[johnb838]

I heard somebody the other day, it might have been Donohue, talk about how the left has this idea that the College of Cardinals and the Papacy is something like a Roman Catholic Supreme Court that can be pressured, lobbied, massaged, manipulated, twisted, and tortured until eventually somebody comes along who will give them what they want.

What they fail to understand is that these are matters of decided church doctrine and are not subject to revision or revisitation, overturning or overthrowing. They are what they are and the Pope has no power to change what has been decided in times past.

I hope that's true. If this Conclave produces another strong conservative it will be the strongest impetus for me yet to dump the Episcopal and be received into the Roman church. That Rome is where I need to be to defend the Principles of Truth against the whimsical self-referential "truth" of secular princes.

[Aquinasfan]

I heard somebody the other day, it might have been Donohue, talk about how the left has this idea that the College of Cardinals and the Papacy is something like a Roman Catholic Supreme Court that can be pressured, lobbied, massaged, manipulated, twisted, and tortured until eventually somebody comes along who will give them what they want. What they fail to understand is that these are matters of decided church doctrine and are not subject to revision or revisitation, overturning or overthrowing. They are what they are and the Pope has no power to change what has been decided in times past.

Bingo. They just don't get it.