Three Roman rules for discerning Divine and Apostolic traditions — first rule
Click or tap any sentence to jump there. The side buttons skip a paragraph.
Roman doctors offer several tests for sorting true Divine and Apostolic traditions from fakes; they boil down to three.
First: whatever Rome believes as de fide, yet is not clearly in Scripture, must itself be a Divine or Apostolic tradition — because Rome cannot err, and because she is not ruled by fresh revelation but only by what she learned from Apostles and Prophets.
Latin
XVI. Porro Doctores Ecclesiae Romanae plures tradunt regulas, quibus traditiones revera divinae & Apostolicae discerni possint ab aliis, quae falso possent pro talibus obtrudi. Quae tamen omnes regulae ad tres reduci possunt. Prima est quod quicquid Ecclesia Romana tanquam de fide credit, nec tamen in Scriptura clare traditum reperitur, hoc ipso censendum est traditionem esse divinam, seu Apostolicam. Idque nititur duobus quae supponunt fundamentis. Unum est quod Ecclesia Romana errare non possit: Alterum quod tamen Ecclesia illa hodie non regitur novis revelationibus: sed quicquid novit in rebus fidei id totum ab Apostolis & Prophetis didicit.