First Vatican Council
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The First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the First Vatican Council or Vatican I, was the 20th ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, held three centuries after the preceding
Window in Domalain, Brittany, showing the Proclamation of Papal Infallibility
Catholic ecclesiastics from various countries gathered in Rome for the council
Drawing showing the First Vatican Council
Medal marking Vatican I
Papal infallibility
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Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church which states that, in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter, the pope when he speaks ex cathedra is preserved from the possibility of error on d
First Vatican Council
…It opened on 8 December 1869 and was adjourned on 20 September 1870 after the Italian Capture of Rome. Its best-known decision is its definition of papal infallibility. The council's main purpose was to clarify Catholic doctrine in response to the rising influence of the modern philosophical trends of the 19th century…
Pope Pius IX (1846–1878), during whose papacy the doctrine of papal infallibility was dogmatically defined by the First Vatican Council
1881 illustration depicting papal infallibility
The only ex cathedra application of papal infallibility since its solemn declaration has been for the Marian Dogma of Assumption in 1950. Painting of the Assumption, Rubens, 1626
Supporters of the pope outside the United Nations in 2008 with a banner quoting Matthew 16