When do popes speak ex cathedra?

Consider four groups that, one might think, couldn’t be more different: Pope Francis’s most zealous defenders; sedevacantists; Protestants; and Catholics who have recently left the Church (for Eastern Orthodoxy, say).  Something at least many of them have in common is a serious misunderstanding of the Catholic doctrine of papal infallibility – one which has led them to draw fallacious conclusions from recent papal teaching that seems to conflict with traditional Catholic doctrine (for example, on Holy Communion for those in invalid marriages, the death penalty, and blessings for same-sex couples).  Some of Pope Francis’s defenders insist that, since these teachings came from a pope, they must therefore be consistent with traditional doctrine, appearances notwithstanding.  Sedevacantists argue instead that, given that these teachings are not consistent with traditional doctrine, Francis must not be a true pope.  Some Protestants, meanwhile, argue that since Francis is a true pope but the teachings in question are (they judge) not consistent with traditional Christian doctrine, Catholic claims about papal infallibility have been falsified.  Finally, some Catholics have concluded the same thing, and left the Church as a result. 

I’ve addressed the doctrinal controversies in question at length elsewhere and will not revisit them here.  The point for present purposes is that, whatever one thinks of them, none of these inferences is sound, because they rest on the false assumption that Catholicism claims that a pope could not err in the ways Francis is in these cases alleged to have erred. 

The Church’s teaching, as famously defined at the First Vatican Council, is as follows:

When the Roman Pontiff speaks ex cathedra, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals.

It is fairly widely understood that this does not mean that a pope is impeccable in his personal moral behavior, or that he cannot err when he speaks on some topic unconnected to faith or morals, or that he cannot err when he offers a personal opinion on some theological matter rather than teaching in his capacity as pope.  Rather, it is only when speaking as universal pastor of the Church on a matter of faith or morals that he is infallible.

However, what is somewhat less widely understood is that even this is not enough for an infallible ex cathedra statement.  As the passage from Vatican I says more than once, the pope also needs to be speaking to the universal Church on a matter of faith or morals in a manner that defines some point of doctrine.  And to “define” a doctrine is more than just putting it forward as binding on the faithful.  As the Second Vatican Council teaches in Lumen Gentium, even papal teaching that is not ex cathedra is normally binding (though as I’ve discussed elsewhere, the Church acknowledges rare exceptions).  To define a doctrine involves, in addition, putting it forward in an absolutely final, irrevocable manner.  When a pope defines some point of doctrine, he is teaching it in a way that is intended to settle the question for all time and can never be revisited.  It only when speaking with this maximum degree of solemnity that a pope is claimed by Vatican I to be making an infallible ex cathedra pronouncement. 

Such pronouncements are rare, and Pope Francis has never made one.  In particular, none of the doctrinal controversies referred to above involves any such pronouncement.  Neither Amoris Laetitia’s teaching on Holy Communion for those in invalid marriages, nor the 2018 revision to the Catechism on the topic of capital punishment, nor Fiducia Supplicans’s teaching on blessings for same-sex couples, involves any ex cathedra statement.  None of these documents is intended to “define” or settle in an absolutely irrevocable way any doctrinal matter.  Hence, if one or more of them really does contain doctrinal error, that would be – though regrettable and indeed scandalous – nevertheless compatible with the doctrine of papal infallibility, because none of them is the kind of pronouncement that is covered by infallibility.

Hence, none of the inferences referred to above is sound.  The fact that these doctrinal pronouncements were issued under the pope’s authority does not (contrary to some of Pope Francis’s defenders) by itself guarantee that they must be reconcilable with tradition, because they are not ex cathedra definitions.  Nor, if they are erroneous, would that entail that Francis is not a true pope, since (contrary to what some sedevacantists seem to think) even true popes are not infallible when teaching in the specific manner of the documents in question.   For the same reason – and contrary to what some Protestants and some Catholics who have lost their faith suppose – if Francis has erred in these cases, that would not falsify Catholic claims about papal infallibility, because the Church never claimed in the first place that popes are infallible when making pronouncements of the specific kind in question, since none of them involves an attempt at making an ex cathedra definition.

