“I like to think of the Church as God’s faithful people, saint and sinner,” Pope Francis said in an October 25 message to the Synod on Synodality.
“One of the characteristics of this faithful people is its infallibility,” the Pope said. He explained:
When you want to know what Holy Mother Church believes, go to the Magisterium, because it is in charge of teaching it to you; but when you want to know how the Church believes, go to the faithful people.
The authentic faith is transmitted by parents to children, the Pope continued, noting that usually mothers are the first educators in the faith. So “the faith is transmitted in dialect, and usually in the feminine dialect.”
In his message the Pope contrasted that understanding of the faith with a “supermarket of salvation” that arises from clericalist attitudes, which he decried as “a great defeat.” He said:
Clericalism is a whip, it is a scourge, it is a form of worldliness that defiles and damages the face of the Lord’s bride; it enslaves God’s holy and faithful people.