Papal supremacy

“ We give more space to the changes and the condition of the Papal States than to the circumstances of other kingdoms of Europe, because the double power exercised there makes any change interesting, and the extended influence of the spiritual supremacy gives proportionate consequence to any movement or event that disturbs the dominancy of the Bishop of Rome. ”

“ But with the defenders of the papacy and followers of the pope it does. And, consequently, those who are willing to form a politico-religious party, pledged to restore temporal power to the pope, even at the possible hazard of a war with Italy, and entangling alliances with other European powers, are promised a crown of eternal glory; while those who are seeking to maintain our institutions as our fathers framed them are anathematized for the sin of rebellion against papal authority. ”

“ Thus firmly was the Papacy rooted in the middle of the fifth century, not only by the encroachments of bishops, but by the authority of emperors. The papal dominion begins, as an institution, with Leo the Great. As a religion it began when Paul and Peter preached at Rome. Its institution was peculiar and unique; a great spiritual government usurping the attributes of other governments, as predicted by Daniel, and, at first benignant, ripening into a gloomy tyranny,--a tyranny so unscrupulous and grasping as to become finally, in the eyes of Luther, an evil power. ”

“ Thus, the power of the Papal chair is far greater than the power of the throne, and Kings owe obedience and submission to Popes. According as the Pope is through God, and in the place of God, so is every thing placed under him; all matters, both temporal and spiritual, belong to his judgment-seat; he shall teach, exhort, punish, improve, condemn, and decide. The church is the divine judgment-seat, and renders account to God of the sins of mankind. She teaches the right way; she is the finger of God. The Pope is the governor under Christ, and over all. ”

“ The strength of the papacy as against its many enemies lay (1) in the strifes of States and nations, in which the pope could always intervene; (2) in the feeling of many serious men that a central power was needed to control strife and tyranny; (3) in the compiled system of canon law, which expanded still further the code of the Decretals and of Gratian, and constantly exalted the papal power; (4) in the orders of preaching friars, who acted as papal emissaries, and kept in partial discredit the local clergy everywhere ”

“ In theory Papacy and Empire were co-equal powers, religious and secular, together carrying on the noble task of God's government on earth. In practice, as their respective rights and powers had not been definitely set off, they could not agree; each wished to be master. The relations between the two constitute the great axis on which mediæval politics revolve, and for a long time must serve as the main motive of our story. The contest between them for mastery resembles a fencing match, in which the Pope thrusts at the Emperor's crown, the Emperor parries, and lunges back at the papal tiara. ”

“ Consequently, when it is thus made too plain and palpable to admit of fair denial, that the infallibility of the pope is the chiefest and most fundamental dogma of faith—the foundation of the whole system of papal belief—it is positively obligatory upon us, in this country, to understand its full import and meaning. ”

“ For the present, he proclaimed the only doctrine which his pride could brook, namely,—that he held his crown from God alone, to whose Servant, the Pope, it simply belonged to perform the ceremony of coronation. This doctrine of his imperial dignity he caused to be stated in a circular, which he addressed to all the provinces of Germany in vindication of his behaviour towards the papal legates:—a measure rendered imperative by the religious temper of the age. ”

“ At thought of that papal court congealed in ritual, pride, and authority, Pierre suddenly understood what horror and repugnance such a pastor would inspire. How great must be the astonishment and contempt of the papal prelates for that singular notion of the northern mind, a pope without dominions or subjects, military household or royal honours, a pope who would be, as it were, a spirit, exercising purely moral authority, dwelling in the depths of God’s temple, and governing the world solely with gestures of benediction and deeds of kindliness and love! ”

“ Such in brief outline is the matured statement of the relation of the pope to the temporal power, a statement which in no way exaggerated the pretensions avowed in the papal curia. Growing out of a confusion of ancient, and a disdain of the lessons of modern, history it aptly reflects the spirit of a time when the church had become immersed in the cares and interests, which she affected to control, of common worldly politics. ”

“ Not only all the Catholic bishops, but also all Christian princes, even Protestants, were invited to come.
But now the spirit of pride and obstinacy became most apparent. Henry VIII. replied to the Pope that he would never intrust the work of reforming religion in his kingdom to any one except to himself. The apostate princes of Germany told the papal legate that they recognized only the emperor as their sovereign; the Viceroy of Naples allowed but four bishops to go to the council; the king of France sent only three prelates, whom he soon after recalled. ”

“ Viva la Libertad y ayuda á la Libertad! it summoned every citizen to sally forth in arms to defend the liberties of the land. Moreover, he had the power of withholding from execution all papal decrees, and his authority in ecclesiastical matters in general caused him to be popularly termed the married pope. ”

“ But at the same time that the Popes required from subjects obedience to their lawful governments, they have ever defended subjects against the abuse of power, or against the tyranny of unjust rulers. In Pagan times it had the appearance as if the people existed for the sovereign, and not the sovereign for the people; but in the days and in the countries where the spiritual supremacy of the Pope was acknowledged by rulers, the Pagan idea had necessarily to disappear, for the Popes gave the princes to understand that they existed for the people, and not the people for them. ”

“ But as these warlike enterprises of the holy fathers were intimately connected with the convulsions and revolutions of Europe, it will prevent repetition by deferring further allusion to them until we arrive at the subsequent chapters, in which we shall consider the papal political intrigues in general.
The papal monarchy is certainly one of the most crafty, demoralizing, and oppressive despotisms that has ever disgraced the name of government. Its ambition is insatiable, its duplicity inscrutible, and its policy and measures are disgraceful and unprincipled. ”