The teaching of the manuals

It is important to emphasize that this is in no way some novel interpretation of papal infallibility manufactured in order to deal with the controversies that have arisen during the pontificate of Pope Francis.  It is simply the way Catholic theologians have always understood the matter.  To see this, consider what is said in several standard theology manuals of the period between Vatican I and Vatican II.  This was, of course, the period when the popes were most keen to emphasize their power to settle matters of doctrine.  And yet the manuals say exactly what I just said about the conditions on an ex cathedra statement.  It is worth adding that these are manuals that received the Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur.  That does not entail that they are infallible, but it does mean that what they say was regarded by ecclesiastical authorities as perfectly orthodox and unremarkable. 

Let’s begin with Scheeben’s 1874 Handbook of Catholic Dogmatics, Book One, Part One.  Commenting on papal authority infallibly to judge matters of doctrine, it tells us that “only those propositions or considerations which the judge evidently intended to determine peremptorily are to be regarded as judicially determined and thus infallibly true” (p. 331, emphasis added).  That is to say, unless the pope intends to settle a matter in a peremptory or final way, his pronouncement is not of an ex cathedra nature.  Accordingly, Scheeben says, “it is possible, notwithstanding the continuing operation of his authority, that the pope extra iudicum [i.e. not ex cathedra] should profess, teach, or attest something false or heretical” (p. 144, parenthetical remark in the original).

Brunsmann and Preuss’s 1932 Handbook of Fundamental Theology, Volume IV, tells us the following:

An ex-cathedra decision… implies the unmistakable intention of the pope to utter a definitive and binding doctrinal decision and to oblige the Universal Church to accept it with absolute certainty.  Hence if the pope, even in his capacity as supreme shepherd and teacher, were to recommend to all the faithful a certain doctrine regarding faith or morals, even if he commanded that doctrine to be taught in all the schools, this would be no ex-cathedra definition, because no definitive doctrinal decision would be intended.  The case is similar with regard to decrees issued by the Roman congregations, when they (as happens with the S. Congregation of the Holy Office, over which the pope himself presides) condemn a doctrine, and the decision is confirmed by the supreme pontiff and published by his authority.  Such decrees are not per se infallible… If and so long as there is a reasonable doubt whether the pope intends a definition to be ex cathedra, no one is in conscience bound to accept it as such.  (pp. 49-50)

Notice that Brunsmann and Preuss not only note that a papal pronouncement does not count as ex cathedra if it is not intended as “definitive” and as settling the matter with “absolute certainty,” but also offer specific examples of teaching that would, accordingly, not count as ex cathedra.  Even a doctrine that a pope in his capacity as universal teacher commends to all the faithful and commands to be taught, or a doctrine taught with his approval by the Holy Office (now known as the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith), would not count as ex cathedra unless there were an “unmistakable intention” and no “reasonable doubt” that he intended it as an absolutely final and irrevocable doctrinal definition.

Ludwig Ott’s 1955 Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma says:

Not all the assertions of the Teaching Authority of the Church on questions of Faith and morals are infallible and consequently irrevocable.  Only those are infallible which emanate from General Councils representing the whole episcopate and the Papal Decisions Ex Cathedra.  The ordinary and usual form of the Papal teaching activity is not infallible.  Further, the decisions of the Roman Congregations (Holy Office, Bible Commission) are not infallible. (p. 10)

The condition of the Infallibility is that the Pope speaks ex cathedra.  For this is required… that he have the intention of deciding finally a teaching of Faith or Morals, so that it is to be held by all the faithful.  Without this intention, which must be made clear in the formulation, or by the circumstances, a decision ex cathedra is not complete.  Most of the doctrinal expressions made by the Popes in their Encyclicals are not decisions ex cathedra. (p. 287)

Ott here reiterates the points we’ve already seen in the other manuals, and adds that “the ordinary and usual form” of papal teaching, including “most of the doctrinal expressions… [in] Encyclicals,” are not infallible. 

Salaverri and Nicolau’s 1955 Sacrae Theologiae Summa, Volume IB notes that “to speak ex cathedra, according to Vatican I, implies that the Roman Pontiff teaches something… defining it as something that must be held, that is, obliging all to an absolute assent of the mind and deciding the matter with an ultimate and irrevocable judgment” (p. 216, emphasis in original).  They add that “the manifest intention of defining something is required” (p. 219, emphasis added).  In other words, and as the other manuals note, unless a pope explicitly tells us that he intends to settle some doctrinal matter in an absolutely final and irrevocable way, we don’t have an ex cathedra definition and thus don’t have an infallible pronouncement.

