The General Councils of Latin Christendom: From

Constantinople IV (869/870) to Lateran V (1512-1517)

(Corpus Christianorum Conciliorum Oecumenicorum
Et Generalium) (Latin) Hardcover 31 Dec 2013
by Brepols Publishers (Author)
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https://books.google.ro/books?
id=bHFDxRgddfAC&pg=PA31&lpg=PA31&dq=list+of+participants+council+of+pisa&
source=bl&ots=JCAJo34uUM&sig=ljWspvwao2yyxDMDccIfAH06UzM&hl=ro&sa=X
&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAjgKahUKEwiSwKzp2ITHAhWKXBQKHTkqA7o#v=onepage&q
=list%20of%20participants%20council%20of%20pisa&f=false (sinoadele sec xv)
https://books.google.ro/books?id=P-eVh-lxCi0C&dq=pastor+history+of+the+popes,
+vol+1&hl=ro&source=gbs_navlinks_s (cardinalii in sec xv)

https://books.google.ro/books?
id=Qrt3Z7fyzlUC&pg=PA245&lpg=PA245&dq=conciliarism&source=bl&ots=NM4NJPhNV&sig=Itrndx2jmjrOb9uyt6Ylw3WaXXo&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0CEsQ6AEwBjgK
ahUKEwjkre-fmJHGAhVGK9sKHXu6AN4#v=onepage&q=conciliarism&f=false (Paul
Valliere, Conciliarism 2012)
https://books.google.ro/books?
id=ZdSVnJDClesC&pg=PA31&lpg=PA31&dq=conciliarism&source=bl&ots=yRTp3iQ0
cd&sig=F3saHjDF680K9btsp_vANdJVmO8&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0CEsQ6AEwBjgeahU
KEwi8796ntZHGAhUiKNsKHSKLAMI#v=onepage&q=conciliarism&f=false
(conciliarism ca raspuns la schisma complet)
https://books.google.ro/books?id=EDzSaqXKaEC&pg=PA345&lpg=PA345&dq=conciliarism&source=bl&ots=gQNYh6uw6w&sig=d
wUJnSSdrtoEysrK7PHMNlU1tSA&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAzgoahUKEwi26
s3HtpHGAhUpmtsKHQphAAM#v=onepage&q=conciliarism&f=false
https://books.google.ro/books?id=mCI3inCYOIC&pg=PA121&lpg=PA121&dq=conciliarism+in+canon+law&source=bl&ots=
Hfo4yi6SXN&sig=6Qgo8UM_ML8Lv2VR13_LYZhfpPI&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0CEgQ6
AEwBmoVCh
MIuOHHkbiRxgIV7yDbCh3UbwBm#v=onepage&q=conciliarism%20in%20canon
%20law&f=false (conciliarism and papalism)

http://ziarullumina.ro/primat-si-sinodalitate-11716.html
https://books.google.ro/books/about/General_Councils_1409_1517_Oxford_Biblio.html?
id=JmoHPlYh6RsC&redir_esc=y (bibliografie sinoadele conciliariste)
https://books.google.ro/books?id=VuX9Oe5afooC&printsec=frontcover&dq=subject:
%22Conciliar+theory%22&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0CEEQ6AEwBDgUahUKEwjosWlzpPGAhUDPhQKHdFOABM#v=onepage&q&f=false
https://books.google.ro/books?
id=UBjoAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR7&lpg=PR7&dq=De+Auferibilitate+Papae+ab+Ecclesia&s
ource=bl&ots=F1oP3te_Ql&sig=23ikkdqqJTsUdYkuxBxZC6fWpQ&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjZpOac6HJAhXKpnIKHVUwCSMQ6AEIHjAA#v=onepage&q=De%20Auferibilitate
%20Papae%20ab%20Ecclesia&f=false
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04423f.htm

http://www.csun.edu/~hcfll004/SV1417.html (sinodul de la konstanz pe larg f ok)

http://www.dailycatholic.org/history/16ecume1.htm (sesiunile in engleza tot)
https://books.google.ro/books?
id=cOC_lsbuSrYC&pg=PR13&lpg=PR13&dq=list+of+participants+to+council+of+cons
tance&source=bl&ots=BDzSLTis2t&sig=EfYPh7_ojZ4a32HENfIShfMeS4&hl=ro&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjw9K2oxfLJAhUBNxQKHVcVAGMQ6AEIQDAF#
v=onepage&q=list%20of%20participants%20to%20council%20of
%20constance&f=false
KONSTANZ TOT

Was Conciliarism an "Orthodox" Option in Medieval

Catholicism?
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. Introduction
II. Pope Gregory VII's (Hildebrand's) Papacy (1073-1085): Radical Novelty
or Development?
OVERVIEW
CALVIN'S JAUNDICED VIEW OF GREGORY VII VS. LATER ESTIMATIONS
SHOULD THE GREGORIAN REFORM BE DESCRIBED AS A "REVOLUTION"?
STATE VS. CHURCH AND CAESARO-PAPISM AS THE CULTURAL BACKDROP
LEO THE GREAT, GREGORY THE GREAT AND OTHER EARLY POPES PREFIGURE
GREGORY VII
III. The Relative Importance and Levels of Authority of the Papacy and
Councils in the Western Church
OVERVIEW
PAPAL APPROVAL OF ECUMENICAL COUNCILS
HINCMAR OF RHEIMS (+ 882): A "CONCILIARIST"?
THE ROMAN SEE AND POPES AS THE STANDARD OF ORTHODOXY
THE PAPACY, NOT COUNCILS, AS SUPREME AUTHORITIES IN THE CHURCH
VENERABLE BEDE (+ 735) AND ST. BONIFACE (+ 754) ON PAPAL AND ROMAN
SUPREMACY
WAS PROTESTANT ECCLESIOLOGY A CONTINUATION OF ORTHODOX CATHOLIC
ECCLESIOLOGY?

IV. Conciliarism as Predominantly a Desperate Heterodox Response to a

Cultural Crisis
THE GREAT SCHISM (1377-1417): PRECIPITATING CAUSE OF THE CONCILIARIST
MOVEMENT PROPER
BRIEF SUMMARY OF HISTORIANS' DESCRIPTIONS OF THE NOVEL AND
REVOLUTIONARY (NOT TRADITIONAL) NATURE OF CONCILIARISM
SECULAR POLITICAL POWER AS A DRIVING FORCE BEHIND CONCILIARISM
CONCILIARISM AS A SHORT-LIVED AND HETERODOX PRACTICAL FAILURE
RADICAL CONCILIARISM GONE AWRY: JOHN WYCLIFFE
Bibliography
*****
I. Introduction
Some students of Church history and the history of ecclesiology (the doctrine and
theology of the Church) claim that conciliarism (the notion that ecumenical councils
were superior to the pope) was, in fact, entirely within the realm of "orthodoxy" -- in
terms of the self-understood ecclesiological paradigm of medieval Catholicism, and
that there were several competing ecclesiologies within Catholic Tradition throughout
the Middle Ages: all more or less equally valid. But one must recognize the
distinction between a multiplicity of theories from individuals (which no one denies)
and "orthodoxy" as declared dogmatically by the Church (in ecumenical councils, and
by popes). Strong advocates of a supposedly "orthodox" conciliarism often blur,
overlook, or completely misunderstand this.
The conciliarist position depends on the truthfulness of the premise that it was
supposedly orthodox. If this can be shown to be factually erroneous, then the theory
of an "orthodox Catholic conciliarism" will collapse. Conciliarism "makes sense" and
appear plausible prima facie (all things being equal) if one grants its usual
assumptions about the nature of Catholic orthodoxy, dogma, the history of the
papacy, and so forth. I contend that conciliarism didn't, and (insofar as it has modern
advocates) doesn't properly comprehend those things, as Catholics themselves
understand and believe them to be (as substantiated by historical fact). The great
Catholic historian and writer Hilaire Belloc wrote:

For the matter with which any story of the Reformation deals is the Catholic Church .
. . therefore is full knowledge of the institution essential to knowledge of the conflict .
. . It is not a point of sympathy or dislike. A man may truly relate a battle whether
he applaud or deplore its issue. But he cannot relate it truly if he does not know the
ground.
(Belloc, 10)
I shall contend (primarily by copious citation of both Protestant and Catholic Church
historians) that conciliarism was neither an equally valid ecclesiological view, nor
orthodox, within the paradigm of historic Catholicism in the West (I will not be
dealing with Eastern Christianity).
II. Pope Gregory VII's (Hildebrand's) Papacy (1073-1085): Radical Novelty or
Development?
OVERVIEW
Many conciliarists and other critics of the historic papacy (as construed by Catholics)
contend that Gregory VII's papacy was a radical change from what went before, and
that his policies and method of governance started down a new path which did
incalculable harm. The policies of this papacy are described as "arrogant" and
"triumphalistic".
Our task, therefore, will be to show how Gregory VII's reign was notfundamentally
different from what came before, but merely a consistent development of it. It is not
the purpose of this paper to delve into biblical or patristic support for the papacy as
Catholics understand it, but it will be most helpful and educational to digress a bit in
order to illustrate that the eleventh century did not suddenly usher in some radical
new scenario in ecclesiology.
To do so we will briefly examine some fairly well-known earlier precedents of papal
primacy or papal supremacy, such as Popes Victor, Innocent I, Gelasius, and
especially two widely- and greatly-revered popes: St. Leo the Great and St. Gregory
the Great. These not only contained key elements of the later, more highly developed
Gregorian papacy, but also even the essential components of the definition of
infallibility at the First Vatican Council in 1870.

As throughout this paper, reputable Church historians will be cited -- many of them
Protestant --, since my own judgments and conclusions on these matters carry no
weight, as a non-expert and non-academic.
CALVIN'S JAUNDICED VIEW OF GREGORY VII VS. LATER ESTIMATIONS
We might expect John Calvin to have an attitude of hostility towards what many
regard as the "high water mark" of papal power and influence: the reign of Gregory
VII, from 1073 to 1085). Thus, John Calvin wrote, in his usual subtle, tentative
fashion:
. . . Hildebrand, who called himself Gregory VII, as he was an unclean and wicked
man, betrayed his malicious intention.
(Institutes of the Christian Religion, IV, 11, 13, in McNeill, II, 1225)
Later estimations of the character of Gregory VII are a bit brighter. The Oxford
Dictionary of the Christian Church summarizes modern historical opinion:
Though Gregory was once regarded as an ambitious tyrant, most modern historians
have revised this judgement and are agreed on his purity of intention and his desire
for 'justice'. In his own lifetime the Church suffered division, and he himself incurred
much criticism; but Gregory's example, and the activities of his successors (esp.
Urban II) did much to regenerate the Church.
(Cross, 596)
SHOULD THE GREGORIAN REFORM BE DESCRIBED AS A "REVOLUTION"?
Was papal supremacy and jurisdictional control (though undoubtedly expanded by
Gregory VII) such a radically new concept, such that it can be regarded as
abreak with, or corruption of, precedent? Hardly. Reputable historians (none of the
following men are Catholic, that I am aware of) point out that the eleventh century
was a development of what came before:
. . . the papacy . . . had not yet assumed the central position to be conferred on it by
Gregory VII in the eleventh century, but it already enjoyed a reputation in strong
contrast to the mediocrity of some of its incumbents, appointed at the whim of the
turbulent Roman nobility . . . But for all his weaknesses the pope remained the
successor of the apostles Peter and Paul and their representative on earth. Bodies of

canon law compiled from the ninth century onwards maintain his supremacy in
matters of dogma and discipline. Monasteries and churches placed themselves under
the protection of St Peter and hence of the Roman pontiff. Secular rulers journeyed
to Rome to settle ecclesiastical disputes involving their domains.
Gregory and his supporters were also out to prove that the reforms the proposed
were by no means innovations but merely a return to normal practice.
(Wolff, 146-147, 235)
Richard William Southern was President of St. John's College, Oxford, and also of the
Royal Historical Society. This is how he regarded the Gregorian reform period, even
despite his "anti-papal" bias indicated by his use of the term "papal pretensions" (p.
100), shortly before the following observations:
The minds of these men [post-1050] turned back to a happier period of papal
enterprise. They dedicated themselves to the task of restoring the papacy to the
position which it had held in a remote past and ought to hold again. Above all they
wished to restore the papacy to the controlling and directing role in the church that
(as they thought) it had once had . . .
We have already noticed the extent to which the popes of the earlier period were, so
to speak, swallowed up in the personality of St Peter and were regarded simply as
the mouthpiece of the Apostle. Gregory VII, a child of the Roman church from
infancy, shared this point of view.
(Southern, 100-101, 103)
STATE VS. CHURCH AND CAESARO-PAPISM AS THE CULTURAL BACKDROP
Another important factor to be considered is the fact that the Gregorian reform and
the relative advance in the papal position vis-a-vis secular rulers or the "state,"
represented -- at least in part -- a reaction against the secular rulers appointing
popes and having too much control of the Church (see, e.g., Wolff's reference above
to popes "appointed at the whim of the turbulent Roman nobility"). Thus, it could be
viewed as a welcome renunciation of, and movement beyond the sort of
characteristic caesaro-papism that had been (and continued to be) a huge problem in
Eastern Orthodox Christianity (and later in such strains of Protestantism as
Lutheranism or Cromwellian Puritanism; not to mention Anglicanism).

In the West for a time, and in the East almost perpetually, emperors and kings
controlled the Church or had too much influence in it. Now (in the 11th century) the
Church would control and administer itself. Surely, this as a step up, notdown: a
positive development rather than a negative corruption. One may quibble about the
relative degree and proper boundaries of papal power, but it seems clear that Church
control of itself is preferable to state control. Historians have noted this as well:
In the late fifth century Pope Gelasius I had tried to provide a working formula to
explain the relationship between the spiritual and secular powers. He had argued
that each authority had its own sphere of action, allotted to it by God, that neither
ought to interfere in the work of the other, but that in the last resort the spiritual
power should have the supreme voice, because it was concerned with the salvation
of the souls of all the community, including that of the secular ruler himself . . .
The sacrosanct character which Christianity conferred on the King reached its highest
theoretical extension with the creation of a Christian Western Roman Empire under
Charlemagne and his successors . . . The Emperor, crowned by the Pope and
invested with a majestic though vague authority over the whole Christian community
as a whole, could easily assume the mantle of Constantine and his Caesaro-Papist
successors. The comparative powerlessness of the Church in the senturies after
Charlemagne assisted the trend.
. . . the full implications of the Gelasian theory was taken up by the Papacy during
the Investiture Contest between Pope Gregory VII and Emperor Henry IV. This
ocnflict arose over the issue of the control of appointments to high ecclesiastical
offices, but became a general struggle for supreme authority over the Church. The
Papacy's venerable claims, established in early Christian centuries but obscured by
infiltration of the secular authority, had been reasserted by the so-called Election
Decree of 1059, which reserved the choice of Pope to the College of Cardinals, his
immediate entourage, and expressly ruled out any secular participation in the
election. The fight between the two authorities was waged on the common ground of
acceptance of the premise of a single Christian society with both spiritual and
political aspects.
(Morrall, 156-158)

But this question of lay investiture was as vitally important for the church as for the
state. Not merely was the bishop a great ecclesiastical as aell as political officer, but
manifestly also that close centralization of the church, which was to be the result of
this movement, could not be secured if temporal princes should have the right of
determining what sort of men should occupy places of such ionfluence in the
government of the church. It was as necessary to the centralization and
independence of the church that it should choose these officers as that it should elect
the head of all -- the pope.
. . . It was an act of rebellion on the part of the papacy against the sovereign, who
had controlled it with almost absolute power for a century, and it was the rising into
an equal, or even superior, place beside the emperor of what was practically a new
power, a rival for his imperial position.
For this was what the movement taken as a whole really meant . . . The full power
which so many men in the past had been laboring to secure, though only imperfectly
understanding it, the position toward which through so many centuries she had been
steadily though unconsciously tending, the church now began clearly to see, and to
realize that it was almost attained, and, seeing this, to set about the last steps
necessary to reach the goal with definite and vigorous purpose.
This cannot be doubted by anyone who looks over the acts and claims of the papacy
during the time of Hildebrand . . .
(Adams, 244-245)
LEO THE GREAT, GREGORY THE GREAT AND OTHER EARLY POPES
PREFIGURE GREGORY VII
Following up on the contention that Gregory VII drew on the definite outlines or
precedent of the much earlier papacy of the patristic period, we shall examine how
historians regard several important popes of that era, including Innocent I, Gelasius,
Nicholas I, Agatho, Leo the Great, and Gregory the Great. The well-known Protestant
historian Philip Schaff reveals (typically) his definite Protestant bias, yet
simultaneous fairness to the facts of history and to the history of the Catholic Church
in particular:

