Talk:Catholic (term)

I have tried to improve this page but it still does not read fluently --BozMo 07:28, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

I do not particularly like the "rightly or wrongly" in the last paragraph. It goes without saying the every one who believes something believes it "rightly or wrongly and inclusion for this particular case looks POV --(talk to)BozMo 10:36, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

Fair article (in muddy waters). Good. But I find the last paragraph ("Many Protestant..." -till- "The Orthodox churches of course, agree. ") a little misleading: It seems to imply that Roman Catholics believe that the Pope is the head of the universal Body of Christ; they (we) don't. The Church (in its most profound/mystical sense) is a Body; in that sense, the Head is just Christ. The pope is the head of the bishops, and hence the head of the Church as institution (divine institution, granted). The paragraphs seems to echo some anti-catholic prejudices and attacks eg. http://jmgainor.homestead.com/files/PU/Scr/hoc.htm which purposedly confounds the two analogical -but different- uses of the term 'head'. The page above indeed links to out of context prases from CV 2; but if one reads the entire page http://www.cin.org/v2church.html one can find 'The Head of this Body is Christ ...He is the head of the Body which is the Church.'--Leonbloy 17:40, 2 Jun 2004 (UTC)

However, the quotes, taken from the documents of Vatican I and Vatican II, clearly speak for themselves on the matter:

"… the successor of Peter, the Vicar of Christ, the visible Head of the whole Church …" Vatican II, Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Chapter III, § 18

"Therefore, if anyone says that blessed Peter the apostle was not appointed by Christ the lord as prince of all the apostles and visible head of the whole church militant... let him be anathema." Vatican I, First dogmatic constitution on the church of Christ, Chapter 1, § 6

"… the Roman pontiff is the successor of blessed Peter, the prince of the apostles, true vicar of Christ, head of the whole church…." Vatican I, First dogmatic constitution on the church of Christ, Chapter 3, § 1

"The Roman pontiff is the true vicar of Christ, the head of the whole church and the father and teacher of all Christians…." Vatican I, First dogmatic constitution on the church of Christ, Chapter 4, § 2

Merge

This should be merged w Catholicism. Sam [Spade] 06:50, 21 May 2004 (UTC)

For future reference, if/when this is ever discussed, note incipient comment on Talk:Catholicism#Organization. I would say that it is basically the case that since "c/Catholic" and "Catholicism" are words with separate entries in dictionaries, and do not entirely overlap in scope, it is worthwhile to have separate entries here as well. In particular, Catholicism is the term for the beliefs and practices of the Catholic Church, whereas "catholic" has a couple of other uses. Also, as a matter of etymology and history, the reasons for particular uses of the word "c/Catholic" as a word merit separate coverage to the extent that they are not covered elsewhere. Trc | [msg] 11:24, 21 May 2004 (UTC)