Religion: A Challenge to Infallibility

Since the First Vatican Council of 1870, it has been a dogma of the Roman Catholic Church that the Pope, when he speaks ex cathedra on matters of faith or morals, is infallible. In the most provocative religious book of the year, Infallibility and the Evidence (Templegate; $4.95), a Catholic bishop, the Most Rev. Francis Simons of Indore in India, argues that there is no Scriptural evidence for the doctrine. He suggests that it be abandoned.

Dutch-born Bishop Simons, who has been a missionary in India since 1935, expects that he will be asked to resign his see as a result of the book, which he wrote out of intellectual conviction. “Having come to the conclusion that I could prove that the Church’s belief in infallibility is mistaken,” he explains, “I felt I had no choice but to publish my case.” The book will unquestionably be studied with care in the Vatican, since Bishop Simons says flatly that “a scrutiny of the traditional arguments seems to prove that the very structure of infallibility has to be abandoned.”

Unforgettable Memories. The Catholic understanding of infallibility has been largely based on the several Scriptural passages in which Jesus enjoins the Apostles to teach all mankind. Si mons, who accepts the common opinion of Protestant scholars on the question, argues that “these texts do not prove or imply infallibility. What they say is only that Christ wanted the Apostles to teach his gospel, and that they had certain knowledge of what to teach. They had such unforgettable memories of all the main events and teaching of Jesus that they could not err in communicating to their audiences. Their infallibility was not of the theological but of the natural kind—which is another name for unshakably certain knowledge.”

Simons is equally unimpressed by another traditional argument for infallibility: that the Apostles in their teaching had the special protection of the Holy Spirit, and that the church is heir to that divine guidance. Whenever the Apostles call upon the Paraclete for assistance, he points out, it is only to refresh their recollections about details of Christ’s ministry, and never to appeal for “proof that their teaching is true.” Simons cites Jesus’ declaration in John 14:26: “The Holy Spirit will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” In Simons’ view, the obviously personal meaning of the word remembrance “makes the words applicable only to the Apostles.” Nor is there any hint in the Bible, Simons claims, that the Apostles’ successors would inherit more than ordinary providential assistance in interpreting what the Apostles themselves witnessed.

Error and Ignorance. The particular infallibility that is claimed for the Pope is based, in part, on Jesus’ words to Peter in Matthew 16:18. “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.” Simons argues that Jesus was simply singling out Peter as the foremost of the Apostles and was not investing him with a special spiritual charisma in teaching. In any case, he adds, “if the evidence for ecclesiastical infallibility is not valid, the case for papal infallibility collapses with it.”

Simons also says that the mystique of infallibility “has not succeeded in saving the Church, its Popes, Bishops and other members from error and ignorance.” Because of the church’s claim to infallibility, “even her good arguments cease to be effective. Behind them outsiders suspect specious pleadings, not honest attempts to find the truth.” Therefore, Simons concludes, “belief in infallibility is an obstacle to progress and the Gospel’s effectiveness.” It is also, more obviously, an obstacle to Christian unity. Simons argues that the demands of ecumenicism also justify the church’s abandonment of the infallibility claim.

Simons concedes that Christianity needs a teaching body, and he believes that the Pope is and should be the principal spokesman for this magisterium. But he also argues that those who claim to speak and define God’s word should base their right not on an abstract and untenable theological doctrine but on fidelity to Scripture. “For both preachers and audience,” says Simons, “the final fount of the Gospel message is in the New Testament books, the only extant documents connecting us with verifiable certainty with Jesus and his message.” He concludes that by keeping faithful to the record of Christ’s words and deeds, the church will always be able to protect itself against errors that misconstrue the Gospel message.