The idea of the papacy, and its claims to the universal dominion of the church, were
distinctly put forward, it is true, so early as the period before us [this volume covers
the years 311-600], but could not make themselves good beyond the limits of the
West. Consequently the papacy, as a historical fact, or so far as it has been
acknowledged, is properly nothing more than the Latin patriarchate run to absolute
monarchy.
(Schaff, Vol. III, Chapter V, "The Hierarchy and Polity of the Church," 60.
"The Papacy," p. 300)
In most of the earlier bishops of Rome the person is eclipsed by the office. The spirit
of the age and public opinion rule the bishops, not the bishops them. In the
preceding period, Victor in the controversy on Easter, Callistus in that on the
restoration of the lapsed, and Stephen in that on heretical baptism, were the first to
come out with hierarchical arrogance; but they were somewhat premature, and
found vigorous resistance in Irenaeus, Hippolytus, and Cyprian, though on all three
questions the Roman view at last carried the day.
In the period before us, Damasus, who subjected Illyria to the Roman jurisdiction,
and established the authority of the Vulgate, and Siricius, who issued the first
genuine decretal letter, trod in the steps of those predecessors. Innocent I. (402
417) took a step beyond, and in the Pelagian controversy ventured the bold
assertion, that in the whole Christian world nothing should be decided without the
cognizance of the Roman see, and that, especially in matters of faith, all bishops
must turn to St. Peter.
[Footnote: Ep. ad Conc. Cartha. and Ep. ad Concil. Milev., both in 416. In reference
to this decision, which went against Pelagius, Augustine uttered the word so often
quoted by Roman divines: "Causa finita est; utinam aliquando finiatur error." But
when Zosimus, the successor of Innocent, took the part of Pelagius, Augustine and
the African church boldly opposed him, and made use of the Cyprianic right of
protest."Circumstances alter cases."]
But the first pope, in the proper sense of the word, is Leo I., who justly bears the
title of "the Great" in the history of the Latin hierarchy. In him the idea of the Papacy,
as it were, became flesh and blood. He conceived it in great energy and clearness,
and carried it out with the Roman spirit of dominion, so far as the circumstances of
the time at all allowed. He marks the same relative epoch in the development of the

papacy, as Cyprian in the history of the episcopate. He had even a higher idea of the
prerogatives of the see of Rome than Gregory the Great, . . .
He was animated with the unwavering conviction that the Lord himself had
committed to him, as the successor of Peter, the care of the whole church.
[Footnote: Ep. v. ad Episcopos Metrop. per Illyricum constitutos, c. 2 (ed. Ball. i.
617, in Mignes Patristic Libr. vol. liv. p. 515): "Quia peromnes ecclesias cura nostra
distenditur, exigente hoc a nobisDomino, qui apostolicae dignitatis beatissimo
apostolo Petro primatum fidei suae remuneratione commisit, universalem ecclesiam
in fundamenti ipsius [Quesnel proposes istius for ipsius] soliditate constituens,
necessitatem sollicitudinis quam habemus, cum his qui nobis collegii caritate juncti
sunt, sociamus."]
He anticipated all the dogmatical arguments by which the power of the papacy was
subsequently established. He refers the petra, on which the church is built, to Peter
and his confession. Though Christ himselfto sum up his views on the subjectis in
the highest sense the rock and foundation, besides which no other can be laid, yet,
by transfer of his authority, the Lord made Peter the rock in virtue of his great
confession, and built on him the indestructible temple of his church. In Peter the
fundamental relation of Christ to his church comes, as it were, to concrete form and
reality in history. To him specially and individually the Lord intrusted the keys of the
kingdom of heaven; to the other apostles only in their general and corporate
capacity. For the faith of Peter the Lord specially prayed in the hour of his passion, as
if the standing of the other apostles would be the firmer, if the mind of their leader
remained unconquered. On Peter rests the steadfastness of the whole apostolic
college in the faith. To him the Lord, after his resurrection, committed the care of his
sheep and lambs. Peter is therefore the pastor and prince of the whole church,
through whom Christ exercises his universal dominion on earth. This primacy,
however, is not limited to the apostolic age, but, like the faith of Peter, and like the
church herself, it perpetuates itself; and it perpetuates itself through the bishops of
Rome, who are related to Peter as Peter was related to Christ. As Christ in Peter, so
Peter in his successors lives and speaks and perpetually executes the commission:
"Feed my sheep." It was by special direction of divine providence, that Peter labored
and died in Rome, and sleeps with thousands of blessed martyrs in holy ground. The
centre of worldly empire alone can be the centre of the kingdom of God. Yet the

political position of Rome would be of no importance without the religious

considerations. By Peter was Rome, which had been the centre of all error and
superstition, transformed into the metropolis of the Christian world, and invested
with a spiritual dominion far wider than her former earthly empire. Hence the
bishopric of Constantinople, not being a sedes apostolica, but resting its dignity on a
political basis alone, can never rival the Roman, whose primacy is rooted both in
divine and human right. Antioch also, where Peter only transiently resided, and
Alexandria, where he planted the church through his disciple Mark, stand only in a
secondary relation to Rome, where his bones repose, and where that was completed,
which in the East was only laid out. The Roman bishop is, therefore, the primus
omnium episcoporum, and on him devolves the plenitudo potestatis, the solicitudo
omnium pastorum, and communis cura universalis ecclesiae.
[Footnote: These views Leo repeatedly expresses in his sermons on the festival of St.
Peter and on the anniversary of his own elevation, as well as in his official letters to
the African, Illyrian, and South Gallic bishops, to Dioscurus of Alexandria, to the
patriarch Anatolius of Constantinople, to the emperor Marcian and the empress
Pulcheria. Particular proof passages are unnecessary. Comp. especially Ep. x., xi.,
xii., xiv., civ.-cvi. (ed. Baller.), and Perthel, l.c. p. 226-241, where the chief passages
are given in full.]
. . . Whosoever, says he, is not with the apostolic see, that is, with the head of the
body, whence all gifts of grace descend throughout the body, is not in the body of the
church, and has no part in her grace . . .
(Schaff, III, Chapter V, "The Hierarchy and Polity of the Church," 63. "Leo the
Great. A.D. 440-461," pp. 314-315, 317-319)
The first Leo and the first Gregory are the two greatest bishops of Rome in the first
six centuries. Between them no important personage appears on the chair of Peter;
and in the course of that intervening century the idea and the power of the papacy
make no material advance. In truth, they went farther in Leos mind than they did in
Gregorys. Leo thought and acted as an absolute monarch; Gregory as first among
the patriarchs; but both under the full conviction that they were the successors of
Peter.

. . . Simplicius (468483), saw the final dissolution of the empire under Romulus
Augustulus (476), but, as he takes not the slightest notice of it in his epistles, he
seems to have ascribed to it but little importance. The papal power had been rather
favored than hindered in its growth by the imbecility of the latest emperors. Now, to
a certain extent, it stepped into the imperial vacancy, and the successor of Peter
became, in the mind of the Western nations, sole heir of the old Roman imperial
succession.
. . . Gelasius I. (492496) clearly announced the principle, that the priestly power is
above the kingly and the imperial, and that from the decisions of the chair of Peter
there is no appeal.
(Schaff, III, Chapter V, "The Hierarchy and Polity of the Church," 64. "The Papacy
from Leo I to Gregory I. a.d. 461590," pp. 323-324)
. . . it cannot be denied that Gregory [the Great; r. 590-604], while he protested in
the strongest terms against the assumption by the Eastern patriarchs of the
antichristian and blasphemous title of universal bishop, claimed and exercised, as far
as he had the opportunity and power, the authority and oversight over the whole
church of Christ, even in the East. "With respect to the church of Constantinople," he
asks in one of his letters, "who doubts that it is subject to the apostolic see?" And in
another letter: "I know not what bishop is not subject to it, if fault is found in him."
"To all who know the Gospels," he writes to emperor Maurice, "it is plain that to
Peter, as the prince of all the apostles, was committed by our Lord the care of the
whole church (totius ecclesiae cura) .... But although the keys of the kingdom of
heaven and the power to bind and to loose, were intrusted to him, and the care and
principality of the whole church (totius ecclesiae cura et principatus), he is not called
universal bishop; while my most holy fellow-priest (vir sanctissimus consacerdos
meus) John dares to call himself universal bishop. I am compelled to exclaim: O
tempora, O mores!"
[Footnote: Epist. V. 20 (III. 745). He quotes in proof the pet-texts of popery, John
xxi. 17; Luke xxii. 31; Matt. xvi. 18.]
We have no right to impeach Gregorys sincerity. But he was clearly inconsistent in
disclaiming the name, and yet claiming the thing itself. The real objection is to the
pretension of a universal episcopate, not to the title. If we concede the former, the

latter is perfectly legitimate. And such universal power had already been claimed by
Roman pontiffs before Gregory, such as Leo I., Felix, Gelasius, Hormisdas, in
language and acts more haughty and self-sufficient than his.
(Schaff, IV, Chapter 4, "The Papal Hierarchy and the Holy Roman Empire,"
51. "Gregory and the Universal Episcopate," pp. 224-225)
. . . Agatho (678681). After sufficient preparations, he called, in concert with
Agatho, a General Council . . .
The epistle of Agatho is a worthy sequel of Leos Epistle to the Chalcedonian Council,
and equally clear and precise in stating the orthodox view. It is also remarkable for
the confidence with which it claims infallibility for the Roman church, in spite of the
monotheletic heresy of Pope Honorius (who is prudently ignored). Agatho quotes the
words of Christ to Peter, Luke 22:31, 32, in favor of papal infallibility, anticipating, as
it were, the Vatican decision of 1870.
(Schaff, IV, Chapter XI, "Doctrinal Controversies," 112. "The Sixth Oecumenical
Council. a.d. 680," pp. 499-500)
Nicolas I. is the greatest pope, we may say the only great pope between Gregory I.
and Gregory VII. He stands between them as one of three peaks of a lofty mountain,
separated from the lower peak by a plane, and from the higher peak by a deep
valley. He appeared to his younger contemporaries as a "new Elijah," who ruled the
world like a sovereign of divine appointment, terrible to the evil-doer whether prince
or priest, yet mild to the good and obedient. He was elected less by the influence of
the clergy than of the emperor Louis II., and consecrated in his presence; he lived
with him on terms of friendship, and was treated in turn with great deference to his
papal dignity. He anticipated Hildebrand in the lofty conception of his office; and his
energy and boldness of character corresponded with it. The pope was in his view the
divinely appointed superintendent of the whole church for the maintenance of order,
discipline and righteousness, and the punishment of wrong and vice, with the aid of
the bishops as his executive organs. He assumed an imperious tone towards the
Carolingians. He regarded the imperial crown a grant of the vicar of St. Peter for the
protection of Christians against infidels. The empire descended to Louis by hereditary
right, but was confirmed by the authority of the apostolic see.

(Schaff, IV, Chapter 4, "The Papal Hierarchy and the Holy Roman Empire,"
61. "Nicolas I., April, 858-Nov. 13, 867," p. 274)
Philip Schaff, the great Protestant Church historian, whom no one would accuse of
having a "Catholic bias" in matters of either history or dogma, thus (rather
decisively) substantiates my point of view on the development of the papacy. I shall
cite some of his most striking words again, so the crucial point will not be lost in the
multitude of words in these quite-necessary and important citations:
The idea of the papacy, and its claims to the universal dominion of the church, were
distinctly put forward, it is true, so early as the period before us. [311-600]
Innocent I. (402417) . . . ventured the bold assertion, that in the whole Christian
world nothing should be decided without the cognizance of the Roman see.
[Leo the Great; r. 440-461] was animated with the unwavering conviction that the
Lord himself had committed to him, as the successor of Peter, the care of the whole
church. He anticipated all the dogmatical arguments by which the power of the
papacy was subsequently established.
[Leo the Great thought that] the bishopric of Constantinople, not being a sedes
apostolica, but resting its dignity on a political basis alone, can never rival the
Roman, whose primacy is rooted both in divine and human right.
Whosoever, says he [Leo the Great], is not with . . . the head of the body, whence all
gifts of grace descend throughout the body, is not in the body of the church, and has
no part in her grace.
Gelasius I. (492496) clearly announced the principle, that the priestly power is
above the kingly and the imperial, and that from the decisions of the chair of Peter
there is no appeal.
. . . it cannot be denied that Gregory [the Great; r. 590-604] . . . claimed and
exercised, . . . the authority and oversight over the whole church of Christ, even in
the East.
. . . such universal power had already been claimed by Roman pontiffs before
Gregory, such as Leo I., Felix, Gelasius, Hormisdas, in language and acts more
haughty and self-sufficient than his.

Agatho [r. 678-681] quotes the words of Christ to Peter, Luke 22:31, 32, in favor of
papal infallibility, anticipating, as it were, the Vatican decision of 1870.
[Nicolas I; r. 858-867] anticipated Hildebrand in the lofty conception of his
office; . . . The pope was in his view the divinely appointed superintendent of the
whole church for the maintenance of order, discipline and righteousness, and the
punishment of wrong and vice, with the aid of the bishops as his executive organs.
The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church agrees with Schaff's overall appraisal,
starting with Pope Victor I [r. 189-198], and summarizing the accomplishments of
many significant popes. Victor I set the date for Easter for the whole of Christianity:
The whole incident is an important step in the history of the Papal supremacy.
(Cross, 1437)
Damasus (r. 366-384):
Damasus did much to strengthen the position of the see of Rome (Decree of Gratian,
378).
(Cross, 374)
Siricius (r. 384-399):
His pontificate is of importance as marking a new stage in the development of Papal
authority.
(Cross, 1280)
Innocent I (r. 402-417):
He insisted that major cases of dispute should be brought to the judgement of the
Apostolic See. His determination to exercise authority in the East as well as the West
is reflected in his support of St. John Chrysostom against his adversaries . . .
(Cross, 703)
Leo the Great (r. 440-461):
His Papacy is remarkable chiefly through the enormous extent to which he advanced
and consolidated the influence of the Roman see. At a time of general disorder he
sought to strengthen the Church by energetic central government, based on a firm
belief that the supremacy of his see was of Divine and Scriptural authority, and he

pressed his claims to jurisdiction in Africa, Spain, and Gaul. He also secured from
Valentinian III a rescript which recognized his jurisdiction over all the Western
provinces.
(Cross, 811)
Simplicius (r. 468-483):
. . . he considerably advanced the jurisdictional claims and prestige of the Holy See.
In the East he successfully intervened in defence of the Chalcedonian formula against
its Monophysite critics.
(Cross, 1278)
Gelasius (r. 492-496):
On his accession to the Papacy he continued the policy of his predecessor, Felix III, in
tenaciously upholding the primacy of the Roman See against Constantinople during
the Acacian Schism.
(Cross, 552)
Hormisdas (r. 514-523):
Hormisdas secured in 519 . . . the signature of John, the Patriarch of Constantinople,
and afterwards of some 250 Eastern bishops, to a dogmatic formula (the 'Formula
Hormisdae') in which . . . Acacius and other heretics were expressly condemned, and
the authority of the Roman see (on the basis of Mt. 16.18) was strongly emphasized.
(Cross, 666)
Gregory the Great (r. 590-604):
In his frequently strained relations with the East he upheld the supremacy of the
Roman see and refused to recognize the title of 'Oecumenical Patriarch', adopted by
the Patriarch of Constantinople . . . His pontificate and personality did much to
establish the idea in men's minds that the Papacy was the supreme authority in the
Church.
(Cross, 594-595)
Nicholas I (r. 858-867):
He successfully asserted the supremacy of the see of Rome against Archbishop John
of Ravenna . . . Similarly, Hincmar of Reims was obliged to acknowledge the right of
the Papacy to intervene in disputes.

(Cross, 970)
We see not a word of alleged multiple ecclesiologies, or of councils as equally or
more authoritative and influential (let alone "orthodox") as the papacy in any of this
(for example, councils attempting to curb the growing exercise and claims of papal
power and jurisdiction). The chief claims to authority were popes and emperors, not
"popes vs. councils," as conciliarists imply was the scenario throughout the late
patristic period and Middle Ages.
Instead, historical fact (as summarized above) demonstrates a steady procession of
popes, one after another (ten are listed above, from the years 189-867, but mostly
from 366-604) who consistently view the papacy as the supreme office in the
Church. Their views are entirely consistent with those of the later Gregory VII, whose
policies were but a development of the earlier papacy, not a "revolution" or "radical"
change. The popes could and did appeal to both Holy Scripture and the prominence
of Rome as the final destination of the Apostles Paul and Peter. Other rival sees could
claim little or nothing of the sort, except for raw power based on historical
expedience or royal favor.
Gregory VII's policies were not radically different from the previous papacy
(especially from the patristic period some 300-700 years earlier), and were a
consistent development. Moreover, I have demonstrated this mostly by citing
Protestant historians and plenty of historical "substance."
III. The Relative Importance and Levels of Authority of the Papacy and Councils in
the Western Church

OVERVIEW
Some Protestant apologists contend that later "Protestant conciliarism" (a curious
concept in and of itself) or the Protestant ecclesiology in general of the so-called
"magisterial reformers", can legitimately appeal to a supposedly "orthodox" tradition
of conciliarism and be regarded as a consistent continuation or development of it. In
so doing, They hope to demonstrate that Protestantism (every bit as much as
Catholicism) is equally "historical" and "organically connected" to the thought and
theology of Middle Ages which preceded its genesis (at least with regard to

ecclesiology). It is an attempt to be "deep in history," yet to remain proudly

Protestant.
But is this scenario consistent with the facts and the ecclesiology of the medieval
Catholic Church as self-understood? I shall argue below that the answer is definitely
"no." Oftentimes, these apologists are merely anachronistically applying Protestant
modes of thinking to Catholic thinking. This is, of course, improper and
fundamentally in error. To analyze the Catholic tradition and attempt to derive one's
own tradition from it, it is necessary to understand that tradition as it was
understood by its own adherents and practitioners. This is particularly true
concerning the criteria of orthodoxy, which every community determines for itself.
With this introductory background, let us turn again to the historians.
PAPAL APPROVAL OF ECUMENICAL COUNCILS
Philip Schaff dates the practice of papal approval of councils to the Council of
Chalcedon in 451:
The papal confirmation, on the contrary, was not considered necessary, until after
the fourth general council, in 451. And notwithstanding this, Justinian broke through
the decrees of the fifth council of 553, without the consent, and in fact, despite the
intimated refusal of Pope Vigilius. In the middle ages, however, the case was
reversed. The influence of the pope on the councils increased, and that of the
emperor declined.
(Schaff, Vol. III, Chapter V, "The Hierarchy and Polity of the Church," 65. "The
Synodical System. The Ecumenical Councils," p. 338)
Latourette and Pelikan also offer similar observations:
We have noted how Leo's Tome set forth the doctrinal position which was approved
by the Council of Chalcedon. Leo declined to recognize as valid the canon enacted by
that body which elevated the see of Constantinople to a position substantially equal
with that of Rome, thus seeming to assert the right of his office to dissent from
decrees of a general or ecumenical council but basing his opposition in part on the
finality of what had been done earlier at Nicaea.
(Latourette, 186)

. . . the theory which had prevailed in the West for the past several centuries . .
which insisted that the Pope alone could call a general council, that either he or his
representative must preside, and that none of its actions was valid without his
approval.
(Latourette, 628)
. . . his definition of what constituted an ecumenical and orthodox council had at its
center the stipulation that the pope must validate such an assembly for it to have
universal authority over the church.
(Pelikan, 231, referring to the views of Anselm of Havelberg [12th century]; drawing
from his Dialogues in Constantinople with Nicetas of Nicomedia, 3, 12; Patrologia
Latina [PL] 188:1226-1228)
HINCMAR OF RHEIMS (+ 882): A "CONCILIARIST"?
In an effort to find a "conciliarist" in the late first millennium, some modern-day
conciliarists propose Hincmar of Rheims (c. 806-882). But is it accurate to describe
this great bishop and canonist as a "conciliarist," if by that we mean a denial of papal
supremacy? No, it is not. Historian Warren Carroll, founder of Christendom College,
and author of a six-volume history of Christianity (four completed as of this writing),
fills in the record a bit:
. . . the Pope [Nicholas] had made it unmistakably clear to all Christendom that kings
as well as other Christians were under the law of Christ and that His Vicar would
enforce His law . . . Pope Nicholas received an appeal against Hincmar from Bishop
Rothad of Soissons, whom Hincmar had deposed and confined in a monastery. The
Pope required Hincmar, very much against his will, to allow Rothad to come to Rome.
Hincmar, though a proud prelate who responded with detailed arguments justifying
his actions regarding Rothad, nevertheless wrote to Pope Nicholas:
I know that we as bishops are subject to the Pope of Rome . . . If it shall be your
pleasure to restore Rothad, I will submit quietly to your will.
. . . Later, Hincmar's own right to be Archbishop of Reims was challenged before Pope
Nicholas. In July 867 Hincmar sent this letter to the great Pope, by some pilgrims
travelling to Rome:
I am sure that my Creator must see rust of evil deeply ingrained upon my soul, or He
would not expose it so often to this purgatorial fire from the seat of Apostolic
authority. I know that in other ways I am a sinner; but I have ever been a faithful

