First Vatican Council

Overview

The First Vatican Council is, by the Catholic Church's own reckoning, the twentieth ecumenical council. A council is an assembly of bishops from the whole Church convened to settle matters of doctrine and discipline. It met roughly three hundred years after the Council of Trent (1545–1563). The Eastern Orthodox Church and Protestantism do not recognize it as a council of the whole Church.

Background

In nineteenth-century Europe, rationalist and liberal ideas were spreading, and governments in a number of countries sought to curtail the Church's influence. The Papal States, ruled by the pope, were also shrinking as a result of the movement for Italian unification. In 1864 Pope Pius IX issued the Syllabus of Errors, which condemned various propositions of modern thought as errors.

Opinion within the Catholic Church was also divided. The movement to strengthen papal authority was called "ultramontanism" (from "beyond the mountains," that is, adherence to Rome across the Alps). Opposing it was a current that emphasized the autonomy of the national churches. In 1868 Pius IX issued a bull convoking the council.

Proceedings

• December 8, 1869: The council opened in St. Peter's Basilica. Approximately 700 bishops are reported to have attended.
• April 24, 1870: The council adopted the dogmatic constitution Dei Filius ("Son of God"). This constitution declared that God can be known with certainty by reason through the created world. It also declared that faith and reason can never contradict each other.
• The papal infallibility controversy: Papal infallibility is the teaching that the pope is free from error when he defines doctrine concerning faith and morals. Whether to define it as dogma provoked fierce debate. The bishops who opposed it considered such a declaration inopportune and also questioned its historical basis. The condemnation of Pope Honorius I by the Third Council of Constantinople in 681 was frequently cited in this connection.
• July 18, 1870: The council adopted the dogmatic constitution Pastor Aeternus ("Eternal Shepherd"). Many of the opposing bishops left Rome before the vote. The final vote was 533 in favor and 2 against.
• September–October 1870: The Franco-Prussian War, which broke out in July, led to the withdrawal of the French troops guarding Rome. On September 20 the Italian army occupied Rome. On October 20 Pius IX suspended the council indefinitely.

Outcome and Influence

Pastor Aeternus defined two points as dogma. The first is that Peter and his successors, the popes, possess primacy, that is, supreme jurisdiction, over the whole Church. The second is that the pope is free from error when he speaks ex cathedra ("from the chair"), that is, when, as supreme pastor, he formally defines doctrine concerning faith and morals. Such definitions were declared irreformable of themselves, and not from the consent of the Church.

Most of the opposing bishops accepted the decisions. However, the German theologian Ignaz von Döllinger and others persisted in their refusal and were excommunicated in 1871. Those who rejected the doctrine of infallibility went on to form the Old Catholic Church. The case most commonly cited as a clear subsequent exercise of papal infallibility is Pius XII's proclamation of the dogma of the Assumption of Mary in 1950. The deliberations of the council, which ended in suspension, were later supplemented by the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). That council also emphasized the authority of the episcopate as a whole, that is, episcopal collegiality.

Assessment

The Catholic Church holds that the council preserved the unity of the Church and the certainty of doctrine amid the challenges of modern thought. The Eastern Orthodox Church acknowledges a primacy of honor for the bishop of Rome. However, it does not accept papal jurisdiction over the whole Church or papal infallibility, and it holds that final doctrinal authority rests with councils. The council's decisions are regarded as having further widened the gap between the two churches following the East–West Schism.

Since the Reformation, Protestantism has held the Bible to be the final authority for faith. It therefore does not accept the doctrine of papal infallibility. The Westminster Confession of Faith, followed by Presbyterians, confesses that there is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ. Other Protestant denominations, including Methodist, Baptist, Holiness, and Full Gospel churches, likewise do not recognize the pope's magisterium, that is, the authority to teach and interpret doctrine. Today, even within the ecumenical movement, the question of papal primacy is regarded as one of the chief obstacles to church unity.