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Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
Vatican City
March 7, 2003
Esteemed and dear Ms. Kuby!
Many thanks for your kind letter of February 20th and the informative book which you sent me in the same mail. It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly.
I would like to suggest that you write to Mr. Peter Fleedwood, (Pontifical Council of Culture, Piazza S. Calisto 16, I00153 Rome) directly and to send him your book.
Sincere Greetings and Blessings,
+ Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
That is, basically, what Mike said. The pope can be a total retard anytime he's not speaking officially on behalf of the church, and specifically on faith and morals (not on say, sports, or politics). Also, popes can fall into sin, which would seem obvious (*cough cough history*).The concept of the Church as Teaching Authority begins with the premise that God came to earth in the person of Jesus Christ to teach people how to live in this world so as to inherit eternal life. If this is true, it is important that his teachings continue in the world. The Gospels do not suffice for this purpose because they contain ambiguities. Bible studies, individually pursues, does not resolve these ambiguities because individuals come up with different interpretations. Is divorce permissible? Was Christ born of a virgin? Did his body ascend after death? Is the fourth Gospel authentic? Withou a sure court of appel, moral and theological disintegration seem inevitable. It is to avert such disintegration that the Church stans as the "supreme court," so to speak, to adjudicate between truth and error on important matters.
This idea of the church as Teaching Authority leads in the end to the doctrine of papal infallibility. [...] The earthly head of the Church is the Pope, succssor to St. Pete in the bishopric of Rome. The doctrine of papal infallibility asserts that when the Pope speaks officially on matters of faith and morals, God protects him from error.
This doctrine is so often misunderstood that it must be emphasized that infallibility is a strictly limited gift. It does not assert that the Pope is endowed with extraordinary intelligence. It does not mean that God helps him to know the answer to every conceivable question. Emphatically it does not mean that Catholics have to accept the Pope's view on politics. The Pope can make mistakes. He can fall into sin. The scientific or historical opinions he holds may be mistaken. He may write books that contain errors. Only in two limited spheres, faith and morals, is he infallible, and in these only when he has consulted widely and speaks officially as the supreme legislator of the Church, defining doctrines that should be held by all its members.
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I think that most of the people I spend my time with would come to a very similar conclusion on this subject.
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