Van Noort’s 1957 Dogmatic Theology, Volume II: Christ’s Church comments on the matter at length:

The pope, even acting as pope, can teach the universal Church without making use of his supreme authority at its maximum power.  Now the Vatican Council defined merely this point: the pope is infallible if he uses his doctrinal authority at its maximum power, by handing down a binding and definitive decision: such a decision, for example, by which he quite clearly intends to bind all Catholics to an absolutely firm and irrevocable assent.

Consequently even if the pope, and acting as pope, praises some doctrine, or recommends it to Christians, or even orders that it alone should be taught in theological schools, this act should not necessarily be considered an infallible decree since he may not intend to hand down a definitive decision.  The same holds true if by his approval he orders some decree of a sacred congregation to be promulgated; for example, a decree of the Holy Office…

For the same reason, namely a lack of intention to hand down a final decision, not all the doctrinal decisions which the pope proposes in encyclical letters should be considered definitions.  In a word, there must always be present and clearly present the intention of the pope to hand down a decision which is final and definitive…

[W]hen he is not speaking ex cathedra… All theologians admit that the pope can make a mistake in matters of faith and morals when so speaking: either by proposing a false opinion in a matter not yet defined, or by innocently differing from some doctrine already defined.  (pp. 293-94)

Van Noort goes on to give an example of a case where a decree of a sacred congregation was issued with papal approval but turned out to be doctrinally erroneous:

It should be candidly admitted, we think, that the sacred congregation did condemn Galileo’s teaching by what was actually a doctrinal decree.  The opinion of some theologians that the decree… was a purely disciplinary decree… is, in our opinion, difficult to square with the facts of the case.  Likewise it should be frankly admitted that the Congregations of the Inquisition and of the Index committed a faux pas in this matter…

The pope was aware of the decree of the congregation, and approved it as a decree of the congregation. (pp. 308-9)

Van Noort’s discussion repeats the points made in the other manuals, and adds the positive explicit assertion that “the pope can make a mistake in matters of faith and morals” when not speaking ex cathedra, along with an example in which a Vatican congregation acting with papal approval did in fact issue a mistaken doctrinal decree.

Again, these manuals were all written after Vatican I proclaimed papal infallibility but before Vatican II and the doctrinal controversies that arose in its wake.  Hence no one can claim that they reflect some more limited, pre-Vatican I conception of papal authority.  Nor can anyone claim that they reflect the polemical interests of post-Vatican II progressives or traditionalists who, for very different reasons, would want to emphasize the limits of papal power.  They are also exactly the sorts of manuals sedevacantists like to appeal to in support of their position.  But in fact they undermine that position, because they show that the errors sedevacantists accuse the post-Vatican II popes of would (even if these popes really were guilty of all the errors they are accused of) be errors of precisely the kind the Church acknowledges can occur, consistent with what Vatican I says about the conditions on infallibility.

Again, I’m not going to revisit here the details of the doctrinal controversies surrounding Pope Francis.  But if the pope’s exhortation Amoris Laetitia, the 2018 revision to the Catechism, or the DDF declaration Fiducia Supplicans contain doctrinal error, then these would be the kinds of errors the Church acknowledges to be possible for a pope to make, because none of them is an ex cathedra pronouncement.  Hence they would not falsify Catholicism, nor would they show that Francis is not a true pope.

A heretical pope?

But what about the thesis that a pope might lose his office due to heresy, which was discussed by St. Robert Bellarmine, Francisco Suárez, and others among the Church’s great theologians?  The first thing to say here is that what is in view in this thesis is formal heresy, not mere material heresy.  A material heresy is a claim that is in fact heretical in its content, whether or not the person who asserts it realizes that, or would persist in adhering to the claim after being warned that it is heretical.  A person who holds some view that is materially heretical would not for that reason alone suffer excommunication and thus cease to be a Catholic.  That would happen only as a result of formal heresy, which is a material heresy that a person persists in despite the attempts of ecclesiastical authority to correct him.  Moreover, we have to be careful in determining what counts as “heresy,” which in canon law is not just any old theological error, but specifically the denial of some teaching that the Church has officially defined.  A formal heretic, then, is someone who obstinately denies some doctrine that the Church has formally defined, despite the attempt of the Church to correct him.

