Roman Catholic (term)
It is not the official name preferred by the Holy See or bishops in full communion with the pope as a designation for their faith or institution.
[2][3] The term "catholic" is one of the Four Marks of the Church set out in the Nicene Creed, a statement of belief widely accepted across Christian denominations.
Those opposed to English rule forged alliances with those against the Protestant Reformation, making the term "Roman Catholic" almost synonymous with being Irish during that period, although that usage changed significantly over time.
[citation needed] The official and popular uses of the term "Roman Catholic" in the English language grew in the 18th century.
[20] Up to the reign of George III, Catholics in Britain who recognized the Pope as head of the Church had generally been designated in official documents as "Papists".
While believing that in the past the term Roman Catholic may have been synonymous with rebel, they held that it was by then as indicative of loyalty as membership in any other Christian denomination.
[22] The situation had been very different two centuries before, when Pope Paul V forbade English members of his church from taking an oath of allegiance to King James I, a prohibition that not all of them observed.
[citation needed] In 1870, English bishops attending the First Vatican Council raised objections to the expression Sancta Romana Catholica Ecclesia ("Holy Roman Catholic Church"), which appeared in the schema (the draft) of the council's Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith.
While the council overwhelmingly rejected that proposal, the text was finally modified to read "Sancta Catholica Apostolica Romana Ecclesia"[34] translated into English either as "the Holy Catholic Apostolic Roman Church"[35] or, by separating each adjective, as "the holy, catholic, apostolic and Roman Church".
The Anglican Archbishop of Dublin had objected to "Catholic Church" and quoted the Council of Trent for the longer title, which was approved by Eugenio Pacelli and Pope Pius XI.
[46] Use of "Roman Catholic" continued to spread in the United States and Canada In the early 20th century to refer to individuals, parishes, and their schools.
For instance, the 1915 Report of the Commissioner of Education of the United States had a specific section for "Roman Catholic Parish Schools".
[48][49] Connecticut state law, last revised in 1955, also provides for organising parish corporations affiliated with the "Roman Catholic Church".
"[71] For instance, the term Roman Catholic was used in the dialogue with the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury Donald Coggan on 29 April 1977.
[84] Official Catholic documents no longer use the term, due to its perceived negative overtones.
[85] In fact, according to John Erickson of Saint Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, "The term 'uniate' itself, once used with pride in the Roman communion, had long since come to be considered as pejorative.
Similarly, Henry Mills Alden writes: The various Protestant sects cannot constitute one Church because they have no intercommunion... each Protestant Church, whether Methodist or Baptist or whatever, is in perfect communion with itself everywhere as the Roman Catholic; and in this respect, consequently, the Roman Catholic has no advantage or superiority, except in the point of numbers.
It simply means that body of Christian believers over the world who agree in their religious views, and accept the same ecclesiastical forms.
"[89] Pope John Paul II referred to himself as "the Head of the Roman Catholic Church" (29 September 1979).
[90] He called the Church "Roman Catholic" when speaking to the Jewish community in Mainz on 17 November 1980,[91] in a message to those celebrating the 450th anniversary of the Confessio Augustana on 25 June 1980,[92] when speaking to the people of Mechelen, Belgium on 18 May 1985,[93] when talking to representatives of Christian confessions in Copenhagen, Denmark on 7 June 1989,[94] when addressing a delegation from the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople on 29 June 1989,[95] at a meeting of the Ukrainian Synod in Rome on 24 March 1980,[96] at a prayer meeting in the Orthodox cathedral of Bialystok, Poland on 5 June 1991,[97] when speaking to the Polish Ecumenical Council in Holy Trinity Church, Warsaw 9 June 1991,[98] at an ecumenical meeting in the Aula Magna of the Colégio Catarinense, in Florianópolis, Brazil on 18 October 1991,[99] and at the Angelus in São Salvador da Bahia, Brazil on 20 October 1991.
[100] Pope Benedict XVI called the Church "the Roman Catholic Church" at a meeting in Warsaw on 25 May 2006[101] and in joint declarations that he signed with Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams on 23 November 2006[102] and with Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople on 30 November 2006.
