By definition.
My husband (raised Baptist, now more Orthodox) once asked me, years ago, what I would do if the Pope made a ruling that direct contraception (intentional impairing the natural fertility of an act of sexual intercourse) was okey-dokey. As I remember it, my answer was along these lines:
- I would first assume some dingbat reporter had gotten it wrong. I'd inveigh furiously against dingbat reporters, and expect John Allen to clear it up.
- If not, I'd apply the Italian adage "traduttore, traditore" and wait awhile til I could see what he said in Italian, Spanish, and Latin. There must have been some stupid ambiguity there. I would grumble mordantly against stupid ambiguity, while waiting confidently for Fr. Z to clear it up.
- If not, then I would assume the Pope had suffered a psychotic break, and therefore was mentally incapacitated and could not exercise his Petrine ministry of feeding the sheep (John 21), and confirming the brethren (Luke 22). Therefore incapable of exercising the Magisterium.
- That puts me approximately in the position of a sedevacantist.
- I'd be expecting God to make this clear, e.g. a well-timed lightning bolt.
- If the pope wasn't hors de combat for mental reasons, the next best explanation would be that *I* was nuts: this must be a dream or a drug trip. I would wait patiently for it to pass, praying "Help me, Lord Jesus"
- In no case would I say that the Pope was right about contraception being OK. It would contradict what the Bible had taught about Onanism, and what the whole *entire* Church had taught for 2,000 years, and no Pope has the authority to do that.
- While redoubling on the theme of "Come Lord Jesus!"
Ugh. Nightmare scenario. Ain't gonna happen. But if it did , that's what I'd do.
And this is what God would do!
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