The thesis in question is that if a pope were a formal heretic in this sense, he would cease to be a Catholic, and thus cease to be pope, since a non-Catholic cannot be a pope.  But as I have argued elsewhere, no one has succeeded in showing that Pope Francis is a formal heretic.  So the thesis that he might have lost his office due to formal heresy is moot.  But even if he were a formal heretic, the matter is still nowhere near as straightforward as sedevacantists suppose.  For one thing, the thesis that a pope could lose his office for formal heresy is not a teaching of the Church, but a theological opinion, nothing more.  Whether a pope really could become a formal heretic, and, if so, whether he would lose his office, are matters that have been debated but never settled, either by theologians or by the Church. 

Here is what Van Noort says on the matter:

Thus far we have been discussing Catholic teaching.  It may be useful to add a few points about purely theological opinions… Theologians disagree… over the question of whether the pope can become a formal heretic by stubbornly clinging to an error on a matter already defined.  The more probable and respectful opinion, followed by Suárez, Bellarmine and many others, holds that just as God has not till this day ever permitted such a thing to happen, so too he never will permit a pope to become a formal and public heretic.  Still, some competent theologians do concede that the pope when not speaking ex cathedra could fall into formal heresy.  They add that should such a case of public papal heresy occur, the pope, either by the very deed itself or at least by a subsequent decision of an ecumenical council, would by divine law forfeit his jurisdiction.  Obviously a man could not continue to be the head of the Church if he ceased to be even a member of the Church. (pp. 293-94)

Salaverri and Nicolau write: “Theologians concede that a general Council can licitly declare a Pope heretical, if this case is possible, but not to depose him authoritatively since he is superior to the Council, unless it is clearly certain that he is a doubtful Pope” (p. 217).

Note first that both manuals are tentative about whether it really is even possible for a pope to become a formal heretic, though some theologians do allow that this is possible.  There are two lessons to draw from this that are relevant for present purposes.  The first is that the Church does permit theologians to entertain and debate the possibility that a pope may not only err, but even fall into formal heresy.  This is important for properly understanding the doctrine of papal infallibility, because it shows that the Church is very far from claiming that everything a pope might say on matters of faith or morals is infallible.  Second, though, the common opinion is that even if a formally heretical pope is possible in theory, it is highly unlikely that divine Providence would allow this ever in fact to occur.  And this reinforces a point that should be obvious in any event, which is that a Catholic ought to be extremely cautious about accusing a pope of formal heresy, as opposed to some lesser degree of error. 

But it is, in any event, not up to just any old Catholic with a stack of theology manuals and a Twitter account to make this determination.  Note that the manuals make reference to the action of a council against a pope guilty of formal heresy.  For to whom does the task fall to warn a pope that he is in danger of such heresy?  And who has the authority to decide that, after having been warned to no avail, his heresy is obstinate and thus has in fact passed from being material to being formal?  If just any old Catholic could claim the right to do this, the result would be precisely the sort of chaos that the institution of an authoritative hierarchical Church is supposed to prevent.  Hence the common view is that, if a pope were to fall into formal heresy and if he were to lose his office as a result, the latter could only occur after some authoritative ecclesiastical body had made the juridical determination that he had in fact fallen into formal heresy and ipso facto lost his office.

Yet even this, as I have argued elsewhere, would by no means solve all the problems that arise in such a scenario.  And this reinforces the point that we are dealing here not with any actual teaching of the Church, but with highly controversial and problematic theological theories, albeit ones the Church permits us to speculate about.  And it is merely on such speculative theories, rather than on official Catholic doctrine, that the sedevacantist position is grounded. 

Ex cathedra heresy?

