mysteries of religion should not be communicated to women by the reading of Sacred Scriptures. Not from the simplicity of women, but from the proud knowledge of men has arisen the abuse of the Scriptures, and have heresies been born.
  • 84. To snatch away from the hands of Christians the New Testament, or to hold it closed against them by taking away from them the means of understanding it, is to close for them the mouth of Christ.
  • 85. To forbid Christians to read Sacred Scripture, especially the Gospels, is to forbid the use of light to the sons of light, and to cause them to suffer a kind of excommunication.
The Power of God in Salvation
  • 30. All whom God wishes to save through Christ, are infallibly saved.
  • 31. The desires of Christ always have their effect; He brings peace to the depth of hearts when He desires it for them.
Particular Redemption
  • 32. Jesus Christ surrendered Himself to death to free forever from the hand of the exterminating angel, by His blood, the first born, that is, the elect.
Justification by Faith that Works through Love
  • 51. Faith justifies when it operates, but it does not operate except through charity.
Faith as the Gift of God
  • 69. Faith, practice of it, increase, and reward of faith, all are a gift of the pure liberality of God.
The Church
  • 72. A mark of the Christian Church is that it is catholic, embracing all the angels of heaven, all the elect and the just on earth, and of all times.
  • 73. What is the Church except an assembly of the sons of God abiding in His bosom, adopted in Christ, subsisting in His person, redeemed by His blood, living in His spirit, acting through His grace, and awaiting the grace of the future life?
  • 74. The Church or the whole Christ has the Incarnate Word as head, but all the saints as members.
  • 75. The Church is one single man composed of many members, of which Christ is the head, the life, the subsistence and the person; it is one single Christ composed of many saints, of whom He is the sanctifier.
Total Depravity
  • 38. Without the grace of the Liberator, the sinner is not free except to do evil.
  • 39. The will, which grace does not anticipate, has no light except for straying, no eagerness except to put itself in danger, no strength except to wound itself, and is capable of all evil and incapable of all good.
  • 40. Without grace we can love nothing except to our own condemnation.
  • 41. All knowledge of God, even natural knowledge, even in the pagan philosophers, cannot come except from God; and without grace knowledge produces nothing but presumption, vanity, and opposition to God Himself, instead of the affections of adoration, gratitude, and love.
  • 42. The grace of Christ alone renders a man fit for the sacrifice of faith; without this there is nothing but impurity, nothing but unworthiness.
  • 48. What else can we be except darkness, except aberration, and except sin, without the light of faith, without Christ, and without charity?
The Absolute Necessity of Grace
  • 1. What else remains for the soul that has lost God and His grace except sin and the consequences of sin, a proud poverty and a slothful indigence, that is, a general impotence for labor, for prayer, and for every good work?
  • 2. The grace of Jesus Christ, which is the efficacious principle of every kind of good, is necessary for every good work; without it, not only is nothing done, but nothing can be done.
  • 5. When God does not soften a heart by the interior unction of His grace, exterior exhortations and graces are of no service except to harden it the more.
  • 9. The grace of Christ is a supreme grace, without which we can never confess Christ, and with which we never deny Him.
The Irresistibility of Grace
  • 10. Grace is the working of the omnipotent hand of God, which nothing can hinder or retard.
  • 11. Grace is nothing else than the omnipotent Will of God, ordering and doing what He orders.
  • 12. When God wishes to save a soul, at whatever time and at whatever place, the undoubted effect follows the Will of God.
  • 13. When God wishes to save a soul and touches it with the interior hand of His grace, no human will resists Him.
  • 14. Howsoever remote from salvation an obstinate sinner is, when Jesus presents Himself to be seen by him in the salutary light of His grace, the sinner is forced to surrender himself, to have recourse to Him, and to humble himself, and to adore his Savior.
  • 15. When God accompanies His commandment and His eternal exhortation by the unction of His Spirit and by the interior force of His grace, He works that obedience in the heart that He is seeking.
  • 16. There are no attractions which do not yield to the attractions of grace, because nothing resists the Almighty.
  • 17. Grace is that voice of the Father which teaches men interiorly and makes them come to Jesus Christ; whoever does not come to Him, after he has heard the exterior voice of the Son, is in no wise taught by the Father.
Unjust Excommunication
  • 91. The fear of an unjust excommunication should never hinder us from fulfilling our duty; never are we separated from the Church, even when by the wickedness of men we seem to be expelled from it, as long as we are attached to God, to Jesus Christ, and to the Church herself by charity.
  • 92. To suffer in peace an excommunication and an unjust anathema rather than betray truth, is to imitate St. Paul; far be it from rebelling against authority or of destroying unity.
Yes, folks, those are things that Rome has officially taught are errors - yet many of these teachings are the truth, as I think will be obvious to most of those reading.

