Yorkville Enquirer

PAPAL INFALLIBILITY DEFINED.—Vicar General Starrs delivered an address in St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York, a few Sundays ago, in explanation of the recently adopted Roman Catholic dogma of papal infallibility. He said it does not mean that the Pope cannot err in what he says or does, for, being human, he is just as fallible as other men. But when he speaks officially as head of the church, declaring anything as to matters of faith, he is infallible. The speaker illustrated his idea as follows:

"In the United States we have a Supreme Court, with a chief justice and associate justices. Many cases are referred from the lower courts to this. But after a case has been decided in the Supreme Court there can be no appeal. These final decisions are as near like those of the Pope as any secular matter can be like a spiritual one. When the Chief Justice is not on the bench his opinions only pass as those of an ordinary citizen; when he presides in the court his decisions are final, and the whole country submits to them. And so in the church, now that the great dogma is announced from the Papal chair there is no appeal from it."