“ The European people at the time understood him sufficiently well to foresee that all their efforts to limit the monarchical power by constitutions would be unavailing if the papal policy announced by him should prevail. The Roman Catholic populations, already upon the verge of revolution, were specially indignant when they realized that the papacy was thus availing itself of the authority of the Church, not only to defeat the popular will, but to require them to accept these teachings as essential parts of the faith. ”

“ But however unfortunate it ultimately proved, it was in accordance with the ideas and customs of the Middle Ages, without which the papal power could not have been so successfully established. And I take the ground that the Papacy was an institution of which very much may be said in its favor in the dark ages of European society, especially in restraining the tyranny of kings and the turbulence of nobles. Governments are based on expediencies and changing circumstances, not on immutable principles or divine rights. ”

“ It is precisely this supremacy which makes this church an organized unit, and places it in the condition to act with full and complete power. The supremacy of the pope may, therefore, stand for the differentia, and we are willing to accept it as such, with the explanation above given, that it includes also the unbroken unity, together with the plenary judicial and legislative power of the Catholic episcopate as a whole, including both the pope as supreme head, and the bishops as conjudices cum papa, or fellow-judges and rulers, with and under the pope, of the universal church. ”

“ They are satisfied with the fundamental principles of their institutions as they are, and those will find themselves mistaken who shall endeavor to make their tolerance the fulcrum upon which the papal lever may rest, in order that they may be carried back to those "blessed ages" when unquestioning obedience to the pope, upon whatsoever subject he chose to embrace within his spiritual jurisdiction, was considered the highest duty of citizenship and the only road to heaven. ”

“ Others, while recognizing the supreme authority of the papal magisterium in matters of doctrine, confine the infallibility to those cases alone in which the pope chooses to make use of it, and declares positively that he is imposing on all the faithful the obligation of belief in a certain definite proposition, under pain of heresy and exclusion from the Church; they do not insist on any special form, but only require that the pope should clearly manifest his will to the Church. ”

“ He forbade the priests to marry, and demanded that all bishops, who at that time were also temporal princes, should receive their office and their possessions, even their temporal power, not from their worldly overlords, but from his hands. He asserted: "As the moon receives its light from the sun, so emperors and princes receive their power from the Pope. The Pope is the viceregent of Christ upon earth, where the mighty of this world owe him obedience; he alone has the right and the power to appoint them to office, or to depose them." ”

“ There need be said of it only that, in former times, there were powerful Governments subject to the dominion of the popes, but all these have passed away—not a single one is left. Protestant Governments have risen out of the ruins of some, and are now rising out of those of others of them, and all these are happy, prosperous, and progressive; whilst the pope himself, with the vast multitude of his allies assisting him, is devoting all the power given him by the Church to persuade them to retrace their steps and return to the retrogressive period of the Middle Ages. ”

“ In the development of the papacy, the religious element worked first, and afterward the civil power. The former worked upon the ignorance and superstition of the people till it had them awed into submission, and then all was ready for a union of church and state, and temporal power as well as spiritual became the possession of the pope.
In the decline of the papacy, also, the religious element did the first work, and receiving an impetus from the Reformation it gained power till the claims of the pope to temporal dominion were denied him, and the power wrested from his blood-stained hands. ”

“ The struggle between the popes—that is, the papacy—and the Church as an organized body of Christian people, for a conciliar decree of the pope's infallibility, was continued through a period of more than a thousand years, during which some popes exercised it without authority as a cover for persecution, and to justify their unlimited ambition; others to assure themselves of impunity in the commission of enormous crimes; while others, influenced by honest Christian instinct and sentiment, repudiated and condemned it as demoralizing and antichristian. ”

“ A curious and very objectionable feature of the papal monarchy is, a system of searching espionage which it attempts to establish over society. In addition to the confessors and spiritual guides by which the pope seeks to discover the thoughts, and direct the conduct of his Catholic subjects, he employs a set of men and women who, in the capacity of servants scrutinize the domestic affairs of non-Catholics, mark, their conversation, and communicate-all important facts through their superior, to him at Rome. ”

“ Were kings excepted when the Lord said, Thou art Peter? [293] Nay; the salvation of souls demands that the Pope shall have full authority in terra to suppress the waves of pride with the arms of humility. The dictatus papae of the year 1075 make the Pope the head of the Christian world: the Roman Church was founded by God alone; the Roman pontiff alone by right is called universal; he alone may use the imperial insignia; his feet alone shall be kissed by all princes; he may depose emperors and release subjects from fealty; and he can be judged by no man. ”

“ Coming back, then, to the present question, Catholics believe the Pope to be the infallible head of the Catholic Church, not the absolute emperor of the kingdoms of this world. Jesus Christ, whose vicar he is, himself proclaimed, “My kingdom is not of this world.” Nations may assume what form of government best suits them; all that is nothing to the Pope. A Catholic is absolutely free in this country, for instance, to vote whatever ticket he may please, Republican or Democratic. ”

“ It is not difficult to understand that the decline of that great body in those virtues which originally elevated them, should be followed by animosities which would undermine their power. We can see why their moral influence should pass away, even when they were in possession of dignities and honors and wealth. But it is a most singular fact that the Pope himself, with whose interests they were allied,--their natural protector, the head of the hierarchy which they so constantly defended,--should have been made the main agent in their temporary humiliation. ”