and a devoted subject of the Holy See and its rulers. With all contrition and with all
the humility within me, I beg you not to believe any man who shall tell you that in
this I lie. Ever since I received your letter, I have not had a thought of withstanding
in any way the decision made at Soissons in 866 and confirmed by you.
(Carroll, 351-352, citing Eleanor S. Duckett, Carolingian Portraits, a Study in the
Ninth Century [Ann Arbor, MI: 1962, 1969, 244, 253-254] )
Non-Catholic historian Jaroslav Pelikan, of Yale University: a highly-revered scholar
and expert on the development of doctrine throughout Church history, concurs with
Carroll's judgment:
. . . Western doctrine had already moved unmistakably in the direction of papal
monarchy, which was to reach its climax in the thirteenth century. In Isidore's
formula, the pope, as supreme pontiff, was "the chief of priests . . . the highest
priest"; it was he who appointed all other priests in the church and who had all
ecclesiastical offices at his disposal. Therefore even so vigorous a proponent of the
special claims and administrative autonomy of metropolitans as Hincmar, the
archbishop of Reims in the ninth century, pointed out, in his very defense of these
claims, that "solicitude for all the churches has been committed to the holy Roman
church, in Peter, the prince of the apostles." His quarrels were with individual
incumbents of the papacy over particular matters of policy and ecclesiastical
administration, never with the status of Rome as the principal see of Christendom.
The church of Rome was "the mother and the teacher {mater et magistra}," whose
authority was to be consulted on all questions of faith and morals, and her
instructions were to be obeyed.
(Pelikan, 48; citing or drawing from Hincmar and Isidore:
On the Rights of Metropolitans, 18 and 4; Patrologia Latina (PL) 126:199 and
126:190
Epistles, 169; Monumenta Germaniae Historica (MGH);Epistolae 8:154
On the Divorce of Lothair and Tetberga, pr.; PL 125:623
Isidore of Seville [c. 560-636]: Origins, 7,12,13; PL 82:291 )
THE ROMAN SEE AND POPES AS THE STANDARD OF ORTHODOXY
Contrary to some conciliarist claims, the see of Rome and the popes were indeed the
standards of orthodoxy throughout these years, according to historians:
Elaborating on the metaphor of the church as mother, he [Hincmar] characterized
"the catholic, apostolic, and holy Roman church" as the one who had "given birth to
us in faith, fed us with catholic milk,' nourished us with breasts full of heaven until
we were ready for solid food, and led us by her orthodox discipline to perfect

manhood." To those who were faithful and pious members of the catholic church, the
validity of a doctrine could be established simply by showing what this church taught.
Not only did the church decide which books belonged in the Catholic canon of
Scripture; it was also the attestation of "the holy see of Rome" that provided
credentials for the church fathers, so that "if there are some who are called doctors
{of the church}, we do not accept or cite their statements in proof of the purity of
the faith unless that same catholic mother church has decreed that their statements
are sound."
(Pelikan, 48; citing Hincmar of Rheims:
On Predestination, 4 and 24; Patrologia Latina (PL) 125:88 and 125:214
Epistles, 99; Monumenta Germaniae Historica (MGH);Epistolae 8:48 )
Kenneth Scott Latourette, the renowned Baptist Church historian from Yale, agrees,
concerning the patristic period:
As we have seen, the Popes usually took an active part in the controversies of the
fourth and fifth centuries over the relation of the divine and human in Jesus Christ
and between Augustinianism and Pelagianism and, with two possible and brief
exceptions, were on the side which the majority eventually regarded as orthodox.
Rome was more and more esteemed in the Catholic Church as the representative
and champion of true Christianity.
(Latourette, 186)
Before receiving his pallium a new archbishop was required to make a written
statement of his orthodox faith, and this requirement established the pope as the
judge of orthodoxy at the highest provincial level of the ecclesiastical hierarchy.
(Southern, 97-98)
The entire authority of the Gospels proclaimed what all the statements of the
apostles affirmed, and this was also what the great broad world believed and what
the Roman church declared. Hincmar of Rheims lined up "the authority of the Holy
Scriptures" with that of "the orthodox teachers" and that of the Roman see as
witnesses to the truth of Christ and of his church. This also implied that it was up to
the church to decide which books belonged to the canon of Scripture.
(Pelikan, 43-44, citing Hincmar and drawing from three other notable figures:

Alcuin [c. 735-804], Epistles, 23; Monumenta Germaniae

Historica (MGH): Epistolae 4:62.
Hincmar, On Predestination, pr.; Patrologia Latina (PL): 125:65.
Isidore of Seville, Prefaces to the Books of the Old and New Testaments (In libros
veteris ac novi testamenti proema), 8; PL 83:158.
Ambrose Autpert [d. 779], Commentary on the Apocalypse, 10; from Corpus
christianorum. Continuatio mediaevalis (Turnhout, Belgium, 1966 -): 27:868.)
The subject of such ecclesiological predicates as "one" or "catholic" was the
institutional, hierarchical church, more specifically, the body of those who
acknowledged the authority of the see of Rome. To be a catholic rather than a
schismatic, one had to follow the well-established authority of the Roman church.
Those who had separated themselves from this authority were accused of supposing
that Christ had a church no broader than their own sect, and hence of believing that
power in the church had been taken away from its legitimate incumbents and
transferred to the few who belonged to this "new church." Outside the borders of the
true church it was useless to make a boast oof one's orthodoxy or of adherence ot
the catholic faith. Authentic orthodoxy and legitimate church membership were
inseparable. "For our part," Alcuin announced, "we take our stand firmly within the
borders of the apostolic doctrine and of the holy Roman church, following their
established authority and clinging to their sacred doctrine, introducing nothing new
and accepting nothing apart from what we find in their catholic writings." This was
the only reliable guarantee of believing correctly and thereby of attaining salvation in
the kingdom of heaven.
Standing behind the guarantee was the apostle Peter, to whom the keys of the
kingdom of heaven had been entrusted. He was, in a title originally applied to the
Roman god Janus, "the heavenly wielder of the keys, who throws open the gate of
heaven."
. . . Aldhelm, used the words of Christ to Peter in Matthew 16:18-19 to argue that "if
the keys of the kingdom of heaven have been conferred on Peter by Christ . . . , who
can triumphantly enter into the gates of the heavenly Paradise if he scorns the chief
statutes of {Peter's} church and despises the commandments of its doctrine" about
the date of Easter? It was a violation of "the rule of the catholic faith on the basis of
the commandments of Scripture" for English monks not to comform to "the tonsure
of Saint Peter, the prince of the apostles." century or so later, another scion of the
English church objected to the use of salt in the celebration of the Eucharist on the
grounds that "this custom is neither observed by the universal church nor validated
by the authority of Rome."

(Pelikan, 45-47, drawing from or citing:

Alcuin, Epistles, 137 and 23; Monumenta Germaniae
Historica (MGH): Epistolae 4:215 and 4:61-62.
Aldhelm [d. 709], Epistles, 4; MGH: Auctores Antiquissimi, 15:486.
Alcuin, Against Felix, 1,4; Patrologia Latina (PL): 101:131.
Matthew 16:19
Ovid.Fasti 1:228.
Aldhelm, Hymns (Carmina ecclesiastica), 1,6; 4, 1, 2; MGH: Auctores Antiquissimi,
15,11; 19.
Aldhelm, Epistles, 4; MGH: Auctores Antiquissimi, 15:485 and 15:482.
Alcuin, Epistles, 137; Monumenta Germaniae Historica(MGH): Epistolae 4:211. )
But in opposition to such local usage there stood the universal rule of prayer as set
down by the church of Rome. Its liturgical tradition went back to Peter and Paul
themselves, and therefore its usage was authoritative. Hence it was appropriate to
quote from the Roman liturgy in establishing the orthodoxy of the anti-adoptionist
position.
(Pelikan, 68; drawing from:
Bishops of Francia, Epistle to Elipandus, 7; Monumenta Germaniae
Historica (MGH): Concilia 2: 1:145.
Hincmar of Rheims, On the Deity as One and Not Three, 13; Patrologia Latina (PL):
125:573.
Alcuin, Against Felix, 7, 13; PL 101:227. )
THE PAPACY, NOT COUNCILS, AS SUPREME AUTHORITIES IN THE CHURCH
Latourette comments on the period roughly between 500 and 1000, and on Gregory
the Great's papacy in particular (590-604):
These many tribal, embryonic national Christian communities possessed a common
tie in the Church of Rome. The popes were increasingly acknowledged as the visible
head of the Church and to a greater or less extent exercised supervision.
(Latourette, 352)
In the general disorder, the Papacy, under some very able men, markedly increased
its power and extended the geographical range of its authority. In principle, as we
have seen, even before the year 500 its claims were sweeping . . .

[Gregory the Great] insisted on the primacy of Rome, especially against the claims of
the Patriarch of Constantinople . . . Gregory was not just another consul: he was a
consul of God and the empire which he sought to strengthen was, as he saw it, the
kingdom of God in which Christ was ruler and the Pope, as Peter's successor, Christ's
viceregent . . . More than any other one man, Gregory laid the foundations for the
power which the Church of Rome was to exercise in the Western Europe of the next
nine centuries . . .
This trend towards regarding the popes as the successors of the Caesars and the
Papacy as the exponent and protector of Romanitas . . . gave to the Church of the
West a structural unity, helped to hold Europe together, and made for civilization.
(Latourette, 337, 339-340)
. . . the Christianity of the West was dominated by Rome. In spite of its weakness in
the last half of the ninth and the first half of the tenth century, the Bishopric of
Rome, the Papacy, exerted an influence over almost all Western Christendom. Only
over the far periphery, especially Ireland, and Spain under the Arabs did it have little
control . . . a degree of unity to Western Christendom which was in striking contrast
with the increasing and enduring schisms in the East.
(Latourette, 368)
R.W. Southern makes many fascinating comments about the period:
The fall of the Roman Empire . . . was complete by the end of the seventh century. It
was then that the work of rebuilding began. The dominating ideal in the rebuilding
was that the unitary authority of the Empire should be replaced by the unitary
authority of the papacy . . . An imperial papacy was the main articulate principle
behind the medieval reconstruction of society . . .
It was this attempt at imperial reconstruction uner papal auspices that gives a
measure of unity to the Middle Ages -- not as the coiners of the phrase imagined, by
abandoning the ideals of the ancient world, but by attempting to give them new life .
. . the attempt to keep the Roman Empire alive was not entirely chimerical. Looked
on in this perspective it is not absurd to say that the Roman Empire achieved its
fullest development in the thirteenth century with Innocent IV playing Caesar to
Frederick II's Pompey.

The unity of the period from the seventh to the sixteenth century comes from the
more or less effective preservation of a unity that draws its strength from the ancient
world . . .
During the whole medieval period there was in Rome a single spiritual and temporal
authority exercising powers which in the end exceeded those that had ever lain
within the grasp of a Roman Emperor. Of course the papacy changed greatly in the
course of these centuries. Its pretensions were never the same as its practice, and
even its strongest advocates differed about the legitimate limits of the papal primacy.
Nor did it lack open enemies. The Greek Church in its slow decline, the majority of
secular rulers at one time or another, and a wide variety of anti-hierarchical critics
throughout the Middle Ages opposed a steady resistance to the most cherished
claims of the papacy. It is an illusion to think of the Middle Ages as a time of
unanimity. The nature of the papal monarchy and the medieval objection to it will
need careful consideration. But it would be foolish to make too many qualifications at
the outset. For the whole of this period -- from the age of Bede to that of Luther,
from the effective replacement of imperial by papal authority in the West in the
eighth century to the fragmentation of that authority in the sixteenth . . . the papacy
is the dominant institution in western Europe.
. . . In 1453 the papal view of Christendom had triumphed. More than any other
force it had been responsible for giving western Christendom an independent
existence in the eighth century, and for providing a doctrinal basis for western
supremacy from the eleventh century onwards. The movement towards Conciliar
government in the church, which might have offered a new path to unity, had in the
end collapsed, not least because of the strength of the papacy. So, from the point of
view of Christendom as a whole, the papacy was the great divisive force throughout
the Middle Ages. But, from the point of view of the West, it was the source of unity
and the symptom of strength.
(Southern, 24-26, 89-90)
To write briefly about the medieval papacy without being superficial requires a strict
limitation of the questions to be discussed. Even then it will not be easy. The
splendour and overwhelming authority of the papal position during most of our
period, the wealth of documents, and the ramifications of papal activity into every

corner of Europe and into every branch of European life make limitation difficult. The
thirteenth-century formula Papa qui et ecclesia dici potest: 'the Pope who also can be
called the Church' has sufficient truth in it to make it hazardous to treat the papacy
as an institution apart from the body which it animated.
(Southern, 91)
. . . no one in the West denied that the pope possessed all the authority of St Peter
over the church. The derivation of the pope's authority seemed one of the clearest
facts of history. The descent of this authority could be traced step by step from the
earliest days without any of the shadows of ambiguity or ignorance that trouble a
modern observer . . . From the beginning St Peter and his successors could be seen
at work directing the church, instituting ceremonies, defining discipline, founding
bishoprics. This scheme of things had the same unambiguous clarity as the
generations of mankind from Adam.
. . . It was possible to say in a quite practical way, without any thought of metaphor,
that men met in Rome 'in the presence of St Peter'. This presence was the source of
western unity during these centuries. It was a unity compatible with the very
slightest exercise of administrative authority.
. . . It seems to have been in England in the seventh century that the idea first took
root that no archbishop could exercise his metropolitan functions until he had
received a pallium from Rome. But whatever the origins of the practice, it soon
became universal in the provinces of the western church . . . there was established a
single chain of profession and obedience throughout the western church.
(Southern, 94, 96-98)
Referring even to the period of the Great Schism, prominent Church historian Alister
E. McGrath states:
It was widely accepted that the final arbiter in all doctrinal disputes within the church
was the pope.
(McGrath, 35)
This authority and state of affairs dates from the 4th century, as J.N.D. Kelly, the
great Anglican patristic scholar observes:

By the middle of the fifth century the Roman church had established,de jure as well
as de facto, a position of primacy in the West, and the papal claims to supremacy
over all bishops in Christendom had been formulated in precise terms . . . The
student tracing the history of the times . . . cannot fail to be impressed by the skill
and persistence with which the Holy See was continually advancing and consolidating
its claims . . . it was easy to draw the inference that the unique authority which
Rome in fact enjoyed, and which the popes saw concentrated in their persons and
their office, was no more than the fulfillment of the divine plan.
(Kelly, 417)
VENERABLE BEDE (+ 735) AND ST. BONIFACE (+ 754) ON PAPAL AND
ROMAN SUPREMACY
In his descriptions of Peter, Bede likewise made use of traditional prerogatives. He
called Peter "the patron of the entire church" and "the first pastor of the church," as
well as "the prince of the apostles" . . . Bede could take the commission to Peter to
mean that "the Lord commanded St. Peter to take care of his entire flock, that is, of
the church," . . .
. . . He customarily referred to Rome as "the holy and apostolic see," and he
supported the authority of Roman doctrine and practice as catholic against local
deviations from it.
(Pelikan, 46-47; citing the Venerable Bede (c. 673-735):
History of the Abbots, I; 2, in Charles Plummer,Venerabilis Baedae opera historica,
Volume I: Text, Oxford: 1896.
Exposition of I Peter, 5; PL 93: 64-65.
Ecclesiastical History, 1, 29; 2, 1; 3, 25; in Plummer, 63; 73; 188)
We have determined in our synod: that we shall maintain the catholic faith and unity
and our subjection to the Roman Church as long as we live; that we shall be the
willing subjects of St. Peter and of his Vicar; that we shall hold a synod every year;
that our metropolitan bishops shall ask for their palliums from that See; and that in
all things we shall obey the orders of St. Peter according to the canons, so that we
may be counted among the sheep entrusted to his care. To these declarations we
have all agreed and subscribed, and we have forwarded them to the shrine of St.
Peter, prince of the Apostles. The Roman clergy and the pontiff have gratefully
accepted them.

. . . And every bishop finding himself unable to reform or correct some fault in his
own diocese shall lay the case openly in the synod before the archbishop for
correction, just as the Roman Church, at my ordination, bound me by an oath that if
I should find priets or people wandering from the law of God and could not correct
them, I would always faithfully report the case to the Apostolic See and the Vicar of
St. Peter for settlement. Thus, if I am not mistaken, should every bishop do to his
metropolitan, and he to the Roman pontiff, if the case cannot be settled among
themselves. So shall they be guiltless of the blood of lost souls.
(St. Boniface [680-754], in Downs, 57-58; citing Ephraim Emerton, translator, The
Letters of St. Boniface [Records of Civilization, 31, Columbia University Press, New
York, 1940], 136-141)
WAS PROTESTANT ECCLESIOLOGY A CONTINUATION OF ORTHODOX
CATHOLIC ECCLESIOLOGY?
Luther tends to defend the sola scriptura principle by emphasizing the confusion and
incoherence of medieval theology, whereas Calvin and Melanchthon argue that the
best catholic theology (such as that of Augustine) supports their views on the priority
of Scripture.
(McGrath, 142)
In other words, rather than being a continuation of medieval theology and
ecclesiology, early Protestantism, according to McGrath, either rejected medieval
theology as confused and corrupt (Luther, whose disdain for Scholasticism is wellknown) or hearkened back to St. Augustine 1100 years earlier, skipping the entire
Middle Ages. Thus, speaking of the so-called "Reformers"' outlook, and after citing
John Calvin, McGrath writes:
Historical continuity is of little importance in relation to the faithful proclamation of
the Word of God . . . Where catholics stressed the importance of historical continuity,
the reformers emphasized equally the importance of doctrinal continuity. While
Protestant churches could not generally provide historical continuity with the
episcopacy . . . they could supply the necessary fidelity to Scripture -- thus, in their
view, legitimating the Protestant ecclesiastical offices. There might not be an
unbroken historical link between the leaders of the Reformation and the bishops of
the early church, but, the reformers argued, since they believed and taught the same
faith as those early church bishops (rather than the distorted gospel of the medieval
church), the necessary continuity was there none the less.

