Is George Bernard Shaw Correct?

"Those who can, do. Those who can't... teach"

Today I would like to get in a little trouble with my teacher friends. They are overworked, underpaid, and have one of the most important jobs - namely, forming our children. I had some terrific teachers in my lifetime. I also had some average teachers in my life time. I would like to say, for the record, that even if you are an average teacher, you are twice the person I will ever be! God Bless you for dealing with brats all day. I think George was not talking about my teacher-friends... but more made this statement regarding the tenured intellectual snobs who live only in theory and do not know what it is like in the real world. The professors that cancelled their tests because there might be emotional distraught over recent election results come to mind.

This post, of course, is not about how I feel concerning teachers. I brought up teachers because the topic of this post is "What does it mean to teach?" 

Some words only have one level of meaning. An example is "telephone." A telephone is a telephone is a telephone. Some words have more than one level of meaning. Love, for example. "I love those shoes" does not mean you will take a bullet for those shoes I hope. Which brings us to the word teach. To teach is to pass on knowledge. You can be taught a lesson by example. You can teach your kids to tie their shoes. You can teach them the difference between right and wrong. If you are in a pastor, you can teach your flock what it means to be a good Christian. If you are pope you can do that too with Your Holiness's weekly audiences and actions! If you are a pope, you can also solemnly teach the Catholic Church what they need to believe in order to be called Catholic, and if they do not believe it, they are outside of the Church. 

Allow me to opine with everybody's favorite Council: Vatican Two One.(my editorial words in red)

Chapter 4. 
On the infallible teaching authority of the Roman Pontiff

1. That apostolic primacy which the Roman Pontiff possesses as successor of Peter, the prince of the apostles, includes also the supreme power of TEACHING. This Holy See has always maintained this, the constant custom of the Church demonstrates it, and the ecumenical councils, particularly those in which East and West met in the union of faith and charity, have declared it.

6. For the Holy Spirit God's gift of Infallibility was promised to the successors of Peter, not so that they might, by his revelation not private revelation, not a eureka moment, not a gut feeling, not a enlightenment of Jesuit formation make known some new doctrine, like Benedict XVI's "two people can share in one popeship, the Passive and the Active" - or more his contemporary predecessor's "divorced and actively remarried people can receive Holy Communion" but that, by his assistance, they might religiously guard protect from error and faithfully expound define the revelation or deposit of faith transmitted by the apostles. the last one died c. 100 AD meaning no new faith after St. John passed away.

Indeed, their apostolic TEACHING was embraced by all the venerable fathers and reverenced and followed by all the holy orthodox doctors, for they knew very well that this See of St. Peter always remains unblemished by any error that is taught, in accordance with the divine promise of our Lord and Savior to the prince of his disciples: I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.

7. This gift given by God, not made up so Catholics can always be right of truth God's truth, adopted by us... not the other way around and never-failing faith was therefore divinely conferred on Peter and his successors in this See so that they might discharge their exalted office actually do what they were put in place to do for the salvation of all, and so that the whole flock of Christ the Catholic Church might be kept away by them the popes from the poisonous food of error heresy and be nourished with the sustenance of heavenly doctrine what is to be held by Catholics so that we may go to heaven. Thus the tendency to schism schism like the Protestants or schism SSPX??? is removed and the whole Church is preserved in unity, and, resting on its foundation, can stand firm against the gates of hell. Unity is very important, one of the four marks. One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism binds us together.

9. Therefore, faithfully adhering clinging/following anything but not doing your own thing to the tradition received from the beginning of the Christian faith not making up one's own religion, to the glory of God our savior, for the exaltation triumph, supremacy, victory, whats right is placed above what is wrong of the Catholic religion and for the salvation His Holiness's intention is made clear he is doing this for the salvation of souls is making the next statement of the Christian people, with the approval of the Sacred Council not that the approval of the council is needed as we'll see, we the popes use to speak in "royal we", so this plural doesn't mean "I need the council's help to do what I am about to do" but it can mean that the bishops are joining in the popes power to teach TEACH and define as a divinely revealed dogma bingo! - key to all of this that when the Roman Pontiff see? only he needs to define speaks EX CATHEDRA, I didn't caps lock this one, it means From the Chair (comes from the time when teachers sat and students stood) that is I love it! here comes the explination of what Ex Cathedra means, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority making clear to all he is acting in the capacity with infallibility he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals not ecology to be held believed as a matter of Faith by the whole Church all Catholics, no exceptions, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility what he possesses which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining draw a line between what can and cannot be held doctrine concerning faith or morals the two subjects the pope rules over. Therefore, such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the Church again, no synod needed, irreformable.

So then, should anyone, which God forbid, have the temerity audacity to reject this definition of ours: let him be anathema. Cast out! The condemnations let us what is at stake. It makes it clear that this was always Truth.

Lets look at the language of other Infallible teachings from the last time a dogma has been defined Ex Cathedra in 1950!

From Munificentissimus Deus of Pius XII:
"...have invoked the light of the Spirit of Truth... by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God...was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory. Hence if anyone... should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which we have defined, let him know that he was fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic Faith."

