The Papal Office is Damaged Badly, Very Badly - By John Huggins
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So, why would the Roman Pontiff, as an official Petrine act (?), choose secular legal parlance, as opposed to theological parlance, to seemingly condemn capital punishment as immoral? An action of the state no less, who seem to enjoy divine authority in this one particular area?
Everything that Pope Francis does is perpetually confusing because he seems to circumvent theological reality and canonical procedure in a way that you cannot convict him of error. Therefore he cannot bind you with his Pontifical acts because of the unorthodox (read: invalid) use of the Petrine prerogatives.
What is manipulated on earth is not bound in heaven, what is confusing on earth is not bound in heaven, what is invalidly done on earth is not bound in heaven.
What is the bigger picture here? It is not a matter of capital punishment, it is a matter of Church authority and the abuse and manipulation of it. What are we going to do when the smoke clears after he is gone?
The papal office is damaged badly, very badly. It is to the point that very few will ever take it serious again. If the next Roman Pontiff does not aggressively take action and immediately begin to reverse, suppress and/or clarify this mess, then our generation is lost.
It will be eventually rectified but it may take a few hundred years. Christ will keep His promise, but it may not look like what we originally thought.
For the first time in 2,000 years we have learned that we do not exactly understand completely what precisely Christ meant when He said He would be with His Church and protect Her from error in faith and morals.
Either Pope Francis is invalidly elected (which I do not hold) or Christ allows the Roman Pontiff to teach error in faith and morals outside of "solemn infallible definitions" key word "solemn" (see last two paragraphs First Vatican Council).
Right now, Pope Francis has not used his office in a way that binds Catholics in the pew on anything.
I would say that the majority of his major documents are inadmissible.
And, that is probably the only merciful thing that has happened these last five plus years.