Benedict XVI is working on a new social encyclical.
When the Pope speaks.
Cardinal Bertone revealed the Holy Father is finishing a new social encyclical, with special concern for the third and fourth world . It is rumored it will be signed on the feast of St. Joseph and released during Easter. CNA has the story.
Are papal encyclicals infallible?
Maybe not according to dissident Catholics or those outside the Church, and even die-hard traditionalists who reject Vatican II. Nevertheless, when the Pope speaks through an encyclical, what he says does command consent on the part of the faithful. As Pius XII affirmed in his 1950 encyclical Humanae generis:
“Nor must it be thought that what is expounded in encyclical letters does not itself command consent, on the pretext that in writing such letters the Popes do not exercise the supreme power of their teaching authority. For these matters are taught with the ordinary teaching authority, of which it is true to say, ‘He who heareth you, heareth me.’ … But if the Supreme Pontiffs in their official documents purposely pass judgment on a matter up to that time under dispute, it is obvious that the matter, according to the mind and will of the same Pontiffs, cannot be any longer considered a question open to discussion among theologians.” - Pius XII
Later, the Council Fathers of Vatican II teach that:
“loyal submission of the will and intellect must be given, in a special way, to the authentic teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff, even when he does not speak ex cathedra in such wise, indeed, that his supreme teaching authority be acknowledged with respect, and that one sincerely adhere to decisions made by him, conformably with his manifest mind and intention, which is made known principally either by the character of the documents in question, or by the frequency with which a certain doctrine is proposed, or by the manner in which the doctrine is formulated.”- Lumen Gentium
Links:
March 1st, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Except that there are limits even to obedience which are allowed implicitly by the same Church and Popes in moral theology tomes which the Church itself imprimaturs like Grisez in “Way of the Lord Jesus” volume one…page 854….and used in seminaries and by a conservative theologian.
In 1455 Romanus Pontifex was a bull by Pope Nicholas V and is online for your perusal and it gave to Portugal the right to take unbelievers land and enslave them in perpetuity.
Portuguese Catholic soldiers then were free for centuries after that to do the imperialism thing as long as their intent was to convert natives. The bull stipulated that no future authority of any level could void it. Native groups have petitioned Rome for years that it be voided.
A real saintly Portuguese soldier would have been above the bull’s contents and would have sought other work to save his soul and would not have obeyed Romanus Pontifex…here is an excerpt:
“We [therefore] weighing all and singular the premises with due meditation, and noting that since we had formerly by other letters of ours granted among other things free and ample faculty to the aforesaid King Alfonso — to invade, search out, capture, vanquish, and subdue all Saracens and pagans whatsoever, and other enemies of Christ wheresoever placed, and the kingdoms, dukedoms, principalities, dominions, possessions, and all movable and immovable goods whatsoever held and possessed by them and to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery, and to apply and appropriate to himself and his successors the kingdoms, dukedoms, counties, principalities, dominions, possessions, and goods, and to convert them to his and their use and profit — by having secured the said faculty, the said King Alfonso, or, by his authority, the aforesaid infante, justly and lawfully has acquired and possessed, and doth possess, these islands, lands, harbors, and seas, and they do of right belong and pertain to the said King Alfonso and his successors…”
In the 1490’s a Spanish Pope then claimed all the rights of this bull for his land on the other side of the earth so that he later divided the earth into the Spanish section and the Portuguese section.
Pope Pius XII should have been more nuanced with his comments in light of such things.
Here is an encyclical which if you obeyed it on religious liberty, you would then be incorrect since Vatican II took an opposite position:
Quanta Cura Pius IX Encyclical promulgated on 8 December 1864.
section 3 2nd paragraph:
“And, against the doctrine of Scripture, of the Church, and of the Holy Fathers, they do not hesitate to assert that “that is the best condition of civil society, in which no duty is recognized, as attached to the civil power, of restraining by enacted penalties, offenders against the Catholic religion, except so far as public peace may require. From which totally false idea of social government they do not fear to foster that erroneous opinion, most fatal in its effects on the Catholic Church and the salvation of souls, called by Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI, an “insanity,”2 viz., that “liberty of conscience and worship is each man’s personal right, which ought to be legally proclaimed and asserted in every rightly constituted society; and that a right resides in the citizens to an absolute liberty, which should be restrained by no authority whether ecclesiastical or civil, whereby they may be able openly and publicly to manifest and declare any of their ideas whatever, either by word of mouth, by the press, or in any other way.”
Vatican II said this in DIGNITATIS HUMANAE :
“This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right.”