Page:The Church, by John Huss.pdf/19

Rh alveus, fons indeficiens et refugium sufficientissimum. In view of such statements, Huss affirms that the doctors treated the Roman pontiff as a fourth person in divine things and placed him on an equality with the Holy Spirit.

In the course of his discussion on the papal office, Huss presents the following views:

The rock upon which the church is built, Matt. 16:18, is Christ and not Peter. The Apostles called Christ the foundation. To Christ, not to Peter, did the patriarchs look forward; and the early Christians did not base their faith on the Apostle.

The Roman pontiff shares authority with other bishops of the church, as Peter shared authority with the other Apostles. Christ did not give the care of all the sheep to Peter even as he did not exclusively give him the power to preach and administer the sacraments.

The word pope is not a Scriptural word and in the early history of the church there were a number of popes. Originally all bishops were called popes, and these were equally the immediate vicars of Christ.

The pope is not infallible. In matters of faith popes may err and have erred—falli et fallere possunt. They may be led astray by avarice or be deceived by ignorance.

The pope may also be a heretic and, as a matter of fact, before the fifteenth century there had been both wicked men and heretics on the papal chair. Here Huss drew for