. . . The opponents of the Reformation, however, were able to draw on a dictum of

Augustine: 'I should not have believed the gospel, unless I was moved by the
authority of the catholic church.'
(McGrath, 143)
This analysis is quite at odds with some Protestant apologists' failed attempt to make
Protestantism consistent with the period which came before it. This is as true of
ecclesiology (closely related to the issue of sola Scriptura, which involves the nature
of authority) as it is of the theology of salvation, or soteriology (primarily,
justification), and other areas where Protestantism introduced previously-unknown or
scarcely-known beliefs. They were radicals andrevolutionaries in these respects, just
as the conciliarists had been.
It makes sense to draw that comparison in that respect, but not to claim that
conciliarism was every bit as orthodox as papal supremacy; therefore, Protestantism
continued one valid Catholic tradition and can thus claim historical continuity and
consistent development from one form of Catholic "orthodoxy." Such a mythical and
non-factual scenario has been, I think, systematically dismantled by the observations
of the historians compiled here.
McGrath provides a fascinating commentary on the relationship of Scripture and
Tradition in early Protestant thought, and shows how the founders of Protestantism
struggled with this issue
(in trying very hard to be equally "historical" as Catholics and Orthodox, as
Protestants):
The only wing of the Reformation to apply the scriptura sola principle consistently
was the radical Reformation, or 'Anabaptism' . . .
The magisterial Reformation was painfully aware of the threat of individualism, and
attempted to avoid this threat by stressing the church's traditional interpretation of
Scripture where this traditional interpretation was regarded as correct. Doctrinal
criticism was directed against those areas in which catholic theology or practice had
gone far beyond, or to have contradicted, Scripture. As most of these developments
had taken place in the Middle Ages, it is not surprising that the reformers spoke of
the period 1200-1500 as an 'era of decay' or a 'period of corruption' which they had

a mission to reform. Equally, it is hardly surprising that we find the reformers

appealing to the Fathers as generally reliable interpreters of Scripture.
. . . This understanding of the sola scriptura principle allowed the reformers to
criticize their opponents on both sides -- on the one side the radicals, on the other
the catholics. The catholics argued that the reformers elevated private judgement
above the corporate judgement of the church. The reformers replied that they were
doing nothing of the sort: they were simply restoring that corporate judgement to
what it once was, by combating the doctrinal degeneration of the Middle Ages by an
appeal to the corporate judgement of the patristic era.
(McGrath, 144-146)
The early reformers were convinced that the medieval church had become corrupted
and its doctrine distorted through a departure from Scripture on the one hand and
through human additions to Scripture on the other.
. . . this understanding of the church is functional, rather than historical: what
legitimates a church or its office-bearers is nothistorical continuity with the apostolic
church, but theologicalcontinuity.
. . . most of the radicals . . . were equally consistent in their views of the institutional
church. The true church was in heaven, and its institutional parodies were on earth.
Luther was thus forced to deal with two difficulties. If the church was not defined
institutionally, but was defined by the preaching of the gospel, how could he
distinguish his views from those of the radicals? He himself had conceded that 'the
church is holy even where the fanatics (Luther's term for the radicals) are dominant,
so long as they do not deny the word and the sacraments'. Alert to the political
realities of the situation, he countered by asserting the need for an institutional
church. Just as he tempered the radical implications of the scriptura sola principle by
an appeal to tradition . . . , so he tempered his potentially radical views on the
nature of the true church by insisting that it had to be viewed as an historical
institution . . .
Luther is thus obliged to assert that 'the false church has only the appearance,
although it also possesses the Christian offices'. In other words, the medieval church

may have looked like the real thing, but it was really something rather different. The
logic of the situation became impossible . . .
Luther accepted Augustine's view of the church as a 'mixed' body, whereas the
radicals developed a Donatist view of the church as a body of the just, and the just
alone . . .
But what basis did Luther then have for breaking away from the Catholic church?
Does not this aspect of his theory of the church necessarily imply that there will
always be corruption in the true church? On the basis of Augustine's theory,
corruption in the Catholic church does not necessarily mean that it is a 'false church'.
(McGrath, 190-194)
McGrath (one of the premier experts today on late medieval theology and doctrinal
development) argues that the early Protestants were opposed to the historical
developments of the Middle Ages almost on principle. They virtually "ditched" the
entire period and went straight back to the Church Fathers, whom they mistakenly
regarded as some sort of proto-Protestants and advocates ofsola Scriptura (neither
opinion is true, of course, as can easily be demonstrated).
This is what I have often called "the Protestant myth" (I used to strongly believe in it
myself): the romantic, wistful longing to return to a supposed Golden Age of the
Church before all the alleged corruptions of Rome and the papacy; where the holy
Church Fathers (people like Augustine and Athanasius: perhaps the two Father most
beloved of Protestants, iinasmuch as they consider the period at all)en masse,
followed Bible Alone and Faith Alone, and so forth. I have dealt with these topics at
length elsewhere.
The case for the "Protestant Myth of Origins" (i.e., that Protestantism is a direct
derivation of patristic theology) is difficult enough to make; in fact (I would argue)
literally impossible (and this becomes abundantly clear, in proportion to how familiar
one becomes with patristic theology). The early Protestants -- and Protestants
characteristically ever since (though not necessarily, by their own initial principles,
correctly understood) -- were "anti-Middle Ages." They didn't seem to think that the
period could be "co-opted" for Protestantism, and generally regarded the Middle Ages

as a thoroughly Catholic period: thereby corrupt, and not in accord with Protestant
theology and thought, which was a reaction against it.
McGrath admits that there is a difficulty in the Protestant view, such that it produces
a certain inconsistency (excepting the Anabaptist tradition, which, according to
McGrath, is "the only wing of the Reformation" which is "utterly consistent" in its ahistoricism, or application of "the scriptura sola principle" and which "had no place
whatsoever for the 'testimony of the Fathers' " [p. 146]). He takes great pains to
show that the mainstream Reformation (Luther, Calvin, Zwingli) was not "antihistorical," yet he sees that they are not entirelyconsistent in this regard. I
completely agree with this analysis. McGrath refers to the "new evangelical churches"
and then describes Calvin's view:
For Calvin, the marks of the true church were that the Word of God should be
preached and the sacraments rightly administered. Since the Roman Catholic church
did not conform even to this minimalist definition of the church, the evangelicals
were perfectly justified in leaving it. And as the evangelical churches conformed to
this definition of a church, there was no justification for further division within them.
(McGrath, 194)
Note how he distinguishes between the Reformed and Catholic churches and
compares Calvin to Lenin, as a revolutionary:
By the time of Calvin's death (1564), the Reformed church was as institutionalized as
its Catholic counterpart and had become its most formidable opponent . . .
The establishment of an ecclesiastical apparatus appropriate to Calvin's goals must
be regarded as one of the most significant aspects of his ministry, and lends added
weight to the case for comparing Calvin to Lenin; both were admirably aware of the
importance of institutions for the propagation of their respective revolutions, and lost
no time in organizing what was required.
(McGrath, 195-196)
This analysis runs contrary to a certain sophisticated, historically-minded Protestant
self-perception which holds that Protestantism is part of the "catholic church" in
some sense, not "separate" from it, and that the movement and its founders
never intended to separate. The very term "reformer" implies aninternal reform of an

existing institution, without overthrowing or leaving it. This is why I don't think
"reformer" is an accurate term for the Protestant Founders, viewed in relation to the
Catholic Church that existed before them. I have always thought of the so-called
"Reformation" as, rather, a "revolt."
McGrath broadly supports my sociological opinion on this matter by speaking of
separate institutions, self-consciously set up as "opponents" to the institutional
Catholic Church. He refers to Calvin's work as a "revolution" and compares him to
Lenin (a most apt comparison, in my opinion, in the precisely limited sense in which
McGrath intends). This is refreshing to observe (especially coming from such a
respected Protestant historian).
Though granting an extreme minimalist Christian legitimacy to the Catholic Church
(e.g., valid baptism), Calvin nevertheless is more or less absolutely opposed to the
institutional Catholic Church:
. . . nothing could be less like the Church than the Pope and his gang; that a hotchpotch of corrupt inventions infected with so many superstitious fictions is far from
the genuine faith. But with all their furious impudence they will never stop the truth,
which we have so often and firmly maintained, from prevailing in the end.
(Balke, 229-230; from Calvin's commentary on John 9:15)
Lastly, Calvin "held that a definite pattern of church government was prescribed by
Scripture" (McGrath, 200). But McGrath notes how he contradicts himself:
Curiously, the lists of ecclesiastical offices (IV. iii. 3; IV. iii.4; IV. iv. 1) which Calvin
presents within the Institutes do not harmonize, and leave both the status of elders
(or presbyters) and the number of ministries in some doubt.
(McGrath, 200)
IV. Conciliarism as Predominantly a Desperate Heterodox Response to a Cultural
Crisis
THE GREAT SCHISM (1377-1417): PRECIPITATING CAUSE OF THE
CONCILIARIST MOVEMENT PROPER
Just as the residence of the popes at Avignon exacerbated the situation so did the
Great Schism in the Church which occurred in 1378 . . . It lasted till 1417, but its

consequences lasted long after that. These consequences were: a forced

administrative division of the Church into regions largely corresponding with
kingdoms; a sharp decline in the standing of the pope vis-a-vis princes; a doctrine
that councils of the Church were in the last resort superior to popes . . .
In the course of these years a doctrine had grown up, embodied in a decree or canon
of the Council, which said that a General Council was in the last resort superior to a
pope . . .
(Denys Hay, "The Background to the Reformation," in Hurstfield, 12)
If conciliar doctrine arose as a "consequence" of, and had "grown up" because of the
Great Schism, how can anyone contend (as some do) that it was a standard option in
ecclesiology all the way back to the 4th century?
Conciliar Theory. The doctrine that the supreme authority in the Church lies with a
General Council. The movement associated with this theory culminated in the 15th
century, but the foundations of it were laid in the early years of the 13th . . . The
outbreak of the Great Schism in 1378 raised the question of the supremacy of
authority in an acute form.
(Cross, 326)
Again, if the "foundations" of conciliarism arose in the early 13th century (the above
source traces it to Hugh of Pisa, who died in 1210), then someone must be right and
someone wrong.
Conciliarism, in the Roman Catholic Church, a theory that a general council of the
church has greater authority than the pope and may, if necessary, depose him.
Conciliarism had its roots in discussions of 12th- and 13th-century canonists who
were attempting to set juridical limitations on the power of the papacy.
(Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1985, III, 515)
In truth, that Church [the "Gallican" / French church], during the Merovingian period,
testifies the same deference to the Holy See as do all the others. Ordinary questions
of discipline are in the ordinary course settled in councils, often held with the assent
of the kings, but on great occasions -- at the Councils of Epaone (517), of Vaison
(529), of Valence (529), of Orleans (538), of Tours (567) -- the bishops do not fail to
declare that they are acting under the impulse of the Holy See, or defer to its
admonitions; they take pride in the approbation of the pope; they cause his name to

be read aloud in the churches, just as is done in Italy and in Africa they cite his
decretals as a source of ecclesiastical law; they show indignation at the mere idea
that anyone should fail in consideration for them. Bishops condemned in councils -like Salonius of Embrun Sagitarius of Gap, Contumeliosus of Riez -- have no difficulty
in appealing to the pope, who, after examination, either confirms or rectifies the
sentence pronounced against them. The accession of the Carlovingian dynasty is
marked by a splendid act of homage paid in France to the power of the papacy:
before assuming the title of king, Pepin makes a point of securing the assent of Pope
Zachary.
. . . Under Gregory VII the pope's legates traversed France from north to south, they
convoked and presided over numerous councils, and, in spite of sporadic and
incoherent acts of resistance, they deposed bishops and excommunicated princes
just as in Germany and Spain
In the following two centuries Gallicanism is even yet unborn; the pontifical power
attains its apogee in France as elsewhere, St. Bernard, then the standard bearer of
the University of Paris, and St. Thomas outline the theory of that power, and their
opinion is that of the school in accepting the attitude of Gregory VII and his
successors in regard to delinquent princes, St. Louis, of whom it has been sought to
make a patron of the Gallican system, is still ignorant of it -- for the fact is now
established that the Pragmatic Sanction, long attributed to him was a wholesale
fabrication put together (about 1445) in the purlieus of the Royal Chancellery of
Charles VII to lend countenance to the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges.
At the opening of the fourteenth century, however, the conflict between Philip the
Fair and Boniface VIII brings out the first glimmerings of the Gallican ideas. That king
does not confine himself to maintaining that, as sovereign he is sole and independent
master of his temporalities; he haughtily proclaims that, in virtue of the concession
made by the pope, with the assent of a general council to Charlemagne and his
successors, he has the right to dispose of vacant ecclesiastical benefices. With the
consent of the nobility, the Third Estate, and a great part of the clergy, he appeals in
the matter from Boniface VIII to a future general council -- the implication being that
the council is superior to the pope. The same ideas and others still more hostile to
the Holy See reappear in the struggle of Fratricelles and Louis of Bavaria against
John XXII; they are expressed by the pens of William Occam, of John of Jandun, and

of Marsilius of Padua, professors in the University of Paris. Among other things, they
deny the Divine origin of the papal primacy, and subject the exercise of it to the good
pleasure of the temporal ruler. Following the pope, the University of Paris condemned
these views; but for all that they did not entirely disappear from the memory, or
from the disputations, of the schools, for the principal work of Marsilius, "Defensor
Pacis", wax translated into French in 1375, probably by a professor of the University
of Paris The Great Schism reawakened them suddenly. The idea of a council naturally
suggested itself as a means of terminating that melancholy rending asunder of
Christendom. Upon that idea was soon grafted the "conciliary theory", which sets the
council above the pope, making it the sole representative of the Church, the sole
organ of infallibility. Timidly sketched by two professors of the University of Paris,
Conrad of Gelnhausen and Henry of Langenstein, this theory was completed and
noisily interpreted to the public by Pierre d'Ailly and Gerson.
. . . The principal force of Gallicanism always was that which it drew from the
external circumstances in which it arose and grew up: the difficulties of the Church,
torn by schism; the encroachments of the civil authorities; political turmoil; the
interested support of the kings of France.
(Herbermann, The Catholic Encyclopedia, "Gallicanism," VI, 353-355)
Liberal Catholic historian Francis Oakley spectacularly confirms my point about the
late-breaking nature of conciliarism over against papal supremacy, in the very title of
his new book: The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church
1300-1870 (Oxford University Press, 2004: see http://www.oup.co.uk/isbn/0-19926528-3?view=rights). Why in the world would he date the movement proper or
"tradition" from the year 1300 if, in fact, the tradition was fully in evidence as a rival
ecclesiology, as far back as the 4th century? Certainly (it seems quite reasonable to
suppose) if there were earlier prominent movements, they would have been included
in such a book (unless it was strictly confining itself to one particular period). The
first two chapters are entitled:
1. "Christendom's Crisis: The Great Schism, the Conciliar Movement, and the Era of
Councils from Pisa to Trent"
2. "Gerson's Hope: Fifteenth-Century Conciliarism and its Roots"
The synopsis for the book on amazon.com reads in part:

. . . the council [of Constance] gave historic expression to a tradition of conciliarist

constitutionalism which long competed for the allegiance of Catholics worldwide with
the high papalist monarchical vision that was destined to triumph in 1870 at Vatican
I and to become identified with Roman Catholic orthodoxy itself. This book sets out
to reconstruct the half-millennial history of that vanquished rival tradition.
"Half-millennial" = 500 years, dating the movement (counting back to 1870) to
approximately 1370, not 370. Philip Hughes comments upon the "desperate"
confusion of the period of the Great Schism. But note how these opinions were not
held by bishops and popes and councils, but merely byindividual theologians:
And in all these years there was a continuous discussion in the world of theologians
and lawyers and royal councillors, not only as to ways and means, practical plans to
end the schism, but as to rights and duties: the rights of subjects to take control
when rulers show themselves incapable or unwilling, and the Church seems to be
drifting to its ruin; the rights of bishops vis-a-vis their chief, the pope; the rights of
the learned, expert in the theology of the Church and its law; the rights of the clergy
in general; the rights of the laity . . . All manner of theories, and interpretations of
law, and of past events, came in these desperate years into men's minds. The new
ideas, the suggested solutions, passed from one university to another, and were
passionately discussed at all levels of society.
(Hughes, 262)
To argue that every opinion on ecclesiology was "orthodox" would be as silly as
saying that Bishop Spong's views within Anglicanism represent traditional Anglican
orthodoxy. Some advocates of traditional conciliarism want to declare all these
theories orthodox. But how is (and was) that determined within the Catholic Church
itself, according to its self-perception? According to historians of the Catholic
Church, Rome and the popes decide that, as seen in Section V. Hughes also calls
them "new ideas." That does not sound like these notions of conciliarism derived
from some 1000 years before and developed continuously within the Western
Tradition concerning authority and ecclesiology, as a "live option," as some would
have us believe.
Barbara W. Tuchman, two-time Pulitzer Prize winning historian, confirms that the
period of confusion (brought on by the Great Schism) was led by the "circumference"
of the Church, not the "center," and that these ideas wereinnovations, not prior
traditions (let alone "orthodox" ones), in her popular work,A Distant Mirror:

All this time the dominant intellectual effort of Europe was engaged in continuous,
contentious, and intense activity to end the papal schism and bring about reform
within the Church. Both aims depended on establishing the supremacy of a Council
over the papacy. As long as both popes persistently refused to abdicate, an agreedupon ending of the schism was impossible, leaving a Council the only alternative . . .
only by establishing the authority of a Council could an instrument of reform be
obtained. Serious theologians struggled seriously with these problems in a genuine
effort to effect change and find a way to limit and constitutionalize the powers of the
papacy . . . Summoned not from the center of the Church but from the
circumference, by universities, sovereigns, and states, the Councils met at Pisa,
Constance, and Basle.
(Tuchman, 589-590)
A. G. Dickens believes that such upheavals were not the norm in medieval times:
Millions of orthodox men and women lived out their short life-spans in a seemingly
immutable setting. Only here and there in the long story of medieval Europe did
circumstances threaten to destroy public regard for papal and priestly authority.
(Dickens, 10)
After citing the radical ideas of Marsiglio of Padua (d. 1342), including the placement
of "the authority of a General Council of the Church above that of the pope," Dickens
calls such views "heterodox":
. . . one of his colleagues was another famous figure, the Nominalist philosopher
William of Ockham (d. 1349), who maintained similarly heterodox views concerning
the nature and functions of the priesthood.
(Dickens [2], 40)
Two pages later, Dickens described the conciliarist declarations concerning the
papacy of the Council of Constance (1414-1418) as "revolutionary work," and the
ideas of the Council of Basle (1431-1439) "even more radical." This does not sound
like "multiple traditions." It is more like the historian's description of an attempt to
supplant one tradition with another (as "revolutions" and "heterodoxies" attempt to
do, by nature).
Renowned Catholic historian Joseph Lortz (generally considered "fair" to
Protestantism, conciliatory, and the very opposite of a so-called "triumphalist"

historian, while remaining an orthodox Catholic) paints the same general picture.
Note his descriptions of conciliarism as a new innovation:
The council [of Constance] enumerated the doctrine of the supremacy of the
universal council (conciliar theory) over the pope. It is true that the most influential
leaders of the movement at the time were not extremists. They realized that the
theory was novel but felt that the present exigency called for this new way. In fact
they could find no other solution to the crisis. But even though viewed as a
temporary expedient, the theory is false and contravenes the order established by
Christ for the government of His Church. It was never approved by the pope -- in
confirming the canons of the council Martin V rejected it.
(Lortz [2], 268)
. . . there was at that time a progressive liberalism and even recklessness of
theological speculation and discussion which not infrequently was carried beyond the
point of reasonable restraint.
(Lortz, 53)
Lortz makes an extremely relevant statement (for our purposes) concerning the
rampant speculation of the time, which did not necessarily preclude the loss of any
notion of "orthodox" Catholic teaching:
. . . we can now sum up: There existed in the late Middle Ages a dangerous
theological uncertainty of such a degree that it was relatively easy for a theologically
independent man to become a heretic.
This does not mean that it was impossible at that time to determine accurately what
the correct teaching of the Church was and to hold fast to it in its totality. But it was
possible only under certain conditions. It required the presence of what, since
Ignatius of Loyola, has been commonly called Sentire cum ecclesia -- a being in tune
with the Church.
(Lortz, 63)
Thus, modern-day conciliarists and theological liberals, not being "in tune" with
Catholic thinking and often misunderstanding it (and not even grasping the nature of
Catholic orthodoxy, and how it is determined within that milieu), look at the period
and accept the false notion that all theories were equally orthodox and acceptable

within a Catholic framework, simply because they existed and were adopted by some
prominent and pious men.
Protestants too often apply their distinctively Protestant thinking to the period and
anachronistically assume that it was a precursor to later Protestant ecclesiological
thought (because -- in the final analysis -- they impose the later thought onto earlier
Catholic intellectual turmoil and confusion). This is, of course, circular reasoning. As
we have seen, both Protestant and Catholic historians inform us that conciliarism was
new and novel, and was not in line with traditional Catholic orthodoxy.
Noted cultural historian Christopher Dawson also believes that the fourteenth century
was a reversal of what came before, not a culmination of some ten centuries of
development of "multiple traditions of authority":
From the tenth to the thirteenth century the movement of European culture under
the urge of a powerful religious impulse had been centripetal, towards unity and
towards the ideals of Catholic universalism. From the beginning of the fourteenth
century this tendency is reversed and a centrifugal movement sets in which
ultimately culminates in the Reformation and the complete destruction of the
religious unity of Christendom. The territorial element in the Church once more
reasserted itself as opposed to the tradition of Catholic universalism, whose claims
now seemed irreconcilable with the prerogatives of the new national monarchies. The
causes of this change are complex and obscure, since they involve a number of both
sociological and religious factors.
. . . the reformers themselves began to abandon the cause of the Papacy [due to the
Great Schism] and to look for help either to the secular power, as did Dante and
William of Ockham and the Spiritual Franciscans, or, like Gerson and d'Ailly and
Langenstein, to the territorial Church and to the ecclesiastical parliamentarism of the
Council of Constance, which in Dr. Figgis's phrase, "attempted to turn into a tepid
constitutionalism the divine authority of a thousand years."
(Dawson, 101-102; citing John Neville Figgis, From Gerson to Grotius 1414-1625,
2nd edition, Cambridge University Press, 1916, 35)
From this impasse [the Great Schism] there was no outlet by the accepted principles
of canon law, and the time had come when William of Ockham's revolutionary ideas
could bear fruit. The leadership of Christendom now passed to the University of Paris,

