Infallible

[Brother Adam]

What writings or decrees in the Catholic Church are considered infallible in nature?

Are any writings or decrees considered to have all of the same attributes as scripture? Are any held higher than scripture?

[Adeodatus]

No writing or decree is infallible "in nature". There is no such thing. Infallibility attaches to a teaching. Strictly speaking, you cannot say that something is "infallible". You can say that something has been "infallibly taught", or that the Church has an "infallible teaching authority". So for example, one can say that such-and-such a teaching has been "infallibly taught" = "taught without error".

Infallible definitions therefore do not sit alongside the Scriptures as a second body of teaching. Rather, the Scriptures themselves cannot explain or teach themselves. In other words, the Bible --- inasmuch as it is a book--- is not a living, breathing teacher. The Living, Breathing Teacher is God Himself, and specifically we say that the Holy Spirit who "inspires" (literally, "breathes into") the Scriptures is the same one who helps the Church to interpret the Scriptures.

Infallible teachings are thus teachings which ultimately come out of the Bible, and have been taught by the grace of the Holy Spirit, and are thus confirmed not to be wrong. For example, Scripture tells us that Jesus is God and man. But that doesn't stop some people who read the Bible from coming up with the wrong conclusion (He is only God, or He is only man, or He is neither God nor man but an angel or demiurge). So the teaching authority of the Church had to declare this truth "infallibly" at the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451. It is just taking a Scriptural teaching and defining it for everyone so that they can be without doubt. Even before Chalcedon Christians believed that Jesus was God and man. Infallible teaching is not new teaching. It is just making a belief certain and removed from doubt.

All dogma, all such teaching must come ultimately from the Bible. There is, of course, no such thing as the Bible existing in some form immediately obvious to everyone. The minute you read the Bible you are already interpreting it. "Infallible teaching" is the Church herself reading the Bible by the grace of the Holy Spirit. This is part of what we mean by "Tradition" with a capital 'T'. It is not a separate body of teaching as a supplement to the Bible. Tradition is the way we have always read the Bible.

So, "infallible teaching" refers to what is taught out of the Scriptures themselves and is not a separate body of teaching. Everything the Catholic Church believes and practices is ultimately grounded in the sacred deposit of faith from the apostles (i.e. Scripture as read in the light of Tradition by the grace of the Holy Spirit).