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He is elected by the college of Cardinals. When a pope dies, they hold an election.
They believe that the pope can speak "ex cathedra" or "from the chair". That means that when he makes such a statement he is infallible. Unfortunately, no Catholic apologist can give you a list of such statements. There is no definitive list.
They also believe that the pope is infallible in issues of faith and morals.
Catholic apologists will also point out that although they think he's infallible...he is not impeccable. There have been some terrible scoundrels that have been pope over the years.
so what is the difference then, other than semantics?
if the Pope does something wrong does that mean God approves,
and does this extend to priests, archbishops, reverends, vicars and the rest too?
So back in the day....Late 16th century many folk cried fowl towards the Pope and the Protestants came to be. What most Christians are. If your point is to discredit Christianity, this won't work. I respect the Pope, but he doesn't speak for me and most Christians.
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
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Originally Posted by Kenneth-Kaunda
so what is the difference then, other than semantics?
if the Pope does something wrong does that mean God approves,
and does this extend to priests, archbishops, reverends, vicars and the rest too?
The Catholic Church teaches that popes, priests, bishops etc are sinners. They're required to confess their sins to other priests, even the pope has to go to confession.
The belief is that the Catholic Church is the original one founded by Christ, and therefore it is protected from false teachings by the Holy Spirit.
I'm no longer a Catholic or Christian, but I remember quite a lot about both. If you want to look up Church teachings, you can go to Catechism of the Catholic Church
He is supposed to have divine authority.
Not sure up to what point.
For me they're just a circus where participants and spectators take it seriously.
I stopped being Theist/Catholic some months ago when I understood.
I dare to assure that if EVEN if the Catholic Church declares everything being false, as in: "Well, we regret to tell you blah blah.., that everything has been made up, we don't know if there's a God even if we wish to, go home, Christianity doesn't exist as far as we're concerned"
The "amazing" people will not accept it and then they'll create their own "New" Catholic Church
The pope is only considered infallible when he speaks ex-cathedra from the Throne of St. Peter. That is a rare event.
As for them claiming to the ordained by God, they make the claim based on apostolic succession. Unfortunately that falls apart as there have been periods of time when the Roman Church had 2 or 3 popes at the same time as the position could be purchased or was given as a reward.
did the Catholic Church do much to stop the Nazis?
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