which was the last stronghold of medieval unity and also the great center of
Ockhamist thought.
For the next thirty or forty years the doctors of Paris championed the cause of unity
against the Popes and Kings and succeeded in achieving a brief triumph through the
Conciliar Movement.
. . . The General Councils which were convoked to end the Schism under the
influence of the University of Paris and the French monarchy were unlike the General
Councils of the past. They were parliaments of Christendom, which were attended by
the whole body of Christian princes with two or three exceptions, and in which the
representatives of the universities played a larger part than the bishops.
(Dawson [2], 27)
The famous historian Will Durant gives the same general analysis, consistent with all
of the above accounts:
Rebellious philosophers, almost a century before [early 14th century], had laid the
theoretical foundations of the "conciliar movement" . . . Heinrich von Langenstein, a
German theologian at the University of Paris, applied (1381) these ideas to the Papal
Schism. Whatever logic there might be, he argued, in the claims of the popes to
supremacy, a crisis had arisen from which logic offered no escape but one: only a
power outside the papacy, and superior to the cardinals, could rescue the Church
from the chaos that was destroying her; and that authority could only be a general
council.
(Durant, 9)
Baptist Church historian Kenneth Scott Latourette agrees, as well:
. . . conciliar theory . . . Obviously it was entirely counter to the theory which had
prevailed in the West for the past several centuries.
(Latourette, 628)
Noted Catholic historian, Henri Daniel-Rops, author of the massive sevenvolumeHistory of the Church of Christ, elaborates, with a strong and insightful
analysis:
The Council of Pisa was the work of a group of avant-garde intellectuals, who
regarded it as an opportunity to legislate for all Christendom in the name of doctrines

which they themselves had evolved. These doctrines were nothing less than
revolutionary, intended to impose a new concept of the Church. But they derived
additional force from the whole tendency of the age, were intimately linked with the
nationalist theories which the emergence of the modern states was bringing into
fashion, and were also contaminated to some extent by completely heretical theses,
such as would soon be advanced by Wyclif and John Huss.
What was the constitution of the Church, according to traditional doctrine as
expressed by the greatest of thirteenth-century scholars? All of them, from
Alexander of Hales to St Bonaventure, from St Albert the Great to St Thomas, were
agreed upon four principles: the Church was a monarchy, governed by one leader,
the Pope; the primacy of the Pope derived only from Christ through Peter, and not, in
any sense whatsoever, from delegation by the faithful; the advice of the leaders of
the Church meeting in council, should one be convened, could be effective only if
accepted by the Pope, and conciliar decisions were valid only if confirmed by him;
and finally, since the Pope was sovereign judge in all matters of faith and discipline,
no one might appeal against his edicts to another tribunal, to wit, a council. It was
against these four principles, which are still regarded as fundamental, that the
revolutionaries rebelled.
The revolutionary movement had sprung into being during the last years of the
thirteenth century and the first of the fourteenth, in the persons of Marsilio of
Padua and Ockham . . .
These rash theories had not become widely known when they were countered by a
tradition of a thousand years and more, which viewed any schismatic tendency with
horror. The Church attacked them as soon as she became aware of their existence,
and in the University of Paris teachers were for some time onliged to swear an oath
that they would not read The Defender of the Peace. The Greaty Schism, however,
provided these subversive doctrines with an opportunity to spread, and in some
cases to triumph. After all, since the Papacy was obviously disintegrating, were the
conciliar theorists not correct in their conclusions? 'Who wants to found the stability
of the Church upon Peter's infirmity?' inquired one Parisian schoolman, Pierre d'Ailly;
and no one could gainsay him. Tragic though it was to hear it formulated, the whole
question arose from the scandal.

. . . As can be seen, these were completely new ideas; had they been adopted, they
would have undermined the Church's order and overthrown her most basic
institutions. But in the impassioned atmosphere into which the Schism had plunged
the whole of Christendom, few paused to consider where such doctrines might lead,
or to ask themselves whether anarchy would not be their logical conclusion.
(Daniel-Rops, 53-57)
BRIEF SUMMARY OF HISTORIANS' DESCRIPTIONS OF THE NOVEL AND
REVOLUTIONARY (NOT TRADITIONAL) NATURE OF CONCILIARISM
Hay: "a doctrine had grown up" [during the time of the Great Schism].
Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church: "foundations . . . laid in the early years of
the 13th [century]."
Encyclopaedia Britannica: "roots in discussions of 12th- and 13th-century canonists."
Francis Oakley: title of his book:The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism in the
Catholic Church 1300-1870 .
Philip Hughes: "new ideas."
A. G. Dickens: "heterodox views" and "revolutionary work."
Joseph Lortz: "a temporary expedient" and "false" theory. "Progressive liberalism"
and "recklessness of theological speculation."
John Neville Figgis (cited approvingly by Christopher Dawson): "tepid
constitutionalism" as opposed to the previous "divine authority of a thousand years."
Christopher Dawson: "revolutionary ideas."
Will Durant: "Rebellious philosophers, almost a century before [early 14th century],
had laid the theoretical foundations."
Kenneth Scott Latourette: "Obviously it was entirely counter to the theory which had
prevailed in the West for the past several centuries."

Henri Daniel-Rops: "nothing less than revolutionary" . . . "a new concept of the
Church" . . . "intimately linked with the nationalist theories" . . . "contaminated to
some extent by completely heretical theses" . . . "the revolutionaries rebelled" . . .
"The revolutionary movement had sprung into being during the last years of the
thirteenth century" . . . "rash theories . . . countered by a tradition of a thousand
years and more" . . . "subversive doctrines" . . . "completely new ideas."
SECULAR POLITICAL POWER AS A DRIVING FORCE BEHIND CONCILIARISM
Secular political power was also an important factor in the rise of conciliarism, just as
it was in the Gregorian reform era. Secular (or non-ecclesiastical) rulers regarded the
papacy as their main rival for power, so they sought to limit its power by support of
councils over against them. This is hardly a "Christian" or "theological" rationale for
conciliarism:
. . . the secular rulers of Europe, including the Holy Roman emperor and the kings of
England and France, looked on the council as a means of limiting papal power . . .
In 1460 Pope Pius II, himself a former conciliarist, declared an appeal from a pope to
a council to be heretical, but by then few remained to mourn the demise of the
conciliar movement.
(Wilcox, 228)
Beyond that the Schism weakened the Church as a unit by putting it in the power of
princes to choose which pope they would obey . . . the allegiance of kings was
determined not by their views as to the spiritual claims of Avignon or Rome but of
political advantage. It was a happy period for kings and the memory of it lived on
among princes: as late as 1477 Lorenzo de Medici wrote to a friend in Rome that
'three or four popes would be better than a single one.'
. . . machinery was laid down for regular meetings of Councils in the future. This
meant that any political opponent of the popes would be able to appeal from papal
decisions to a future Council -- and many did so, from little brigands in the Papal
States to great kings like Louis XI of France.
. . . As in England so in France the basic rights over the clergy exercised by the
secular government were recognized. There is no doubt that the Avignon papacy, the

Great Schism and the Councils all contributed to making churches more regional in
spirit and more secular in control.
(Denys Hay, "The Background to the Reformation," in Hurstfield, 13-14; citation from
L. Pastor, History of the Popes, translated by Antrobus, 1894, IV, 300)
The increasing accumulation of power in the hands of the ruler also meant increased
authority over the external affairs of the church. The trend toward national churches
whose external affairs were largely controlled by the political authorities was one of
the characteristic features of the fifteenth century. As early as 1324 Marsiglio of
Padua had sketched in his Defensor Pacis the picture of a national church
independent of Rome. In France the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges (1438) entrusted
the French king with considerable power over the French church . . . A similar
situation prevailed in England and Spain where appointments to positions of
ecclesiastical eminence and matters of church finance were virtually controlled by the
king.
(Hillerbrand, 16)
Of course, national and class egoism in all parts and ranks of the Church played an
important role in the diminishing of papal authority since the fourteenth century.
(Lortz, 59)
. . . the peoples of the West were full of the pride of youth and the consciousness of
their latent powers. The State was no longer a confused tangle of feudal and regional
units engaged in perpetual war. It had achieved political order, and, in the Western
kingdoms at least, national unity. And consequently, when they had overcome the
anarchy and separation of feudalism, they felt that the Church, with its international
system of jurisdiction and finance and its vast territorial endowments, was a rival
that interfered with the full realization of their ideals of sovereignty and autonomy.
. . . in the Hussite movement we see the reforming spirit separating itself altogether
from the Catholic tradition and coalescing with the spirit of nationalism to produce a
great explosion of revolutionary feeling, which already betokens the end of the
medieval order.

(Dawson, 102-103)
An erastian tradition with some almost modern overtones originated with Dubois and
other French nationalists who witnessed the clash between Philip IV and Boniface
VIII. It grew to maturity a few decades later in a parallel context: that of the
struggle between Emperor Louis of Bavaria and the French-controlled Papacy. The
notorious Defensor Pacis (1324) by the Emperor's champion Marsiglio of Padua lived
on not merely as a forerunner but as an active participant in the victories of
sixteenth-century rulers over the Church. In England, for example, a printed
translation of theDefensor Pacis was personally financed by the executive of the
political Reformation, Thomas Cromwell . . . Practical politicians like Cromwell . . .
found in the Paduan a rich fund of ideas . . . The episcopal hierarchy is of human and
not divine institution, while the primacy of Rome arises merely from the Donation of
Constantine, a document still accepted as genuine in Marsiglio's day . . .
The antipapal and erastian tradition inherited by the sixteenth century did not lie in
th realm of theory alone. Especially in France, with its Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges
(1438), and in England, with its Statutes of Provisors and Praemunire (1351-93),
large powers over the national churches were conveyed from the Papacy to the
monarchies . . . Similarly the Catholic Kings became the effective masters of the
Spanish Church.
(Dickens, 20-22)
. . . many began to look for means of imposing reform upon the church, perhaps
through an appeal to secular authorites . . . The second major factor concerns the
rise in the power of the secular rulers of Europe, who increasingly came to regard the
pope's propblems as of somewhat limited relevance . . .
Nationalism becamse an increasingly important factor in reducing papal authority
north of the Alps, as the situation in France demonstrates . . .
A further illustration of the severe restrictions placed upon papal authority by secular
rulers can be seen in the case of Henry VIII's attempt to divorce Catherine of
Aragon.
(McGrath, 35-36)

CONCILIARISM AS A SHORT-LIVED AND HETERODOX PRACTICAL FAILURE

In any event, the practical outworking of conciliarism was that it did not work,
because it didn't provide the proper unity and centrality that the papacy provided:
The reform of the Church at Constance was confined to a few broad resolutions,
condemning non-residence of clergy and corruption. Beyond that the prelates could
not agree . . . each of the 'nations' -- the English, French, German, Italian and
Spanish -- had its own particular grievances and solutions.
(Denys Hay, "The Background to the Reformation," in Hurstfield, 14)
. . . by ending the Great Schism in the West . . . it had dug its own grave. When once
the Church in Western Europe was reunited under one Pope, the Pontiffs, asserting
the traditional claims of their predecessors, made their power effective against the
councils, divided as these were and without adequate leadership. Moreover, like the
Papacy, members of the councils were too deeply involved in the abuses against
which much of Europe was complaining to work the sweeping reforms which the
situation demanded.
(Latourette, 635)
RADICAL CONCILIARISM GONE AWRY: JOHN WYCLIFFE
In England the schism brought Wyclif to the turning point that led to protestantism.
At first he welcomed Urban as a reformer, but as the financial abuses of both Popes
grew more flagrant, he came to regard both as Anti-Christs and the schism as the
natural end of a corrupted papacy . . . Despairing of reform from within after the
schism, he came in 1379 to a radical conclusion: since the Church was incapable of
reforming itself, it must be brought under secular supervision. He now saw the King
as God's Vicar on earth from whom bishops derived their authority and through
whom the state, as guardian of the Church, could compel reform. Going beyond the
abuses of the Church to attack the theory, Wyclif was now prepared to sweep away
the entire ecclesiastical superstructure -- papacy, hierarchy, orders. Having rejected
the divine authority of the Church, it was now that he came to his rejection of its
essence -- the power of the sacraments, specifically of the Eucharist.
(Tuchman, 338)
Bibliography

(P = Protestant / C = Catholic; others are of unknown religious affiliation -- probably

non-Catholic)
Adams, George Burton (P?), Civilization During the Middle Ages, New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1906.
Balke, Willem (P), Calvin and the Anabaptist Radicals, translated by William Heynen,
Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1981, from the 1973 Dutch
version.
Belloc, Hilaire (C), How the Reformation Happened, New York: Robert M. McBride &
Co., 1928.
Carroll, Warren H. (C), A History of Christendom (six volumes), Volume 2: The
Building of Christendom, Front Royal, VA: Christendom College Press, 1987.
Cross, F.L. and E.A. Livingstone, editors (P), The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian
Church, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, 1983.
Daniel-Rops, Henri (C), The Protestant Reformation, volume 1, translated Audrey
Butler, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1961, from the 1958 French edition.
Dawson, Christopher (C), Medieval Essays, Garden City, NY: Doubleday Image, 1959.
Dawson, Christopher (C) [2], The Dividing of Christendom, New York: Sheed & Ward,
1965.
Dickens, A. G. (P), Reformation and Society in Sixteenth-Century Europe, London:
Thames and Hudson, 1966.
Dickens, A. G. (P) [2], The Age of Humanism and Reformation, Englewood Cliffs, NJ:
Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1972.
Downs, Norton (?), editor, The Medieval Pageant: Readings in Medieval History,
Princeton, NJ: D. Van Nostrand Co., Inc., 1964.
Durant, Will (secularist), The Reformation, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1957
(volume 6 of the ten-volume work, The Story of Civilization, 1967).

Herbermann, Charles G. (C), editor, The Catholic Encyclopedia, New York: The
Encyclopedia Press, 1913; sixteen volumes. Available online:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/
Hillerbrand, Hans J. (P), Men and Ideas in the Sixteenth Century, Chicago: Rand
McNally & Co., 1969.
Hughes, Philip (C), The Church in Crisis: A History of the General Councils, 3251870, Garden City, NY: Hanover House, 1961.
Hurstfield, Joel (P), editor, The Reformation Crisis, New York: Harper Torchbooks,
1966.
Kelly, J. N. D. (P), Early Christian Doctrines, San Francisco: HarperCollins, revised
edition, 1978.
Latourette, Kenneth Scott (P), A History of Christianity (two volumes), Volume
1:Beginnings to 1500, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1953; reprinted in 1975.
Lortz, Joseph (C), How the Reformation Came, translated by Otto M. Knab (from the
German Wie kam es zur Reformation?), New York: Herder and Herder, 1964.
Lortz, Joseph (C) [2], History of the Church, translated and adapted from the 5th
and 6th German edition by Edwin G. Kaiser, Milwaukee: The Bruce Publishing Co.,
1939.
McGrath, Alister E. (P), Reformation Thought: An Introduction, Grand Rapids, MI:
Baker Book House, 2nd edition, 1993.
McNeill, John T. (P), editor and Ford Lewis Battles (P), translator, John
Calvin:Institutes of the Christian Religion, Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960
(from 1559 edition).
Morrall, John B. (?), The Medieval Imprint, Baltimore; Penguin Books, 1970.
Pelikan, Jaroslav (P), The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of
Doctrine (five volumes), Volume 3: The Growth of Medieval Theology (600-1300),
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978.

Schaff, Philip (P), History of the Christian Church, New York: Charles Scribner's sons,
1910, eight volumes; available online:
http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/history/About.htm
Southern, R.W. (P?), Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages (The Pelican
History of the Church, volume 2), Baltimore; Penguin Books, 1970.
Tuchman, Barbara W., (?), A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century, New York:
Ballantine Books, 1978.
Wilcox, Donald J. (?), In Search of God and Self: Renaissance and Reformation
Thought, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1975.
Wolff, Philippe (?), The Awakening of Europe (The Pelican History of European
Thought, volume 1), translated by Anne Carter, Baltimore; Penguin Books, 1968

The Church, Authority, And Infallibility (Part 6): Conciliarism

In an earlier response to Dave Armstrong, I cited a recent book by the Roman
Catholic scholar Joseph Kelly, in which he presents a view of church history
significantly different than Dave's. What I want to do here is quote some of Kelly's
comments on an issue related to medieval Western ecclesiology. People often think of
post-patristic and Western ecclesiology as more unified and consistent than it
actually was. Even as late as the post-patristic medieval era, and even in the West,
such a foundational element of Roman Catholic ecclesiology as the papacy was
widely questioned and sometimes rejected.
Kelly writes:
Codes of law always allow for all sorts of possibilities, no matter how seemingly
minute or absurd or unlikely. In the early thirteenth century canon lawyers had
speculated about what to do if a pope fell into heresy. Slowly but surely some canon
lawyers constructed the view that the pope does not have absolute rule over the
church because the power of the church is greater than his. They speculated that the
ultimate power in the church resided in the ecumenical council. These few sentences
summarize decades of very complex developments. The superiority of the council to
the pope is the conciliar theory; its practical application is conciliarism. (The
Ecumenical Councils Of The Catholic Church [Collegeville, Minnesota: Liturgical Press,
2009], p. 107)
Conciliarism sometimes had popular support in the West:
Pushed by the rulers and the nobility [during the Great Schism], in 1409 the
cardinals of both popes largely deserted them and met in the Italian city of Pisa,
where they proclaimed the need to go above the popes' heads to a general council,
citing the consequences of the schism for this clear violation of canon law. With some
major exceptions (Germany, the Spanish kingdoms) Catholic Europe supported

them....
Many in Catholic Europe, both clerical and lay, believed that the papacy would never
reform itself and that only a council could truly reform the church....
The belief in the curative powers of a reforming council never died out until the
Reformation....
Conciliarist traditions ran strong in northern Europe. (pp. 107, 121, 123)
There were multiple medieval councils that claimed authority over the papacy, which
is a contradiction of modern Catholic ecclesiology. Kelly writes:
This [the teaching of the ecumenical Council of Constance] is conciliarism at its most
basic. The council asserts that it meets under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, that it
represents the Catholic Church and thus has the supreme authority in the church,
and that its authority derives from Christ and even the popes must obey the
council....
But no scholar doubts that Constance meant what it said because in 1417, before
choosing a new pope, the council passed a second monumental decree, Frequens,
which asserted that the new pope must call another council five years after
Constance closes, then another one seven years after that, and then a council every
ten years so that there would be, in effect, a council in every pontificate. The leaders
of Constance truly wished to change the governmental structure of the church....
Many Catholics, including rulers and bishops, favored conciliarism, and so Martin
[Pope Martin V] obliged and obeyed the decree. (pp. 111, 114)
He also discusses the conciliarism of the Council of Basel-Ferrara-Florence-Rome (pp.
114-119). He notes that the cardinal chosen by Pope Eugenius IV to open the council
and preside over it was himself a conciliarist (p. 114). Even as late as the Council of
Trent, the "specter of conciliarism" was still on the minds of the Catholic leadership,
and a revival of conciliarism at Trent was feared when Pope Pius IV seemed to be
nearing death (p. 145).
What's the significance of medieval conciliarism?
For one thing, it undermines the popular Catholic appeal to pre-Reformation unity.
The sort of diversity of belief I've outlined in this post and in this series is much
different than the picture that's often painted by modern Catholics.
Secondly, the conciliar and papal support for conciliarism is problematic for Catholic
authority claims.
Third, the widespread doubt about something as simple and foundational as papal
authority, as late as the post-patristic medieval era and even in the West, illustrates
a point I made when responding to Dave Armstrong earlier this year. Scripture has
better evidence supporting it, and has been more widely accepted, than Roman
Catholic ecclesiology.
Posted by Jason Engwer at 4:13 AM

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Labels: Catholicism, Dave Armstrong, Ecclesiology, Jason Engwer, Orthodoxy

3 comments:
1.
Viisaus3/26/2010 7:45 AM
The 1910 Catholic Encyclopedia celebrated the defeat of Conciliarism as the best fruit
of
the
1870
Vatican
I
council.
It was so happy about it that it even celebrated a person who later quitted the Roman
church
to
become
a
major
heretic
(Lamennais):

"He was the first who dared to attack Gallicanism publicly in France, and prepared the
way
for
its
defeat,
the
crowning
work
of
the
Vatican
Council."
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08762a.htm

(The Gallican French church was the most powerful promoter of Conciliarism. The
same Louis XIV who banished the Huguenots from France asserted most decisively his
independence from the Vatican.)
Reply
2.
Viisaus3/26/2010 8:04 AM
George Salmon pointed out the utter irony of how once so celebrated late 17th century
RC apologist Bossuet went out of fashion because of his Conciliar-Gallican beliefs:

pp.