- TurretinFan

10 comments:

  1. Isn't #32 correct?
    Godith

    ReplyDelete
  2. TF,

    I hope you don't mind me pointing these minor typos out; I'm not doing it to be pugnacious or irritating.

    "Scriptural" should be "Scripture".

    Some of Rome's rejection of Scriptural are more clear than others. One particularly clear set of examples comes from the dogmatic Constitution, "Unigenitus,"dated Sept. 8, 1713, and authorized by Clement XI. I've previously posted a full list of the 101 "errors" condemned (link to full list).

    And "official" should be "officially".

    There many alleged errors identified. I've taken the liberty to highlight a few of them. Remember, these are what the Roman church has official proclaimed to be errors.

    In Him,
    CD

    P.S. - this was yet another very well constructed, and instructive post revealing just how rabidly Rome hates the Bible, the One true and living God, and His people.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Here is the 1713 "Unigenitus" bull online:

    http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Clem11/c11unige.htm

    And remember - these things are not declared to be mere errors, but for all seeming purposes, DAMNING errors. Not mere intellectual "venial sins" (to use RC terminology) but mortal ones:

    "Declared and condemned as false, captious, evil-sounding, offensive to pious ears, scandalous, pernicious, rash, injurious to the Church and her practice, insulting not only to the Church but also the secular powers seditious, impious, blasphemous, suspected of heresy, and smacking of heresy itself, and, besides, favoring heretics and heresies, and also schisms, erroneous, close to heresy, many times condemned, and finally heretical, clearly renewing many heresies respectively and most especially those which are contained in the infamous propositions of Jansen, and indeed accepted in that sense in which these have been condemned."


    This is definitely the sort of papal teaching that even faithful modern RCs (unless they are of fanatical semi-sedevacantist variety) are today embarrassed of, and would dearly like to shove quietly down to an Orwellian memory-hole - but can't.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Besides the obvious:

    "... as I think will be obvious to most of those reading."

    Every single bullet point published in this thread, as I read it, one or more verses of Sacred Scripture popped up in my mind giving me greater understanding of the verse or verses!

    I hasten to say that this here is clear and convincing evidence that one can use to conclude the RCC and company is indeed a Anti-Christ organization.

    It's no hearty endorsement.

    It's about time we lift up our voices by the Will and Way of God Himself and ask for the Day of the Lord to come about exposing the works done on the earth against Him:

    2Pe 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.
    2Pe 3:11 Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness,
    2Pe 3:12 waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!
    2Pe 3:13 But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.


    What hinders us then from completing the Word given to us to complete?

    I sadly admit my own soul is a drag on this completion!


    Mat 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

    ReplyDelete
  5. CD:

    Thanks again for your assistance - it is always appreciated!

    - TurretinFan

    ReplyDelete
  6. From the 1911 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica - note that even back in the 1710s, Rome's hostility to Bible-reading was too much for many enlightened Gallican Catholics:

    http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Jansenism

    "In 1703 Louis XIV. wrote to Pope Clement XI., proposing that they should take joint action to make an end of Jansenism for ever. Clement replied in 1705 with a bull condemning respectful silence. This measure only whetted Louis's appetite. He was growing old and increasingly superstitious; the affairs of his realm were going from bad to worse; he became frenziedly anxious to propitiate the wrath of his maker by making war on the enemies of the Church. In 1711 he asked the pope for a second, and still stronger bull, that would tear up Jansenism by the roots.

    The pope's choice of a book to condemn fell on Quesnel's Reflexions; in 1713 appeared the bull Unigenitus, anathematizing no less than one-hundredand-one of its propositions. Indeed, in his zeal against the Jansenists the pope condemned various practices in no way peculiar to their party; thus, for instance, many orthodox Catholics were exasperated at the heavy blow he dealt at popular Bible reading. Hence the bull met with much opposition from Archbishop de Noailles and others who did not call themselves Jansenists. In the midst of the conflict Louis XIV. died (September 1715); but the freethinking duke of Orleans, who succeeded him as regent, continued after some wavering to support the bull. Thereupon four bishops appealed against it to a general council; and the country became divided into "appellants" and "acceptants" (1717). The regent's disreputable minister, Cardinal Dubois, patched up an abortive truce in 1720, but the appellants promptly "re-appealed" against it. During the next ten years, however, they were slowly crushed, and in 1730 the Unigenitus was proclaimed part and parcel of the law of France. This led to a great quarrel with the judges, who were intensely Gallican in spirit (see Gallicanism), and had always regarded the Unigenitus as a triumph of ultramontanism. The quarrel dragged indefinitely on through the 18th century, though the questions at issue were really constitutional and political rather than religious."

