The Vicar of God by H. Grattan Guinness

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park, Washington, D. C. · Sep 13, 1915

The Vicar of God

By H. Grattan Guinness

In A. D. 1294 Boniface VIII became Pope, and by his superior audacity he threw into the shade even Innocent III. He deserves to be designated the most usurping of mankind, as witnesses his celebrated bull Unam sanctam. In this document the full claims of the Papacy come out. We have noted several ever-increasing stages of papal assumption already, but now we reach the climax—the claim which, if it were a true one, would abundantly justify all the rest; we reach the towering pinnacle and topmost peak of human self-exaltation. What was the claim of Boniface VIII? It was that—

The Pope Represents God Upon Earth.

As this claim is the most extraordinary and audacious ever made by mortal man, I will state it, not in my own words, but in the words of the highest papal authority. In the summary of things concerning the dignity, authority, and infallibility of the Pope, set forth by Boniface VIII, are these words: “The Pope is of so great dignity and excellence that he is not merely man, but as if God, and the vicar of God (non simplex homo, sed quasi Deus, et Dei vicarius). The Pope alone is called most holy, . . . divine monarch, and supreme emperor, and king of kings. The Pope is of so great dignity and power that he constitutes one and the same tribunal with Christ (facit unum et idem tribunal cum Christo), so that whatsoever the Pope does seems to proceed from the mouth of God (ab ore Dei). . . . The Pope is as God on earth (papa est quasi Deus in terra).”

That which was claimed by Boniface VIII in the thirteenth century has been claimed ever since by a succession of popes down to Pius IX and Leo XIII in the nineteenth century. The Pope speaks today as the vicar of Christ, as God's vicegerent. The great ecumenical council of 1870 proclaimed him such, and declared him to be infallible. A professor of history in the Roman university, writing on the council of 1870, uses the following language, which strikingly expresses the papal ideal: “The Pope is not a power among men to be venerated like another. But he is a power altogether divine. He is the propounder and teacher of the law of the Lord in the whole universe; he is the supreme leader of the nations, to guide them in the way of eternal salvation; he is the common father and universal guardian of the whole human species in the name of God. The human species has been perfected in its natural qualities by divine revelation and by its incarnation of the Word, and has been lifted up into a supernatural order, in which alone can it find its temporal and eternal felicity. The treasures of revelation, the treasures of truth, the treasures of righteousness, the treasures of supernatural grace upon earth, have been deposited by God in the hands of one man, who is the sole dispenser and keeper of them. The life-giving work of the divine incarnation, work of wisdom, of love, of mercy, is ceaselessly continued in the ceaseless action of one man, thereto ordained by Providence. This man is the Pope. This is evidently implied in his designation itself, the vicar of Christ. For if he holds the place of Christ upon earth, that means that he continues the work of Christ in the world, and is in respect of us what Christ would be if he were here below, himself visibly governing the church.”

Do you hear these words? Do you take them in? Do you grasp the thought which they express? Do you perceive the main idea and central principle of the Papacy? The Pope is not simply man, but “as if God” and “the vicar of God,” as God on earth. No wonder the sentence is addressed to every pope on his coronation, “Know thou art the father of princes and kings, and the governor of the world;” no wonder that he is worshiped by cardinals and archbishops and bishops, by priests and monks and nuns innumerable, by all the millions of Catholics throughout the world; no wonder that he has dethroned monarchs and given away kingdoms, dispensed pardons and bestowed indulgences, canonized saints, remitted purgatorial pains, promulgated dogmas, and issued bulls and laws and extravagants, laid empires under interdicts, bestowed benedictions, and uttered anathemas!

Who is like unto him on the earth? What are great men, philosophers, statesmen, conquerors, princes, kings, and even emperors of the earth compared to him? Their glory is of the earth, earthy; his is from above, it is divine. He is the representative of Christ, the Creator and Redeemer, the Lord of all. He is as Christ; he takes the place of Christ. He is as God, as God on earth. This blasphemous notion is the keystone of the entire papal arch; it is the stupendous axis on which the whole papal world has rotated for ages, and is rotating at this hour.—“Romanism and the Reformation,” H. Grattan Guinness, D. D., F. R. A. S., London, J. Nisbet & Co., 1891, pages 16-18.