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2 THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA CATHOLICS AND THE POPE The following questions and answers dealing with Catholics and their relations to the Pope are taken from a pamphlet issued by the Catholic Laymen’s Association of Georgia. Copies of the pamphlet will be mailed free to any address on request. This is the second article of the series: sin “Does ?” the Pope lose his authority if he commits No, his sin is personal; his authority is not. He is not given authority for himself, but for the people, who can not search his heart and, therefore, must be able to rely upon his authority, whether or not his heart is clean. This is true of the President, Gov ernors, Judges and other public officials of our coun try and it can not be otherwise in respect of the Pope, Bishops and Priests of the Church. ' If the Pope were deposed what would happen ?” His successor would be elected. “Suppose two persons claim to be Pope, who would decide the contest?” Naturally, that body whose office it is to elect the Pope, the College of Cardinals. As such a thing has not occurred in five or six hundred years, however, it does not occasion much concern among Catholics. “Do Catholics admit that any Popes were wicked men ?” Yes, three certainly; four or five others, perhaps. A number of others (not over twenty), although one should not say they were wicked, were not exemplary men. Of the remainder on the long list of more than two hundred and sixty, all were men of very high character and many were saints of God. It is a noble record, reassuring, inspiring, incomparably more splendid than any other line of men on earth, and every Catholic is heartened and praises God and His Church more and more as he knows more and more of the history of the Popes through the centuries past. “Are Catholics permitted to believe that any Pope is in Hell?” Catholics are not permitted to believe that any cer tain person is in Hell (unless it be Judas whose fate the Scriptures reveal). We are taught that it is a sin against charity to say or believe of any man, regard less of what we may know of him or how he lived or died, that he is in Hell. Though we know men who have denied and betrayed the Church, who have rebelled against her authority, who have sought to destroy her, who have spread false doctrines over the world, who have doubted and blasphemed God, we may not say or believe that a certain one of them is in Hell. The Scriptures warn us, “Judge not.” But what became of the unbroken succession when it did occur?” It remained unbroken, the same as does the suc cession of civil rulers when two persons claim the same office. “Is the record of the Popes, their names, the time of their election, the years they reigned and the dates of their death, from St. Peter to the present time, complete and authentic?” It is; complete and authentic as the record of any other historic succession; so that at any given time in the nineteen hundred years since St. Peter, we know who was Pope quite as well as we know who at that time was Emperor of Rome or King of England or successor of Mohammed. “Who was the woman Pope?” There has not been one. A story is related of one called Popess Joan, but it is fiction. Some historians who are otherwise fairly creditable used to repeat the story, before the development of modern historical criticism; it still is occasionally repeated by ignorant or misinformed persons, or persons who delight in bits of scandal or find profit in spreading falsehood about Catholics; but no present day writer who values his reputation for scholarship or truth will venture to put forward the exploded myth about the woman Pope. “Was there ever a boy Pope?” John XII was only eighteen years of age when by combined force and intrigue he was elevated to the Papacy, which he disgraced by conduct that was a scandal to all Rome, for which he was deposed. This occurred before the present method of Papal elections was prescribed, when the people of Rome elected the Pope, and more than once forgot their duty and sur rendered their honor and their pride in the elec tions. “Are Catholics generally told about the lives of (he Popes who were wicked men?” Their lives are given in our histories and encyclo pedias, which are available to all; but Catholics do not make a practice of filling their minds with such things. Most of us realise that evil has a strong corroding influence. Unless it is necessary, therefore, we try to avoid dwelling upon the wickedness of our fellow- men, whether they were Popes or civil rulers or other public men, or men in private life. It is enough for us to know that all men are human, more or less sinful, entitled to our charity and in need of our prayers. To show, however, that the character of a wicked man who was Pope is not hidden from Catholics so that they can not know it and may be deceived into thinking that the Pope is sinless, we quote from the Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. VIII, page 426, where a Pope is described as a coarse, immoral man whose life was such that the Lateran was spoken of as a brothel and the moral corruption in Rome became the subject of general odium.” It might be difficult to believe that such a man could in any way represent Christ on earth, were it not for the fact that among twelve whom Christ Himself chose, was Judas; which is a warning to men for all time to come: As we dare not condemn Christ, we may not condemn His Church, for the wickedness of some of His followers. If the Pope is not inspired, and not in any way divine, how is he infallible?” By virtue of his succession to St. Peter whom our Lord made Chief of the Apostles and Supreme Shep herd of Christendom, and to whom He gave the keys of His Kingdom and whose acts on earth He prom ised to ratify in Heaven. Since God can not fail of His promise to ratify, and can not ratify error, He must give His supreme agent such assistance in his office as will prevent him from teaching error when he teaches as the agent of God.