    ReplyDelete
  7. From the 1911 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica - note that even back in the 1710s, Rome's hostility to Bible-reading was too much for many enlightened Gallican Catholics:

    http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Jansenism

    "In 1703 Louis XIV. wrote to Pope Clement XI., proposing that they should take joint action to make an end of Jansenism for ever. Clement replied in 1705 with a bull condemning respectful silence. This measure only whetted Louis's appetite. He was growing old and increasingly superstitious; the affairs of his realm were going from bad to worse; he became frenziedly anxious to propitiate the wrath of his maker by making war on the enemies of the Church. In 1711 he asked the pope for a second, and still stronger bull, that would tear up Jansenism by the roots.

    The pope's choice of a book to condemn fell on Quesnel's Reflexions; in 1713 appeared the bull Unigenitus, anathematizing no less than one-hundredand-one of its propositions. Indeed, in his zeal against the Jansenists the pope condemned various practices in no way peculiar to their party; thus, for instance, many orthodox Catholics were exasperated at the heavy blow he dealt at popular Bible reading. Hence the bull met with much opposition from Archbishop de Noailles and others who did not call themselves Jansenists. In the midst of the conflict Louis XIV. died (September 1715); but the freethinking duke of Orleans, who succeeded him as regent, continued after some wavering to support the bull. Thereupon four bishops appealed against it to a general council; and the country became divided into "appellants" and "acceptants" (1717). The regent's disreputable minister, Cardinal Dubois, patched up an abortive truce in 1720, but the appellants promptly "re-appealed" against it. During the next ten years, however, they were slowly crushed, and in 1730 the Unigenitus was proclaimed part and parcel of the law of France. This led to a great quarrel with the judges, who were intensely Gallican in spirit (see Gallicanism), and had always regarded the Unigenitus as a triumph of ultramontanism. The quarrel dragged indefinitely on through the 18th century, though the questions at issue were really constitutional and political rather than religious."

    ReplyDelete
  8. Some of those alleged errors actually are errors. You may have to read them carefully to understand why.

    Usually when words like "every," "all," "always," and "never" are used in reference to a complex matter, the statement is erroneous. Those absolute concepts are generally only valid when it comes to simple questions. So 79 and 80 are surely false, in the strictly absolutist form that they are stated. There are some kinds of persons who will only use the study of scripture to abuse it and to spread error. Surely the reading of Sacred Scripture is for all Christians and many non-Christians (hopefully it will lead them to Christ), but I don't think it's for literally all non-Christians. 83 is surely false. The reason that women rarely have been guilty of notoriously abusing scripture is not because they are innocently simple, but because they are rarely religious leaders (or any kind of leaders). It is men who are usually in leadership roles and it is men who are leaders of heresies and cults simply because of the relatively patriarchal nature of most societies.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I don't agree, Steelikat. Perhaps a Romanist attempting to defend the condemnation of these points would retreat to that kind of defense, but the sense of the expressions is readily ascertained not to simply be an objection to the use of "all" without implicit qualification.

    As for #83, perhaps you should re-read it. There's multiple negation going on. The truth is that women should be allowed to learn by reading the Scriptures. Although women are the weaker vessel, in fact most (virtually all) herisarchs are men.

    - TurretinFan

    ReplyDelete
  10. Interesting. I'm not sure many argue Unigenitus is infallible, but obviously it was authoritative teaching to be followed. But it does seem to fly in the face of a lot of medieval teaching and big-named theologians leading up to it, which probably partially explains why it was so resisted in France after being issued. In fact, Ex Omnibus was issued a few decades later stating "The authority of the apostolic constitution which begins with the word Unigenitus is certainly so great and lays claim everywhere to such sincere veneration and obedience that no one can withdraw the submission due it or oppose it without risking the loss of eternal salvation. Now, a controversy has risen concerning whether viaticum must be denied to those who oppose the constitution. The answer must be given without any hesitation that as long as they are opposed publicly and notoriously, viaticum must be denied them" so the "publicly and notoriously" could leave room for legitimate internal dissent perhaps.

    Anyhow, much of it now seems to be fairly irrelevant (as Perry noted in the other post on infallible efficacious grace with Aquinas and others - modern Thomists such as Garrigou-Lagrange taught similarly in the 20th century and he was definitely held in high regard in Rome). A traditionalist site noted the following magisterial documents that they view as contradicting Unigenitus:
    -Council Carthage XVI (418)
    -The Catalogue or the Authoritative Statements of the Past Bishops of the Holy See Concerning the Grace of God (Indiculus de Gratia Dei)
    -Sicut Rationi (520)
    -Council of Orange II (529)
    -Epistle of Pope John II
    -Ad Salutem (1930)

    You might also be interested in Ex omnibus afflictionibus from 1567 which has some similar condemnations of teachings on grace (from Bajus in this case).

    ReplyDelete

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