So far we have been discussing papal teaching that is not presented in the first place as if it were an irrevocable ex cathedra pronouncement.  But what if a pope attempted to teach some heresy in an ex cathedra way?  Is this possible even in theory?  Sometimes Catholics say things to the effect that were a pope ever to try to do this, God would strike him dead before he could carry it out.  Interestingly, though, Scheeben treats the matter as being more complicated than that.  He writes:

Infallibility in itself does not absolutely rule out the possibility that the judge of last resort may place… a formally invalid act of judgment.  In this sense, therefore, many theologians in the Scholastic period were able to deem the judicial infallibility of the pope consistent with the possibility that he, out of wantonness or fear, might place personal acts, even with the claim of his authority, which should not be regarded at the same time as acts of his authority or of his See and hence, without prejudice to the infallibility of the latter, could be erroneous.

Those theologians considered… the sole [hypothetical] case of obvious and absolute temerity the one in which the pope would attempt to define a notorious heresy, or, what amounts to the same thing, to reject a notorious dogma that is held without doubt by the entire Church and thus to require the whole Church to abandon her faith; for in this case, they said, the pope would behave not as a shepherd but as a wolf, not as a teacher but as a madman, while on the other hand the Church or the episcopate could and would have to rise up immediately as one against the pope, although we could not say that she was rising up over or even merely against papal authority; rather she would rise up only against the arbitrariness of the person who hitherto had possessed the papal authority, but plainly through the questionable act renounced it and relieved himself of it. (p. 310)

What Scheeben appears to have in mind by a “notorious heresy” or the “reject[ion of] a notorious dogma” is the explicit denial of something manifestly previously defined as irreformable doctrine.  And by the “attempt to define” such a heresy, Scheeben seems to have in mind a case where a pope issued a decree like the following: “Using my full authority as successor of Peter and universal teacher of all the faithful, I hereby declare and define by a solemn and irrevocable decree that Jesus of Nazareth was not the Son of God,” or something similarly manifestly heretical. 

Scheeben does not claim that Providence might ever in fact allow such a thing, but he does discuss it as an abstract possibility that would not be strictly ruled out by the doctrine of papal infallibility.  But how could it not be ruled out?  Scheeben’s view (or at least, the view of the Scholastic theologians he has in mind) is that such an act would be “formally invalid” precisely because it would manifestly conflict with previously defined dogma.  The idea seems to be that among the conditions on an ex cathedra definition is that it be logically consistent with previous definitions.  After all, when proclaiming papal infallibility and setting out the conditions on ex cathedra pronouncements, Vatican I explicitly says that:

The Holy Spirit was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by his revelation, make known some new doctrine, but that, by his assistance, they might religiously guard and faithfully expound the revelation or deposit of faith transmitted by the apostles.

The position Scheeben is describing, then, would seem to be that an attempt to define a manifest heresy ex cathedra would be a kind of misfire, a failure right from the get-go to fulfill a basic condition on making an ex cathedra definition – just as a failure explicitly to speak in one’s capacity as pope, or a failure to manifest one’s intention actually to define a doctrine irrevocably, would be a failure to fulfill the conditions on an ex cathedra pronouncement.  (In this respect, the position Scheeben is describing would be analogous to Fr. Thomas Weinandy’s thesis about the conditions on magisterial teaching more generally, which I discussed in a recent post.)

Some might object to this position (as some have objected to Fr. Weinandy’s thesis) that it amounts to an appeal to “private judgment,” the very thing Catholics criticize Protestants for.  For if a Catholic were to judge some papal definition heretical, wouldn’t this precisely be to rely on his own judgment rather than that of the Church?

But this objection rests on a crude misunderstanding of the notion of “private judgment.”  The Church has never claimed that we have no understanding at all of scripture, tradition, or past papal teaching apart from what the current pope happens to say about it.  And such a claim would be manifestly false.  You don’t need the pope to tell you, for example, that scripture teaches that God created the universe, that he made a covenant with Israel through Moses, that Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, and so on.  Non-Catholics no less than Catholics can know that much just from reading the Bible and noting how it has always been understood for millennia.  It’s not as if the text is just a bunch of unintelligible squiggles that we can make absolutely no sense of unless the current pope tells us: “This is what this squiggle means, this is what that squiggle means, etc.” 

What the Magisterium of the Church is needed for is to settle matters that go beyond what the text has always been understood to say – finer points of interpretation, implications for doctrinal controversies, applications to current problems, and so on.  For example, it is open to the Church to say: “This is what divine creation of the universe amounts to,” or “Here is the right way to reconcile this passage with that one.”  It is not open to the Church to say: “Actually, God did not create the universe after all,” or “It turns out that we’ve always been misunderstanding scripture when we took it to be saying that God created the universe.” 