87-88

"Bossuet was, in his time, 'the Eagle of Meaux': the terror of Protestant sectaries, the
most trusted champion of his Church. But he fought for her not only against the
Protestants, but against the theory of Infallibility, then called Ultramontane, because
held on the other side of the mountains, but rejected by the Gallican Church. In
another lecture I shall speak more at length of the principles of Gallicanism and of its
history. Suffice it here to mention that one of its fundamental doctrines was, that the
doctrinal decisions of the Pope were not to be regarded as final; that they might be
reviewed and corrected, or even rejected, by a General Council or by the Church at
large. A formal treatise of Bossuet in proof of this principle was a storehouse of
arguments, largely drawn on in the controversies of the years 1869-70. But this
principle of his was condemned with an anathema at the Vatican Council of the latter
year.

...
And so, though on a number of questions Bossuet might side against the Protestants
and with the Pope of his day, it is plain that he was not, on principle, following the
Pope's guidance: consequently, Bossuet is treated by the predominant Roman Catholic
school of the present day as no better than a Protestant. Just as he himself had
argued that outside the Roman Church there was no truth or consistency, and that
Protestantism was but an inconsistent compromise with infidelity, so Cardinal Manning
says nearly the same things of that theory of Gallicanism of which Bossuet was the
ablest defender. 'It was exactly the same heresy,' Manning declares, 'which in England
took the form of the Reformation, and in France that of Gallicanism'. Dr. Brownson's
Review, the chief organ of American Romanism, treated Bossuet's opinions with even
less ceremony. It said, 'Gallicanism was always a heresy. The Gallicans are as much
alien from the Church or Commonwealth of Christ as are Arians, Lutherans, Calvinists,
Anabaptists,
Methodists,
Spiritists,
or
Devil-worshippers.'
Could the irony of events give a more singular refutation than this? A man writes a
book to prove that Protestantism is false because Protestants disagree among
themselves, and Romanism is true because its doctrines are always the same, and its
children never disagree; and in a few years he is himself classed with Devilworshippers by the most accredited authorities of the religion which he defends, and
whose doctrines he supposes himself, and is supposed by everyone else at the time
most thoroughly to understand. For all we can tell, the Romanist champions of the
present day may be in no better case. Can Cardinal Manning be secure that, as the
development of Roman doctrine proceeds, he may not be left stranded outside the
limits of orthodoxy, and be classed with Devil-worshippers by the Romanist champions
of
the
next
century?"
http://www.archive.org/details/infallibilitych02salmgoog

Salmon's prophecy has pretty much come true - many post-Vatican II RCs are now
embarrassed by the bigotry of Vatican I era Ultramontanists like Manning.
We might actually argue that Conciliarism has made a big "de facto" comeback within
the RCC as the American church (for example) is anything but perfectly obedient to
the pope.
Reply
3.
Viisaus3/26/2010 9:00 AM
Here is a full treatise on Gallicanism by Salmon, for those wishing to further educate
themselves:
(see

zip

file

of

"The

Gallican

Theory

of

Infallibility.")

"The French bishops naturally took the side of their King, whose influence in his own
country was overpowering; and it was while the relations between France and Rome

were thus strained that what are called the Four Gallican Propositions of 1682, drawn
up
by
the
celebrated
Bossuet,
were
formulated.
These

are

as

follows:

I. The first declared that the power possessed by Peter and his successors was in
things spiritual, not in things temporal; in accordance with the texts, My kingdom is
not of this world; Render unto Caesar, &c.; Let every soul be subject to the higher
powers. Consequently, kings are not, by the law of God, subject to any ecclesiastical
power with respect to their temporal government, nor can their subjects be released
from the duty of obeying them, nor absolved from their oath of allegiance.
2. The second defined the power of the Pope in things spiritual, viz. as such that the
decrees of the Council of Constance, approved as they are by the Holy See and the
practice of the whole Church, remain in full force and perpetual obligation; and it
declared that these decrees must not be depreciated as insufficiently approved or as
restricted to a time of schism. I may remind you that these decrees declared that a
general Council, legitimately assembled, derives its authority immediately from Christ
[and therefore not from the Pope], and that every person of what dignity soever, even
papal, is bound to obey it in what relates to the faith, or to the extirpation of schism,
or to the reformation of the Church in its head and members. If you remember the
circumstances of the Church at the time of the Council of Constance, you will see that
these decrees were absolutely necessary at the time. The object was to heal the
schism, there being then three claimants for the Popedom; and although the whole
Christian world longed for an end to the schism, all the claimants had shown great
reluctance to a voluntary resignation. The Council deposed all three, and elected a new
Pope; but since each of the candidates had some who believed him to be the real
Pope, it is evident the act of the Council could not meet with universal recognition
unless it was maintained that the Council had an authority higher than the papal, and
was able even to depose a real Pope if the good of the Church required it.
3. The third Gallican decree declared that the exercise of the Apostolic authority must
be regulated by the canons enacted by the Spirit of God and consecrated by the
reverence of the whole world; in particular that the ancient rules, customs, and
institutions of the realm and Church of France must remain inviolable.
4. The fourth, that though the Pope has the principal power in deciding questions of
faith, and though his decrees extend to all Churches, nevertheless his judgment is not
irreversible
until
confirmed
by
the
consent
of
the
Church.
Thus you see that these decrees took away altogether the Popes temporal power
over countries of which he was not the civil sovereign; that in spiritual things they
limited his disciplinary power by general and local canons that, even in matters of
faith, they held that his decisions needed to be ratified by universal consent."
http://www.tracts.ukgo.com/george_salmon.htm

Thus we can see that Conciliarism actually did NOT come to an end even with the
advent of Reformation, but continued on powerfully (in France at least) until withering
away
the
19th
century.

The French Revolution gave a fatal blow to Gallicanism, as it removed the main
motivation for asserting the independence of French church - such a system had
presupposed the rule by a Christian monarch. Gallican church had no place to stand in
secularized France.

CANON LAW AND COMMUNIO

Writings on the Constitutional Law of the Church

Ontology of Synodality *

I. Synodality, Conciliarity, Collegiality.

II. The Synodal Dimension of Episcopal Ministry
III. The Principal Institutional Forms of Synodality
IV. Conclusions

I. Synodality, Conciliarity, Collegiality

1. The Terminological Impasse and the Underlying

Misunderstanding
It is not rare for canon law only to recognize as an authentic expression
of collegiality (or synodality) the activity of bishops within traditional
collegial structures (ecumenical and particular councils) and modern
structures (synod of bishops, bishops conferences), or still more
rigorously, only in those activities which lead to a deliberative vote.
On the basis of this latter reduction, many deny that the synod of
bishops, the college of cardinals, and at least for a large part of their
activity, the conferences of bishops, are authentic expressions of
collegiality, at least insofar as these organs express themselves or are
required to express themselves only through a consultative vote.
The attribution or non-attribution of the term collegiality to these
institutions, or to a part of their activity, and consequently the greater or

lesser ecclesiological significance that is attributed to them, is an

indication of the terminological and conceptual confusion that exists
within canonical theory.
For a correct approach to the problem of synodality, one cannot fail to
consider the existence of a double non-identity: that between synodality
and conciliar activity, and that between synodality and the participation
of the faithful in the life of the Church.
Conducting an analysis on the nature of synodality one must accept the
hypothesis that it is realized not only on the episcopal or perhaps
presbyteral level, but also on the level of the laity. However, since this
hypothesis theoretically intersects with the problem of the difference
existing between synodality and participation, it is necessary to divide
the questions. 1 Here we shall treat only the problem of episcopal
synodality.
Already at this level the problem is complex, which is visibly
demonstrated by the terminological impasse in which ecclesiology and
canon law have been entangled since the Council.
To clarify the underlying question, it could be very useful to substitute
the term collegiality with that of synodality, much less compromised
from the juridical and theological point of view. The Greek term
synodos, which in its Latin transcription (synodus) was always used
as a perfectly equivalent synonym of concilium (with which it was
translated), has the merit above all of terminologically including, among
the institutions of a collegial character, also the synod of bishops and
the diocesan synod.
The substitution of synodality for collegiality, although not required for
substantial reasons, enables us to avoid, at least terminologically, the
misunderstanding according to which collegiality is identified with the
activity of bishops within their several collegial structures. Since it is
not tied to reductive historical-doctrinal preconceptions, the term
synodality permits us to approach the problem of collegiality without
conceptually tying it to those juridical-institutional forms in which it can
be expressed.
2. The Doctrinal Embarrassment of Vatican II and the First
Clarifications
That Vatican II did not succeed in dealing with the problem of synodality
in a doctrinally complete way - if only for the fact that it treated
synodality solely on the level of the universal Church without dealing
with the issue on the level of the particular Church - is very probably due
to the fact that it was not able to develop an explicit theological

discourse on the Church based on the central category

of communio, which ties together all of ecclesiology like a tenuous
filigree. 2
A symptom of this doctrinal embarrassment is the lack of the use of
abstract nouns, such as synodality, conciliarity, 3 collegiality, which
would inevitably have required the Council to give a theoretical definition
of the contents. The Council has avoided even using the adjectives
synodal and conciliar, restricting - not without parsimony - its lexicon
to the adjective collegial.
The origin of the doctrinal equivocation generated by the term
collegiality undoubtedly goes back to the use made by Vatican II of the
originally juridical notion of collegium to express the ecclesiological
reality of the hierarchical communion constituted by the Apostles with
Peter and by the bishops with the Pope. By using also the adjective
collegial, whose juridical significance is likewise unavoidable, the
Council has aggravated the misunderstanding.
Dealing with the problem of the collegial activity of the college of
bishops by means of the abstract term of collegiality, canonical theory
has easily guaranteed a reduced sense of the notion expressed by it. In
fact, there has frequently occurred a reductio ad unum between the
dimension of collective responsibility inherent in the nature and specific
mode of operation of the episcopal ministry, and the institutional
modality through which the bishops can realize their mission in the
Church in a synodal way. This reduction assumes that collegiality is only
authentic to the measure in which it is realized through collegial acts
(and in particular in the form of a deliberative vote) posed within
collegial decision-making structures, whether traditional (such as
councils), or more recent (such as the synod of bishops and the
conferences of bishops).
Interpreting Lumen gentium, which intentionally uses the term
collegium alternatively with others (such as coetus, corpus,
ordus), the Nota explicative praevia n. 1 attempts in vain to explain
that the ordo episcoporum cannot be identified with the juridical
institution of a college, maintaining that the college of bishops does not
rigorously realize the notion of college according to the understanding of
it proper to the general theory of law, by reason of the fact that it is not
ruled by the principle of the juridical parity of its members.
In reality, the general theory of law and juridical practice certify, both
doctrinally and historically, the existence of colleges which are
hierarchically structured and in which the principle of juridical parity
does not apply. 4 The most eloquent modern example is that of the

Security Council of the UN, in which only two members, the United
States and the Soviet Union, enjoy the right to a veto, which represents
the most discriminatory form of the use of collective power, because of
its rigorously hierarchical nature.
In reality, that which distinguishes the structure of the college of bishops
from the juridical institution of a college as developed by the general
theory of law is the fact that, contrary to the general institution of a
college, the college of bishops works also and above all outside of the
institutional collegial framework through which its activity is sometimes
regulated (ecumenical council) and within which the bishops are called
to express themselves (with a deliberative vote) through a truly collegial
act. The episcopate spread throughout the world does not cease
theologically and canonically to be the college of bishops and to act in a
synodal manner, even when they are not united in a council. The
individual bishops do not cease to act formally as members of the
college even when they act individually.
Actually, not all the acts through which synodality is expressed have
collegial character in the technical and juridical sense. Indeed, from the
juridical perspective, the acts done by bishops in the exercise of their
ministry are rarely truly collegial acts.
In the technical and juridical sense, an act is collegial only when the will
of the individual member loses its juridical autonomy, so as to be
integrated into the one act of will expressed by the college as one
juridical subject. It follows that the will of the college is not identified,
from the formal point of view, even with the will of the majority.
The collegial act is different from the parallel act, as it is realized for
example in the exercise of the ordinary magisterium of bishops spread
throughout the world, or in certain decisions of the conferences of
bishops. In the parallel act, the will of each member converges in the
production of a plurality of results which are distinct from the formal
point of view, but equal among themselves from the material point of
view. In the parallel act, each bishop remains the autonomously
responsible subject of his individual act. 5
The collegial act is different from the collective act, whose result is not
only one, but is one for all, even if the individual person remains
autonomously responsible for his own act, as in Eucharistic
concelebration. Here the one consecration of the species is not the
product of the will of the majority or of the college as a unique juridical
subject, but of each individual concelebrant. 6
Occasionally Vatican II has also used the adverb coniunctim to
indicate the fact that an act in a college can sometimes by completed

collegially, in a technical sense, or only in parallel form. The Council has

surprisingly used this adverb with regard to conferences of bishops. This
was both to avoid taking a position on their synodal character since it is
an institution of the particular Churches and not of the universal Church
as such, as well as to take account of the fact that bishops can manifest
their will according to different juridical forms: that of the collegial act or
that of the parallel act. 7
3. The Confirmation of the Historical Analysis
If it were necessary to identify episcopal synodality with the conciliar
activity of bishops, one would have to conclude, on the basis of
historical findings, that synodality is an extraordinary, if not indeed a
subsidiary phenomenon in the exercise of the episcopal ministry, both at
the level of the universal as well as the particular Church.
Actually, the universal Church has celebrated only some twenty
ecumenical or general councils in the twenty centuries of its history.
Above all, there were long periods in which the activity of ecumenical
councils remained completely paralyzed, as in the two and a half
centuries between the Fourth Constantinopolitan (869) and the First
Lateran Council (1123) and in the three centuries which separate the
Council of Trent from Vatican I.
An even more negative result, proportionally, comes from an analysis of
the conciliar activity of the particular Churches, on the basis of provincial
councils. Among the different forms of particular councils, this is the
institution that has remained not only most constant in its activity, but
also substantially identical from the formal perspective from its birth in
the third and fourth century until today. 8
The frequency of provincial councils (or minor councils in general), even
if relatively intense between the First and Second Nicene Councils (325787), was much less in any case than the synodal consciousness of the
Church of that period, as expressed in can. 5 of the First Council of
Nicea, which prescribed the convocation of two provincial councils each
year. Evidently, in the real evaluation of the conciliar practice of this
period, it is necessary to keep in mind two things. The first is the fact
that legislative production, being of a predominantly conciliar origin (that
is, not from decretals, as in the following period), should have stimulated
the frequency of councils in an optimal way. Secondly, legislation did not
yet have the pretense - as it would in the second millennium - of
regulating the life of the Church in detail, which has rendered the
convoking of councils less urgent and indispensable.
In fact, the provincial conciliar activity was almost completely

extinguished, together with ecumenical conciliar activity, in the centuries

on either side of the millennium. Its revitalization occurred on more
realistic foundations due to the work of the Fourth Lateran Council
(1215), with the prescription of can. 6 calling for the convocation of a
provincial council at least once a year. However, even in this period which goes from the Gregorian Reform to the exile in Avignon (1305)
and which very probably marks, despite the strong process of papal
centralization, the golden period of all conciliar activity in the history of
the Church in the West - their actual concrete frequency did not exceed
5% of the legislative requirements, if one takes account of the number
of existing provinces.
Contrary to what might have been expected, the frequency of provincial
councils in the centuries of conciliarism, marked by an ecclesiological
consciousness that was more corporate than authentically synodal, was
minimal. 9
From Trent to Vatican I, provincial conciliar activity suffered a grave
deviation. In fact, if one leaves out some jumps, found in the first half
century after Trent - due primarily to the application of the reforms of the
Council - and also found after the liberal Revolution of 1848, especially
in non-European Churches (as in the USA and in mission territory), it
can be seen that between 1600 and 1850 there were two and a half
centuries of total paralysis. The deviation is that much graver since, in
ascertaining the lesser synodal sensibility of the Church in this period,
canonical legislation had already substantially reduced the frequency
with which provincial councils were required. In fact, already with the
Council of Constance the celebration of only one council was called for
every three years, whereas the Code of 1917 (can. 283) prescribes a
council only every twenty years.
Keeping as a point of reference the legislative prescriptions and the
number of ecclesiastical provinces (which have almost quadrupled since
Trent, mostly in the last century and during the pontificate of Pius XII),
one must note that provincial conciliar activity did not exceed 2.5-3% of
that which was required by legislation. This means that during this entire
period, instead of a provincial council every three years in each
individual province, there was only one provincial council celebrated in
the entire Latin Church every year.
This historical analysis also leads us to conclude, at least post factum,
that synodality cannot be made to coincide with conciliar activity, unless
one is willing to recognize that the Church has in fact forgotten her own
proper synodal structure during long periods of her history.

