@XboxLiveGOP It's worse online bc some of them don't even frequent the sacraments but certainly irl it is a convenient way to feel superior to others with little effort
@XboxLiveGOP I would say at least at popular level the religious "blind obedience" from their constitutions was passed into the laity by their educational institutions
(a) The pope can do whatever he wants (positivism)
(b) Whatever the pope does, is sure to be good (infallibility)
Taken together leave the whole content of the Catholic faith merely provisional, up for endless revision without scrutiny. There is no 'red line' of falsifiability.
@SonaNylExile Since the loss of the papal states the popular view of the papacy has increasingly become insane. Is the pope the servant of the servants of God bound by divine law and tradition or is he God incarnate on earth?
The Avignon papacy shows that it is possible for a series of popes to make prudential decisions with disastrous consequences for the Church (even ones touching on divine law, if Bellarmine is correct*).
Whatever one thinks of the Ecône consecrations, it's perfectly Catholic to