Atheists, tell me, a Roman Catholic: why should I become an atheist?

[Aoi Magi]

Does a old man, chosen by other fallible old farts, suddenly gain magical understanding of the bible to overthrow it's authority as "solo scripta" despite their whole faith relying on it? I don't really understand why catholics can believe the interpretations despite history repeatedly showing they are not infallible. [1]

The senile old farts have thought themselves as gods like Pope Nicholas I declared that "the appellation of God had been confirmed by Constantine on the Pope, who, being God, cannot be judged by man." - Labb IX Dist.: 96 Can. 7, Satis evidentur, Decret Gratian Primer Para. [2]

I mean after you have a "heretic" like Pope Honorious, or require reversals like Pope Zosimus reversing he predecessors pronouncements, how do you honestly believe that what the current pope is saying is truth and you won't be damned for following it by some future pope? [3]

1) The Catholic Church has never held to the concept of "sola scriptura". It does not rely on "sola scriptura". It is not a religion of a book. It is a religion of a person and the community he founded. That community wrote the scriptures, and that same community today is the Catholic Church. Catholic infallibility is and always has been a very qualified and specific meaning. I'd invite you to see what it actually means.

2) This quotation does not exist. It is a misrepresentation of things he probably did say, namely: the affirmation of the donation of Constantine (giving the Pope temporal authority over the Western empire, leading eventually to the Papal States), and the affirmation that the Pope had the highest authority on earth (NOT that the Pope is God). Given that Nicholas was Pope at a time of bad relations with the Patriarchs of the East (especially Photius in Constantinople), it is not surprising that he would be trying to assert his authority.

As it turns out, the "donation of Constantine" was forgery. Everyone at the time, however, (including the Pope, Byzantine Emperor, Western Emperor, and the Eastern Bishops) thought it was real.

3) There is a difference between material heresy (unknowingly believing something that is heretical) and formal heresy (knowingly believing something that is heretical, and publically teaching said heresy in spite of ecclesial requests to stop). There is a difference between every-day things the Pope says (non-infallible personal remarks and correspondence and interviews) and very specific things he says for the purpose of teaching (non-infallible magisterial teaching like exhortations, encyclicals, apostolic letters, etc.) and very specific things he says for the purpose of solemnly and finally defining a dogma/aspect of a dogma (infallible ex-cathedra pronouncements).

Pope Honorius may have been a material heretic. That is not a problem. Almost every Catholic is probably a material heretic in some way (i.e. there is probably something we think in good-faith that the Church teaches, but we are actually wrong about). He never, however, solemnly defined his material heresy as a dogma. If he had done that, then you would have a point.

....right, I guess similar quotes like Innocent III saying "Indeed, it is not too much to say that in view of the sublimity of their offices the priests are so many gods." also fake.


so why a teaching from a fallible man cannot also be fallible?