II. The Synodal Dimension of Episcopal Ministry

1. The Dynamics of the Reciprocal Immanence of its Constitutive
Elements as the Essential Nucleus of the Communio
In synodality, in so far as it is an element intrinsic to the nature and
specific mode of exercise of the episcopal ministry, the ecclesiological
principle of communio - which encompasses the entire mysticalinstitutional reality of the Church - emerges according to a particular
structure.
The criterion of communio, in fact, first of all determines the relationship
of the faithful with God and the other faithful (communio cum Deo et
hominibus), giving a new ontological dimension to the faithful.
It assumes further significance in the particular hierarchical relationship
existing between the bishops and the Pope (in addition to that between
the presbyters and the bishop). As a result, bishops (and presbyters)
receive the legitimacy to exercise their ministry, ad validitatem or ad
liceitatem, only in the measure in which they accept the communio
hierarchica with the Pope (or with the bishop).
The principle of communio regulates finally both the constitutional
relationship between the universal and the particular Church, as well as
the ecumenical relationship of the separated churches or ecclesial
communities with the Church of Christ, which alone is one, holy, catholic
and apostolic, and which subsists in the Roman Catholic Church.
This last eminently structural level of the communio has been defined
for the first time in its fullness by LG 23, 1, in the formula according to
which the universal Church is realized in and from the particular
Churches (in quibus et ex quibus una et unica ecclesia catholica
exsistit). 10The universal Church, although having a proper ministerial
expression in the college of bishops and in the Pope (which expression
has its roots, in any case, in the particular Church, since the bishops
and also the Pope have their locus theologicus in the particular
Church), does not exist as an autonomous reality, but only in so far as it
is concretely and historically realized in the particular Churches and
emerges from them as their global outcome.
The universal Church, which is realized in each individual particular
Church, renders present all the particular Churches of which she is
constituted. 11 The one Church of Christ subsists in the Roman Catholic
Church on account of the fact that in her, the immanence between the
universal and particular is so perfect as to realize the fullness of

communion. This is true by definition, if not always historically.

The communio is plena only in the measure in which the universal
Church is realized not as an abstract idea, according to the tendency of
the Orthodox model of Platonic extraction (universalia ante res), but as
an historically existing reality composed concretely of all the particular
Churches (universalia in rebus). It is plena, furthermore, only to the
measure in which the particular Church exists, not so much as an
autonomous reality, which according to the tendency of the Protestant
model can be nominalistically aggregated (universalia post res) with
the other particular Churches on a federative basis, but rather as a
reality in which the totality of all the particular Churches is present, due
to the mediation of the universal Church which is realized in her.
The principle of reciprocal immanence of the constitutive elements of
the constitutional structure of the Church, which comes out in a
paradigmatic way in the immanence of the universal in the particular
and of the particular in the universal, forms the essence itself of the
notion of communio. LG 23, 1, has grasped this dynamic with
surprising lucidity on the level of the relationship between the universal
and the particular Church. It is a dynamic which is repeated on all the
levels of the ecclesial structure, in addition to that of the communio
Ecclesiarum. It occurs on the level of the communio hierarchica or
ministeriorum, in which the Pope expresses the entire college and the
college includes the Pope, and on the level of the communio fidelium,
that is, of Christian anthropology. 12
The faithful, in fact, is the person whose identity is determined by his
belonging to the people of God, the Mystical Body of the Church.
Therefore, he is determined by the fact that all the other faithful, through
the mediation of his belonging to the Mystical Body, are really immanent
in his person. Thus it would not be exact to conceive the members of
the faithful as individual entities, opposed to a collective reality, as
occurs instead at the natural level of human society, where the
relationship of the individual and the collectivity - which tends to be
conflictory on account of original sin - can be transcended only in an
extrinsic way through a juridical order which limits the liberty of each
person, not only in fact, but also structurally.
2. The Reciprocal Immanence Between the Personal and the
Synodal Dimension of the Episcopal Ministry
The synodal dimension, connatural to the episcopal ministry, is also
determined by the principle of communio. Actually, synodality is not
opposed to the personal dimension, from which it is formally distinct, but

is immanent to it, because every bishop is ontologically determined by

the fact that the other bishops also possess the same unique sacrament
of Orders. The oneness of the sacrament in the plurality of its personal
realizations is the foundation of the structure of the ministry that is not
only personal, but also synodal.
It follows that synodality does not tend to restrict the personal exercise
of the episcopal ministry, but to confer a vaster extension to it. This is
because it develops the ontological relationship with other ministries
which it already possesses, enlarging it beyond the institutional,
jurisdictional or territorial limits in which the bishop is individually
inserted.
Analogously to that which was affirmed with regard to the supernatural
anthropological dimension of the faithful, it would be incorrect to treat
the problem of synodality, as a dimension of the episcopal ministry, on
the basis of natural secular institutional models. This operation would
inevitably lead to the irremediable antimony existing between the
individual and the collective principle underlying every human and civil
collegial institution. The discourse, to be rigorously theological, must
therefore avoid taking rise either from the scepticism with which the
modern democratic consciousness judges the monocratic exercise of
power, or from the optimism with which the sociological sciences, or the
technocratic model, assume that the administration of the group or the
coordination or division of power is the only form of government
possible in a society with social, economic and political connections that
are ever more complex. 13
The episcopal ministry or office, in fact, does not find any parallel in the
monocratic or democratic political systems, whose constitutions, even
when they have recourse to natural law, are based on the delegation of
power and not on the institution of office. In the ecclesial constitution, on
the contrary, the episcopal ministry or office, on the one hand, is beyond
the disposition of the Church; on the other hand, it is defined by the fact
that the potestas sacra with which the titular subject is invested is not
delegated. It is entrusted to the bishops not by the Church, but by
Christ, although through a sacramental mediation.
Two dimensions can be isolated in the episcopal ministry, from the
systematic point of view: the personal and the synodal. These are
formally diverse, but not adequately distinct, since the synodal
dimension is present in the personal, and the personal dimension
remains present and operative in the synodal. This complex structure of
reciprocal immanence derives from the fact that the synodal dimension,
already present in the personal, develops and is made explicit not on

the basis of extrinsic or chance elements, but from ecclesiologically

necessary elements, inherent in the nature of the episcopal ministry.
In civil society, the plurality of offices on which the principle of division
and collaboration of powers is based, is not necessary in itself, since the
choice between a monocratic and democratic regime is not imposed by
a necessity of natural law. In the ecclesial constitution, on the other
hand, the majority of offices are ontologically necessary. It is not the
material fact of the plurality of bishops as such, but the fact that it is an
indispensably necessary element of the constitution of the Church which
generates a double dimension in the episcopal ministry. In fact, it is not
possible to explain the pluralistic structure of the Church on the basis of
philosophical or historical considerations, and still less on the sole basis
of practical considerations. The unity and plurality of the Church can be
known only by faith, and can be rendered theologically plausible as an
historical and institutional reflection of the unity and plurality of the
Trinitarian mystery. 14
3. The Sacramental Root of this Reciprocal Immanence
The sacramental origin of the personal dimension of the episcopal
ministry confers on the bishop a capacity of representation radically
different from the representation proper to a public or civil juridical
institution, for two reasons. On the one hand, this is because
sacramental representation establishes a relation of partial
correspondence between the minister and Christ who acts ex opere
operato in the sacrament. On the other hand, because, in contrast to a
secular juridical model, sacramental representation cannot be realized
by a moral or juridical person, but only by a physical person.
For this reason, for example, theology has never affirmed that the
college of bishops or an ecumenical council represent Christ, even
though they hold the supreme and full power in the universal Church.
Only the bishop represents Christ sacramentally - and therefore
personally - as invisible head of the Church. A proof of this is the fact
that Eucharistic concelebration is not an act of the college as such, but
only a collective act in which the one consecration of the species is
caused individually by the individual ministers.
The college of bishops, on the other hand, represents the Church.
However, in contrast with the individual bishops in their representation
of Christ, it does so in a total rather than partial way.
The synodal dimension of the ecclesial ministry is based on a
phenomenon of representation of an ecclesiological nature, which
presupposes, however, the sacrament of Orders. It is in virtue of the

sacrament of Orders that the bishop represents his own particular

Church within the universal Church, and the universal within the
particular. In this sense, ecclesiological representation also has a
sacramental root. This explains further why the distinction between the
personal and synodal dimension is not adequate. However, the element
which generates ecclesiological representation is primarily the
necessarily pluralistic structure of the Church. Constitutionally, the
Church is a pluralistic rather than a monistic reality: it is a communio
Ecclesiarum.
This pluralism does not depend, as we have seen, on the material fact
that a plurality of bishops and of particular Churches historically exist in
the Church, but on the fact that the Church of Christ, in her universal
dimension, is necessarily realized in and from the particular Churches.
The specific basis of synodality with respect to the personal dimension
of the episcopal ministry is the existence of the communio
Ecclesiarum, as an ecclesiologically necessary reality.
The pluralist dimension, in its turn, is not added to the particular Church,
but is already present in her, for two different yet related reasons. First
of all, this is because all the other particular Churches are present in
any particular Church through the mediation of the universal Church
(formed from all the Churches) which is realized in them. It follows that
on the level of the relationship of the universal and particular Church, an
adequate distinction cannot be made between unity (particular Church)
and plurality (universal Church), which corresponds to the distinction
between the personal and the synodal elements of the episcopal
ministry.
Secondly this is because the particular Church already has in itself a
synodal component. In fact, the particular Church is not only constituted
by the bishop, even if he is the principle and foundation of her unity
(LG 23, 1), but by the bishop with his presbyterium (in addition to the
portion of the people of God belonging to it; can. 369). The episcopal
ministry is already synodally constituted also from the point of view of its
personal dimension, because it does not exist without presbyters. The
existence of the presbyters around the bishop does not derive solely
from functional reasons, as if it were only because the bishop by himself
is not able to fulfill all the tasks pertaining to his office, but from
ecclesiological reasons. A monistic structure of the particular Church,
formed by the bishop alone without the presbyterium, would not be able
to realize in itself the synodal structure of the universal Church. The
universal Church can be realized in the particular Church only because
the synodal structure of the presbyterium exists in her, of which the

bishop is head. Evidently, the synodal structure of the particular Church

is only analogous to that of the universal Church, because the
relationship of bishop to presbyters is different from the relationship
between the Pope and the bishops. Otherwise there would be an infinite
regression.
4. Two Different Modalities for the Realization of Apostolicity
The differentiation between the personal and the synodal element of the
episcopal ministry is realized according to two different modalities
according to which the apostolic succession takes place: through the
distinct logical structure of transmission and communication proper to
both Sacrament and Word.
From the formal point of view, apostolicity is realized in the form of
personal succession through the Sacrament. In the synodal form it is
realized through the Word, whose binding force is institutionally
translated as iuris dictio, or jurisdiction.
The structural logic of the communication of the sacramental sign is
different from that of spoken language. However, this distinction is
inadequate, because both have a symbolic character, and because both
are immanent in each other. In fact, the Sacrament always includes the
Word and the Word has a sacramental effect. The Sacrament makes
the efficacy of the Word concrete, and the Word tends necessarily
towards the realization of the sacramental sign, giving it a salvific
significance. 15 Word and Sacrament are the two elements through
which salvation is communicated and transmitted. Formally diverse but
inadequately distinguished, each has its own structural dynamics, and
they stand to each other in a relation of reciprocal dependency in the
transmission of salvation.
In the ordinary economy of salvation, which is the ecclesial economy,
the Sacrament - which always also includes the Word - is necessary for
the constitution of the Church to be realized. The Word by itself, on the
contrary, is not sufficient. This explains why Vatican II attributes the
qualification of ecclesial only to those Christian communities which
conserve at least the sacrament of Baptism. Outside of Baptism there
only exists a regime of Christian religion, in the measure in which
individuals are inspired by the message of Christ, deprived, however, of
the salvific value proper to ecclesiality.
The fact that the Sacrament also includes the Word - from which the
symbolic sign receives the qualification of salvific sign - explains why
the sacra potestas, that is, the legitimation to celebrate the sacraments
and to preach the Word with authority - up to the point of issuing

juridically binding norms of disciplinary behavior - is transmitted in its

totality through the sacrament of Orders. When it is not a matter of
transmitting the sacra potestas in order to guarantee the continuation of
the apostolic succession, but of exercising it in the daily life of the
Church, it operates according to the structural logic of communication
proper to the sacramental sign and to the Word, which, in the juridical
language of the second half of the twelfth century, took on the names of
the power of Orders and the power of jurisdiction. 16 Orders and
jurisdiction are not two distinct parts of the sacra potestas with different
contents, but only two formally different functions of the
same potestas which always operates in its totality, both in Orders and
in jurisdiction. 17
Since the symbolic sign through which it is expressed is always the
same and universally maintains the same significance, the sacra
potestas operative in the sacrament of Orders is formally and materially
the same for all bishops. When it operates, however, according to the
structural logic of the Word, it can assume a formally distinct value,
although still remaining everywhere identical in its content.
Contrary to the sacramental sign, the Word is structurally connected to
the capacity of man to express himself through the logical-formal
instrument of the judgment. It can be enunciated not only individually by
an individual physical person, but also by a plurality of persons in
common, who are thus able to confer a formally binding authority that is
more universal.
In contrast with the symbolic sacramental sign, a judgment can be
integrated into the dynamics specific to parallel acts and truly collegial
acts, transforming itself into a doctrinal or disciplinary decision of the
entire college of bishops.
From the point of view of its material content, the Word may be identical
when it is pronounced by a single bishop or by the entire college of
bishops. It can, however, assume different grades of universality and
thus of formal authority. This explains why the global responsibility for
the proclamation of the Word belongs in solidum to the entire college
of bishops, in which the supreme and universal expression of synodality
is realized.
The Sacrament confers on the bishop all the power of Orders, that is,
the possibility of rendering the entire sacra potestas always and
everywhere operative, according to the structural logic of the symbolic
sign. The missio canonica, instead, determines the territorial or
personal area, within which the individual bishop can use his sacra
potestas authoritatively according to the logic of the communication of

the Word.
The individual bishop, who can always validly consecrate in the entire
universal Church, can preach the contents of the Word authoritatively
and derive from it a juridically binding disciplinary order only for his own
particular Church.
However, although not enjoying a true power of jurisdiction in the entire
universal Church, every bishop is invested with a responsibility and a
solicitude with regard to her (LG 23, 2). This responsibility is inherent in
the episcopal ministry, both because Sacrament and Word, in their
content, are common and equal for all bishops, and because the
particular Church is a constitutive part of the universal
Church. 18 Exercising the sacra potestas in his particular Church,
according to the personal modality of the ministry, the bishop also
constructs the universal Church and assumes thereby a responsibility
which already has a synodal dimension in itself.
However, in order to be able to exercise the sacra potestas in solidum,
in so far as it expresses the Word, with a juridically binding force for the
entire universal Church, the bishop must be inserted in the (synodal)
structures prescribed by the universal Church, accepting the juridical
norms dictated by the communio hierarchica.
The apostolic succession along the line of the Word is fully realized only
as a collective succession of all bishops per modum non aequalitatis
sed proportionalitatis (Nexp. 1), with regard to the formulation of the
judgment on the truth of the faith and on the authenticity of ecclesial
discipline. This means that in virtue of the sacra potestas, exercised
according to the modality of the Word or jurisdiction, the college of
bishops also has the authority to formulate the final judgment on the
authenticity of the sacraments and thus on the licitness or validity of
their use.
The dogmatic affirmation according to which the college of bishops and
the Pope personally can exercise the full and supreme potestas in the
universal Church, in relation to the power of Orders and jurisdiction, has
a different meaning for the college and for the Pope.
For the college, the affirmation has a solely disjunctive value, since it
exercises the sacra potestas, according to the modality of the
sacramental sign, solely through the individual bishops. The college as
such cannot exercise the power of Orders either with a truly collegial act
or with a parallel act. In this sense, the sacra potestas of the college is
full and supreme only materially, not being different in content from that
of every member of the college. It is not full and supreme in a formal
sense, since the power of Orders of each individual bishop, in itself

universal, does not acquire a superior efficacy by the fact of being

exercised by all the bishops.
For the Pope, on the contrary, the same affirmation does not have a
disjunctive value, since he possesses all the power of Orders and all the
power of jurisdiction, both from a material and formal point of view. The
bishop of Rome is the one bishop who has the capacity to exercise
thesacra potestas according to the expressive modality of the Word with
all the extension of judgment and with all the formal binding force
inherent in it.
The theological justification of this fact is one of the nodal points of all of
ecclesiology. If it is easy to base the hierarchical structure of the
particular Church on the model of the hierarchical structure of the
Eucharist, it is difficult to go back from the Eucharist to the hierarchical
structure of the universal Church, since the Eucharist is always realized
in the same way in all the particular Churches, including the Church of
Rome.
The voluntaristic solution, which permits the justification of the existence
of the primacy of Peter, making direct recourse to the will of Christ
certified by the New Testament, offers the dogmatic guarantee of the
fact in itself, but does not give the reasons for which Christ has
established it. Even the model of the Trinity offers only an analogical
consideration to justify the hierarchical structure of the universal Church,
as well as her unity and plurality.
The difficulty of giving a systematic justification that is intrinsic to the
nexus mysteriorum explains why Orthodox theology can lead to a
synodally joint and acephalous ecclesiological solution, and can affirm
that the hierarchical subordination of one bishop to another has a
character that is only historical and human. 19