To deny this would be to empty of all content the Church’s claim to her own infallibility.  It would be to say, out of one side of one’s mouth, that the Church always teaches in accord with scripture and tradition – but then, out of the other side, effectively to take this back by saying that if the Church ends up contradicting some teaching that has always been regarded as part of scripture and tradition, then it must not really have been part of scripture and tradition after all.  That would be an instance of what is known in logic as a “No true Scotsman” fallacy.  It would make the Church’s claim to infallibility unfalsifiable.

Furthermore, as I have shown at length elsewhere, the Church has always acknowledged that it can in some cases be legitimate respectfully to criticize popes, even on doctrinal matters.  The Church could not have done so if every criticism of papal teaching necessarily amounted to “private judgment.”

So, Scheeben is correct to hold that, if a pope were to try to define ex cathedra a claim like “Jesus of Nazareth was not the Son of God,” that would be a manifest heresy, and it would not amount to “private judgment” to say so.  On the contrary, it would be precisely to adhere, not to one’s own private judgment, but to what the Magisterium itself has in the past always insisted is irreformable teaching.

But now another objection to Scheeben’s thesis (or rather, the thesis he is entertaining) might arise.  For doesn’t this thesis itself also make the doctrine of papal infallibility unfalsifiable?  For doesn’t it amount to saying that popes always speak infallibly when making an ex cathedra pronouncement – but then going on to insist that if they do utter some error in what purports to be an ex cathedra pronouncement, it must not really have been an ex cathedra pronouncement after all?

But that is not in fact what Scheeben says.  What he says is that if a pope attempts to define ex cathedra some “notorious heresy,” then in that sort of case it would not amount to a genuine ex cathedra act but rather only to a failed attempt at such an act.  Again, he evidently has in mind cases where a pope would deny some doctrine that has manifestly been formally defined by the Church as irreformable doctrine (for example, the teaching that Jesus is the Son of God).  But Scheeben does not address cases where a pope might attempt to define ex cathedra some heresy that is not notorious or blatant, but more subtle.  And here, one might argue, is where the doctrine of papal infallibility might open itself to falsification even if one accepts the thesis discussed by Scheeben.

Here would be an example.  Suppose a pope were to attempt to make an ex cathedra definition like one of the following: “Using my full authority as successor of Peter and universal teacher of all the faithful, I hereby declare and define by a solemn and irrevocable decree that the death penalty is intrinsically evil,” or “Using my full authority as successor of Peter and universal teacher of all the faithful, I hereby declare and define by a solemn and irrevocable decree that same-sex sexual activity can be morally acceptable.” 

Such pronouncements would not contradict any past formal doctrinal definition – a previous ex cathedra papal pronouncement, a conciliar definition, or the like.  But they would manifestly contradict the clear and consistent teaching of scripture and of the ordinary magisterium of the Church for two millennia.  And the Church holds that scripture and the consistent teaching of the ordinary magisterium cannot be in error on a matter of faith or morals.  Hence, if a pope attempted to make an ex cathedra pronouncement of one of the kinds just described, he would clearly be teaching error.

Hence, I would say, if a pope were to make such a pronouncement, that would falsify the doctrine of papal infallibility.  And I am myself not inclined to agree with the thesis entertained by Scheeben either.  That is to say, I am inclined to say that, if a pope tried to define ex cathedra a “notorious heresy” like the claim that Jesus was not the Son of God, that too would falsify the doctrine of papal infallibility.

Since I have no doubt that that doctrine is true, I would predict that such a thing will never in fact happen.  The doctrine is falsifiable in the sense that it makes substantive empirical claims that can be tested against experience.  But it has passed every such test for two millennia, and will continue to do so.

Related posts:

When do popes teach infallibly?

Popes, heresy, and papal heresy

What counts as magisterial teaching?

The Church permits criticism of popes under certain circumstances

Aquinas on St. Paul’s correction of St. Peter

Papal fallibility

The error and condemnation of Pope Honorius

Can Pope Honorius be defended?