Whats on the test? Are things like false worship going to matter when we face our Maker? Yes! Are things like being good stewards of planet Earth going to matter when our soul is judged? Not nearly as much! The point of this blog is to focus on the stuff that actually matters. There are other blogs that have artsy pictures of food from above, or even talk about how great the pope is/isn't. This isn't that blog.

Okay, so far I hope that I have convinced you, dear reader, that the pope speaking Ex Cathedra is the highest form of teaching. What does that mean about when he does mean when he doesn't speak Ex Catherdra? Well...obviously he does not enjoy the gift of Infallibility i.e. can be fallible. When John Paul II said what Archbishop Lefebvre did (disobediently consecrated four bishops in 1988) was a schismatic act, His Holiness was talking off the cuff, not Ex Cathedra. It goes back to "I love those shoes." Love doesn't mean love in that instant... maybe a connotation of affection and desire, but no where near love. When JPII said "schismatic" it didn't meet the real definition of schism. When Henry VIII broke away from Rome and the English bishops renounced their allegiance to Rome, and continued to rule as a counter-Roman church, that does meet the definition of schism!

So the Protestants in England and all over denied the Petrine Primacy, infallibly taught in Chapter One of the First Vatican Council, and they are wrong for doing so. There are probably 100(0) dogmas that were TAUGHT we could go over that the Protestants do not agree with. That makes them outside of the Church, and we should pray for their return. But what about the Traditionalists? They do not accept Vatican II. Why? Well, in short, Vatican two was the antithesis of The Syllabus of Errors by Bl. Pius IX. The Syllabus (hey, thats another teacher word ;) )condemned everything Vatican II stood for. Vatican II is called the French Revolution of the Church so that Fraternity, Liberty, and Equality would reign. What did the Second Vatican Council TEACH? Lets see what the popes said.

"The substance of the ancient doctrine of the Deposit of Faith is one thing, and the way it is presented is another. And it is the latter which must be taken into great consideration with patience if necessary, everything being measured in the forms and proportions of a magesterium which is predominately pastoral in character."

-Pope John XXIII's opening speech of Vatican II. 

"There are those who ask by what authority, what theological qualification, the Council intended to give to its TEACHINGS, knowing that it avoided issuing solemn dogmatic definitions backed by the Church's infallible TEACHING authority. The answer is known by those who remember the concilliar declaration of March 6, 1964, repeated on November 16, 1964. In view of the pastoral nature of the Council, it avoided proclaiming in an extraordinary manner any dogmas carrying the mark of infallibility."

-Pope Paul VI (general audience, Rome, 01-December, 1966)

"The Second Vatican Council has not been treated as a part of the entire living Tradition of the Church, but as an end of Tradition, a new start from zero. The truth is that this particular council defined no dogma at all, and deliberately chose to remain on a modest level, as a merely pastoral council; and yet so many treat it as though it had made itself into a sort of super-dogma which takes away the importance of all the rest."

-then Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (address to the Bishops of Chile, 13-July, 1988)

This post is too long. I need to wrap it up! I will attempt to answer one last question: How does a Traditionalist say that the Church cannot err to a Protestant but say the Church is in error when talking to a non-traditional Catholic? I answer that question with Vatican One. God gave us his Bride, the Church, and handed the spotless Faith which cannot fail because it comes from God, not Man. The Church cannot err. The men leading the Church can, have, and do err. They cannot err if they invoke their potency as the Vicar of Christ teach from the throne of St. Peter and dogmatically teach a truth that all Christians must believe, and that has been held by the faithful since Apostolic times. God has promised us the gift of Infallibility in that circumstance, and if you call yourself Catholic, there is no way around it! If the pope, his College of Cardinals, the USCCB, etc. have their own opinion, that is nothing new. There are lots of times in history the popes have been wrong, and I would be happy to explain to a Protestant why they were wrong. The three cases come that come to mind are Popes Formosus, Honorius, and Liberius. These popes were not wrong because they turned the Vatican into a brothel like Pope Alexander VI... they actually gave their private opinion on matters of faith to the public and were not remembered by history kindly! But they, by the grace of God, never formally taught their "teachings" in dogmatic definitions. The good Christians in those times were right in standing up against the false teachings. They knew the Holy Mother Church is always correct, and someone at the top was screwing up a la St. Paul to the Galatians 1:8.

A Catholic can tell a Protestant that Catholicism is indeed the Inerrant Church that Christ founded on St. Peter. That same person can tell his or her Catholic neighbor that the Church hierarchy is errant and wrong on one or multiple matters (as long as they can back it up) since the pope and the bishops are not the Church The popes and bishops have been given charge to protect the Church's Faith and pass it along unblemished and without adding their own spin. That is why they are there, and it is true that we must obey our Local Ordinaries in everything but sin since they have delegated jurisdiction over us. But with the amount of harm the hierarchy is allowing/promoting, it would be hard to say that we are not in a Crisis of the Faith. There have been persecutions, but we have to acknowledge the past crises and what was the outcome. Here are the Fourth Century words of St. Athanasius to his flock. 

"It is a fact that they have the churches, but you have the Faith...They claim that they represent the Church, but in reality, they are the ones who are expelling themselves from it and going astray."

If there have been past crises, a current crisis of the Faith, then there could even be future crises. (link to The Lord of the World review here!) But we have Christs words to rest on! "The gates of Hell shall never prevail against it!

St. Athanasius, pray for us.