III. The Principal Institutional Forms of Synodality

1. From the Ecumenical Council to the Conferences of Bishops
The principle of the communio hierarchica, which determines the
structure of the college of bishops, and that of the communio
Ecclesiarum, have been historically translated according to different
institutional synodal forms. As the communion of the particular
Churches among themselves is derived from the constitutive
relationship of communion which each of them enjoys with the Church
of Rome, so the relationship of communion of the bishops between

themselves is derived from the constitutive relationship of communion

which each individual bishop holds with the Pope as head of the
college.
This means that, in the concrete exercise of the sacra
potestas, according to the formal expression of the Word, the synodality
inherent in the episcopal ministry can express itself only in the measure
in which it includes, directly or indirectly, also the head of the college of
bishops. The universal or less universal value of the binding force of
doctrinal or disciplinary decisions depends on the direct or indirect
function that belongs to the Pope as head of the college.
On the other hand, within the direct function belonging to the head of
the college, the exercise of synodality can assume a double form: that in
which the Pope is the constitutive element for the exercise of the
synodality of the college as such, and that in which the Pope makes
explicit the synodality inherent in his personal ministry, not with the
entire college, but only with the aid of some bishops convoked in the
synod of bishops. Both in the first and in the second case, the binding
force of the exercise of synodality is universal. The difference, however,
lies in the fact that whereas in the first case the operating subject is the
entire college as such, in the second case of the synod, the operating
subject is the head of the college. The college is active only indirectly,
through its head and a part of the bishops which represent it according
to an ecclesiological relationship that is not total. Therefore this rests on
a strongly sociological basis.
a) The first juridical structure in which the synodality of the college of
bishops is expressed is that in which the head of the college is also a
member of the voting body. This coincides in fact with the juridical
structure of the ecumenical council, or of a council by letter, even if in
this latter expression, synodality is reduced solely to the formal
dimension, deprived of the contents emerging from the discussion. The
council is the structure which institutionalizes the synodal dimension of
the college of bishops in the most complete way.
All the bishops enjoy a deliberative vote. However, the Pope, who can
preside iure proprio, does not formally vote, but approves the decrees.
This juridical solution connotes the fact that, since the vote of the Pope
is constitutive of the collegial act, this cannot be determined by the
majority of the bishops, but by their convergence of judgment with the
head of the college. It also means that without the head, the council
does not represent the college of bishops. In fact, in case of vacancy in
the see of Rome, the council is suspended (can. 340). 20
b) The second juridical structure is that in which the head of the college

of bishops is not a member of the voting body. The vote of the bishops
is consultative, since the college is not formally expressed as such, but
only through the Pope. The separation of the head of the voting college
(as in the synod of bishops and in the consistory) imprints a corporative
connotation to the exercise of synodality. The bishops represent
themselves and not the entire Church except according to a strongly
sociological dimension. 21
A first variation of this model is that of the consistory, when it is
convoked not to advise the Pope, but to celebrate an event or to receive
a papal decision (can. 353 2 in fine). 22 Synodality is expressed more
on a sacramental basis than in the exercise of the sacra potestas
according to the modality of the Word.
A second variation is that of the consistory convoked for the election of
the Pope. Since there is no head of the college, one cannot rigorously
speak of synodality (if this is the expression of the communio
hierarchica), but only of a corporate structure with a limited scope,
which, however, has its foundation in the horizontal relation of
communion existing between the bishops who are cardinals. In the
measure in which they respect the procedure of election fixed by papal
law, they operate in a position of virtual hierarchical communion and
thus of communion with the universal Church. Actually, this is a structure
originally proper to the Church of Rome, which has progressively
assumed a universal character.
c) The third juridical structure is that in which the head of the college of
bishops is not part of the voting body. This occurs in the particular
councils and episcopal conferences, where bishops express themselves
with a deliberative vote due to the potestas propria, inherent in their
office, and not on the basis of a potestas delegata, as occurs instead
in the synod of bishops for the cases in which the Pope gives a
deliberative power to the synod (can. 343). 23
The recognitio of the decrees (can. 446 and 456) on the part of the
head of the college of bishops has a different meaning from the
confirmatio (can. 341 1) of the decrees of an ecumenical council,
since it does not affect the nature of the decision, and thus it does not
confer a universal value on them. Despite papal control, the decision
remains the expression of episcopal synodality. Since it does not
intrinsically include a decision-making participation of the Pope, it
possesses only a particular character.
A first purely formal variant is that in which the Pope personally assists
in the work of a particular council. A second variant is that in which the
Pope celebrates a particular council, not as head of the college of

bishops, but only as metropolitan or patriarch of the West. Its decrees

would acquire a universal validity only in virtue of a phenomenon of
reception, or due to an act of primacy. In judging the synodal value of all
of these juridical structures, it is necessary not only to take account of
their universal or particular expressive value, but also of the
ecclesiological function assumed by their deliberative or consultative
vote.
2. The Function of the Deliberative and Consultative Vote in the
Exercise of Synodality
The juridical institutions of the deliberative and consultative vote play a
different role in the juridical order of the Church - at least in theory if not
always in practice - than that which is proper to the general theory of
law. 24 Evaluated according to the logic of civil constitutional systems,
where the central problem is that of the division of power, the
deliberative and consultative vote can easily be misunderstood in their
significance.
Evidently, even if the constitutional problem is not posed in the Church
in terms of the division of power, since the sacra potestas is indivisible,
it is still possible to fix, extend or restrict the competencies of the
episcopal ministry (and of the other ministries or offices) - amply
attested to in the course of history - by having recourse, among other
things, also to the institutions of the deliberative and consultative vote.
However, the nucleus of the question remains distinct from that of civil
law. On the one hand, this is because the episcopal ministry has a
necessary aspect from the point of view of competencies. On the other
hand, it is because - at least according to the ecclesiological
consciousness at which the modern Church has arrived - in principle no
member of the faithful should be excluded from a global coresponsibility for the building up of the Church. This also includes,
therefore, the dynamism of the preparation of decisions, even when
these decisions rest finally with the bishops.
The position of the bishops at an ecumenical council is juridically
expressed by a deliberative vote. The voting in itself, however, serves
not so much to decide as to ascertain which bishops, and which
particular Churches represented by them, have reached a judgment of
communion on faith and discipline. More than a discretionary fact of
power, this is a matter, at least on the level of fundamental questions, of
an act of ascertainment. The common judgment of a council, for that
matter, does not come in itself from the judgment of the majority, as in a
parliament, but from the convergence of the bishops with the Pope.

Since it is a synodal fact rather than a parliamentary majority act, the

connatural tendency for the decision is that of reaching at least moral
unanimity.
The deliberative vote of the bishops at the council is not deliberative
according to the meaning proper to the general theory of law, because
its formal binding force does not derive as such from the discretionary
nature of the human will. It is deliberative in the sense that the testimony
of the bishops with regard to their faith and the faith of their particular
Churches is inappellable. Actually, faith is not a fact that can be defined
in a voluntaristic way, nor is it a fact which can be testified to by
representation. This explains, for example, why the representative of a
bishop at a council does not enjoy a deliberative vote, but at most only a
consultative vote. 25 No one, in fact, can be represented in faith, since
salvation is an eminently personal act.
The deliberative character of the vote of the bishop coincides thus with
the necessary nature of his personal witness of faith. This evidently
does not exclude the fact that in a council, as in all other sectors of the
life of the Church, the actual operation may take place according to a
logic closer to that of the division of power, than that inherent in the
nature of synodality. This danger is that much greater in proportion as it
is difficult to establish the connection of concrete problems with the
sacramental element and the Word.
With the consultative vote, on the other hand, the juridical order of the
Church expresses, in theory, although in an approximate way and with
different degrees of efficacy, the position of all the other members of the
faithful (laity and clerics) who are structurally called to contribute to the
formulation of the judgment of faith of those who have the responsibility
to express it as the common judgment that is binding for all.
The difference of this from the way in which the consultative vote is
understood according to the general theory of law is given by the fact
that in the Church, the consultative vote should not express (and in itself
does not express) an institutional form of the limitation of power,
decided by those who possess a deliberative vote. On the contrary, it is
a necessity inherent in the dynamics of communion. This depends on
the fact that the particular Church (to give only one example) is not
constituted only by the bishop with his presbyterium, but also by a
portion of the People of God.
Therefore, it is necessary to keep in mind the fact that the common
priesthood of all the faithful is primary with respect to the ministerial
priesthood, in the sense that the latter exists only for the sake of the
former. Therefore, it must keep it in mind in the formation of its own

judgment, according to the consultative modalities which can historically

change. 26
The relationship of immanence to that portion of the People of God from
whom the particular Church is formed, is thus constitutive for the
process from which the doctrinal and disciplinary judgment of the bishop
should be formed. The sensus fidei and the charism of all the faithful
should flow into it. However, the judgment of the faithful - not
measurable with the mathematical criteria of a numerical majority - is
not constituted as a common judgment valid for all, until the bishop has
pronounced his testimony and his word.
This structural relationship of immanence of the bishop to his particular
Church can be institutionally expressed by the institution of the
consultative vote, but it does not coincide with it. This is not only
because there exist other possibilities for manifesting it theoretically and
practically, but above all because it does not represent a compromise
between an authoritarian and a democratic practice, as occurs in civil
juridical orders.
Although assuming different values (even if it remains identical from the
formal perspective), according to whether it is exercised by presbyters
with regard to the bishop or by members of the laity with regard to the
presbyters and the bishop, the consultative vote assumes a binding
force which derives from the intrinsic nature of the communion,
determined by the principle of the reciprocal immanence of the
elements.
In so far as it is a possible juridical expression of a dynamism inherent
in the constitutional nature of the Church, the consultative vote acquires
a significance not dissimilar to that of the deliberative vote, both
because it institutionally expresses a relationship of necessary
reciprocity, but also because it does not express a juridical position of
power, but a testimony of faith, whose binding force cannot be
adequately measured and limited in juridical terms. In fact, the truth of
faith can emerge with an evidence that is intrinsically binding even from
the testimony of a simple member of the faithful, which pastors must
take account of, unless they are to be gravely lacking in their ministerial
function. 27
At the level of the universal Church, the consultative vote can be applied
to express the relation of synodality inherent in the primatial ministry of
the Pope with regard to the other bishops. As a personal subject
through which the college of bishops becomes operative, the Pope,
although remaining the only one responsible for his act, is determined
by the synodal relationship which ties him to the other bishops, both in

virtue of the fact that he is invested with the same Sacrament and the
same Word, as well as due to the fact that the Church Rome, of which
he is the bishop, belongs in a constitutive way to the communio
Ecclesiarum.
This relationship of ontological dependence can be made juridically
explicit through a consultative vote of a part of the bishops of the
college. However, it would necessarily be transformed into a deliberative
vote in the case in which all the bishops were interrogated, since in this
case the bishops with the Pope would represent the college in its
totality, and the operating subject would synodally be the college as
such.
Whereas the relation of the college to the Pope is expressed from the
point of view of the collegial act through a deliberative vote, the
relationship of Pope to college can be expressed through a consultative
vote of a part of the bishops. The consultative character of the vote of
the synod of bishops does not depend on the fact that it is not a collegial
act in the technical-juridical sense. In fact, even the consultative vote, in
that it is a vote of the synod and not only of a majority, is a technically
collegial act. Its consultative character depends instead on the fact that
it does not ecclesiologically represent the college as a totality (even
while operating on the basis of their potestas propria, since the
bishops by their nature must be of aid to the Pope), and therefore it
does not express the testimony of all the other bishops.
It follows that the consultative vote, although it is a clear (even if not
rigorously necessary) expression of synodality, is as such reformable by
the deliberative vote of an ecumenical council, unless of course it has
already been assumed as an irreformable primatial act of the head of
the college.

IV. Conclusions
In conclusion, it can be affirmed that synodality is a dimension inherent
in the nature of the episcopal ministry. It emerges in its ontological
structure from the principle of communio, which postulates the
immanence of the universal in the particular and of the particular in the
universal. It is determined by the fact that all the bishops participate in
the same grade of the sacrament of Orders, which also includes the
Word, and from the fact that the Church of Christ is realized with a
particular and a universal dimension.

In the exercise of the sacra potestas, synodality is sacramentally

expressed above all in concelebration, but it assumes all its expressive
capacities only when it operates through the structural logic of the
communication of the Word, that is, of the so-called power of
jurisdiction.
Only the Word - in contrast to the sacramental dimension - is capable of
assuming a more universal binding force than the personal
pronouncement of an individual bishop or a pronouncement expressed
synodally by a group of bishops. This comes from the possibility for
such a pronouncement to be integrated in fact (as in parallel acts) or by
law (as in collegial acts) with a doctrinal or disciplinary judgment of the
college, whether it is expressed through its head, or through the totality
of its members with the Pope.

* First published: Ontologia della sinodalit, in: Pastor bonus in Populo. Figura, ruolo e funzioni del
vescovo nella Chiesa, ed. by A. Autiero and O. Carena, Rome 1990, pp. 303-329.
1 For a first approach to the problems posed by participation, we refer the reader to our studies:
Synodality, in: Nuovo Dizionario di Teologia, ed. by G. Barbaglio and S. Dianich, Rome 1982, pp. 14661495; I laici nel nuovo Codice di Diritto Canonico, La Scuola Cattolica 112 (1984), 194-218.
2 Cf. O. Saier, Die Communio in der Lehre des Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzils (Munich 1973); cf., however,
the observations in this regard by G. Alberigo, Istituzioni per la comunione tra lepiscopato universale e il
vescovo di Roma, in: Id. (ed.), LEcclesiologia del Vaticano II: Dinamismi e Prospettive (Bologna 1981), pp.
233-242, esp. note 11.
3 In the use made by canonical theory of this term, the equivocation has been introduced according to
which collegiality would require the permanence of an ecumenical council; cf., for example, Y. Congar,
Konziliare Struktur oder konziliare Regierungsform der Kirche, Concilium 19 (1983), 501-506; G. Alberigo,
Istituzioni per la comunione, loc. cit., pp. 235-262.
4 Cf. W. Aymans, Das synodale Element in der Kirchenverfassung, (Munich 1970), pp. 196-201.
5 Cf. W. Aymans, Kollegium und kollegialer Akt im kanonischen Recht (Munich 1969), pp. 88-91.
6 Cf. K. Mrsdorf, Munus regendi et potestas iurisdictionis, in: Acta Conventus Internationalis
Canonistarum Romae diebus 20-25 maii 1968 celebrati (Vatican City 1970), pp. 199-211.
7 Cf. CD 38, 1; can. 447.
8 For an analysis of real synodal activity conducted in the course of history, cf. E. Corecco, La formazione
della Chiesa cattolica negli Stati Uniti dAmerica attraverso lattivit sinodale (Brescia 1970), pp. 41-84, with

tables in the appendix; cf. also S. C. Bonicelli, I concili particolari da Graziano al Concilio di Trento (Brescia
1971).
9 Cf. P. de Vooght, Le conciliarisme aux conciles de Constance et de Ble, in: Le concile et les conciles
(Paris 1960), pp. 179-180; G. Alberigo, Lo sviluppo della dottrina sui poteri nella Chiesa universale. Momenti
essenziali tra il XVI e il XIX secolo (Rome/Freiburg/Basel/Barcelona/Vienna 1964), p. 12.
10 Cf. W. Aymans, Das synodale Element, loc. cit., pp. 318-324.
11 Cf. the discourse of John Paul II of December 21, 1984 to the Cardinals and to the Roman Curia, in
which he affirms: In fact, there is an ontological relationship of mutual inclusion between the individual
particular Churches. Every particular Church, in so far as she is a realization of the one Church of Christ, is
present in some way in all the particular Churches, in which and from which the one and only Catholic
Church has her existence (LG 23) (V infatti tra le singole Chiese particolari un rapporto ontologico di
vicendevole inclusione: ogni Chiesa particolare, in quanto realizzazione dellunica Chiesa di Cristo, in
qualche modo presente in tutte le Chiese particolari, nelle quali e dalle quali ha la sua esistenza la Chiesa
cattolica, una ed unica [LG 23]), La Traccia - Linsegnamento di Giovanni Paolo II, 11, (1985), pp. 14291435.
12 The relationship of reciprocal immanence is also realized, for example, between the Word and the
sacraments, between the ministerial and common priesthood, and between the duty and the rights of the
faithful in the Church; cf. E. Corecco, Il catalogo dei doveri-diritti del fedele nel CIC, in: Atti del V Colloquio
Giuridico dellUniversit Lateranense of 1984 (in process of publication).
13 Cf. D. Pirson, Personalitt und Kollegialitt des kirchlichen Amtes, ZevKR 19 (1974), 337-355.
14 Cf. M. Philipson, La Santissima Trinit e la Chiesa, in: La Chiesa del Vaticano II, ed. by G. Barana
(Florence 1965), pp. 327-350; E. Zoghby, Unit e diversit della Chiesa, in ibid., pp. 522-540.
15 G. Shngen, in his book Symbol und Wirklichkeit im Kultmysterium (Bonn 1937), p. 18, has expressed
the problem with this significant formulation: Vom Worte wird das Sakrament mit der Flle mchtiger
Geistlichkeit und vom Sakrament wird das Wort mit der Flle geistlicher Wirklichkeit erfllt. The
determination with which J. Beyer opposes the usage of the term Sacrament in the singular instead of the
plural, when it is a matter of denoting the entire sacramental reality as such, seems superfluous. Cf. Il
nuovo codice di diritto canonico, La Scuola Cattolica 112 (1984), 131 n. 21.
16 Cf. K. Mrsdorf, Die Entwicklung der Zweigliedrigkeit der kirchlichen Hierarchie, MThZ 3 (1952), 1-16;
A. -M. Stickler, Die Zweigliedrigkeit der Kirchengewalt bei Laurentius Hispanus, in Ius Sacrum, Klaus
Mrsdorf zum 60. Geburtstag, ed. by A. Scheuermann and G. May (Munich/Paderborn/Vienna 1969), pp.
181-206.
17 Cf. E. Corecco, Natura e struttura della Sacra potestas nella dottrina e nel nuovo Codice di Diritto
Canonico, Communio 75 (1984), 24-52.
18 On the problem of the relationship of the universal and particular Church, cf. J. Ratzinger, Probleme
und Hoffnungen des anglikanisch-katholischen Dialogs, IKZ Communio 12 (1983), 244-259.
19 Cf., for example, V. Pospischil, Der Patriarch in der Serbisch-Orthodoxen Kirche (Vienna, 1966); R.
Potz, Patriarch und Synode in Konstantinopel (Vienna 1971).
20 For the problem of the reception of Vatican II in the Code with regard to ecumenical councils, cf. the
issue of Concilium 19 (1983). If it is true that the Code has preferred the hierarchical formulations of the
Nexp. to the more open formulations of LG, and has put the ecumenical council in a systematic position of
secondary importance (even with respect to the Code of 1917), the affirmation does not seem to be as
plausible, however, according to which the Code has attributed a substantial and systematic priority to the
college of bishops over the ecumenical council. The subject of the plena, suprema, universalis potestas is
not the council as such, in fact, but the college of bishops, even during the celebration of a council.

21 Even if the problem of possible limits imposed by collegiality on the primacy has not yet found concrete
responses, the hypothesis of attributing to a permanent synod of bishops the legitimacy to represent the
entire college does not seem to be plausible, since no one in the Church (and thus not even the bishops)
can have himself represented in the act of giving witness to his own faith. Both the compromise formula of
can. 343, by which the Pope can attribute a deliberative vote to the synod, as well as the hypothesis of
admitting an appeal from a possible permanent synod to a council, are juridical surrogates useful perhaps to
encourage a more intense synodal practice at the level of the universal Church, but not capable of
theoretically resolving the problem of the limits provoked by the principle of collegiality over the primacy. On
these questions, cf., for example, the projected statutes for a new synod of bishops developed by G.
Alberigo, Appunti per organi collegiali nella Chiesa cattolica, in: Lecclesiologia del Vaticano II, loc. cit., pp.
262-266, with the counter-observations made by J. Lcuyer, pp. 267-270.
22 It is interesting to note that for both of these cases, can. 353 1 uses the expression collegiali actione.
23 In contrast to W. Bertrams, De Synodi Episcoporum potestate cooperandi in exercitio potestatis
primatialis, in: Quaestiones Fundamentales Iuris Canonici, Rome 1969, esp. pp. 501-507, we hold that
even maintaining the thesis that there is one subject of power in the Church (the college of bishops as
such), it is possible to attribute to the synod a character that is solely consultative (even due to a potestas
that is proper and not merely delegated). Also in this case, the synod does not represent the college in its
totality, since the bishops cannot have themselves represented in the witness of their faith. On all these
problems we refer the reader globally to the very accurate analysis contained in the large monograph by G.
P. Milano, Il Sinodo dei Vescovi (1985), in process of publication.
24 On this entire question, cf. E. Corecco, Parlamento ecclesiale o diaconia sinodale?, Strumento
Internazionale per un Lavoro Teologico: Communio 1 (1972), 32-44.
25 The new Code does not express itself on this problem, but there is no reason to hold that the
consciousness of the Church has changed on this point. Can. 224 2 of the Code of 1917, although it did
not recognize any right to a vote for a representative of a bishop, attributes to them at least the right of
putting their signature (as a witness) on the conciliar decrees.
26 The consultative vote of the laity should not be misunderstood as a simple aid given to the ordained
ministers, as does A. Acerbi in Lecclesiologia sottesa alle istituzioni ecclesiali post-conciliari, in:
LEcclesiologia del Vaticano II, loc. cit., pp. 226-228. The function of the common priesthood and the
sensus fidei is not that of aiding the ministerial priesthood, but of expressing their own testimony and their
own opinion on faith and ecclesial discipline.
27 It is sufficient to recall the text of LG 12 in which it is affirmed that those who have charge over the
Church should judge the genuineness and proper use of these gifts, through their office not indeed to
extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to what is good (cf. 1 Th 5:12 and 19-21), in order to
realize the juridical significance of charisms and thus of the duty of the pastors, which can also be juridically
exacted.