Religion: John the Persuasive

To Roman Catholics, the dogma of papal infallibility is a logical extension of the church’s God-given duty to protect the teaching of Christ from error. To Protestants, infallibility is an unwarranted assumption of power by the Bishop of Rome, and a serious bar to Christian reunion. Last week a Protestant theologian suggested that non-Catholics ought to take another look at the doctrine.

Speaking to a seminar on Christian unity at Manhattan’s Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest, Dr. Ralph Hyslop, Professor of Ecumenical Studies at Union Theological Seminary, affirmed his own belief that doctrinal authority rests with “the Christian congregation” as a whole. But it might be, he mused, that if the Catholics are right, and “if indeed Christ gave to Peter and his successors that Kingly authority which is surely His to give, that the head of the church upon earth might have the power to maintain the truth in spite of all error, then it is unwise to resist the loving summons of the Vicar of Christ.” Moreover, said Hyslop, who is a member of the United Church of Christ, “the embodiment of the doctrine in a person is at this moment in history most persuasive in the person of John XXIII.”