Part One.

“The pope (Latin: papa from Greek: πάππαςpappas, “father”), also known as the supreme pontiff (Pontifex Maximus), or the Roman pontiff (Romanus Pontifex), is the bishop of Rome, chief pastor of the worldwide Catholic Church,and head of state or sovereign of the Vatican City State.”

Matthew 16:

I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Since the Lord Jesus Christ God Incarnate chose Saint Peter to be the caretaker of the Keys to Heaven, this has been passed down over 200 Clerics who have inherited the Crown of Saint Peter for over 2000 years, many of them later on became Saints.

879 Sacramental ministry in the Church, then, is at once a collegial and a personal service, exercised in the name of Christ. This is evidenced by the bonds between the episcopal college and its head, the successor of St. Peter, and in the relationship between the bishop’s pastoral responsibility for his particular church and the common solicitude of the episcopal college for the universal Church.
The episcopal college and its head, the Pope

-The Catechism of the Catholic Church.

What is the purpose of the Pontiff in the Church and in Christianity as a whole? Unity and Direction, The first among equals.  The Pope plays a very important Theological and ceremonial role within the Church, not only is he the de facto ‘head’ of the church. The Unity of the universality of the Christian Faith is Channelled and represented by the Office of the High Pontiff.

882 The Pope, Bishop of Rome and Peter’s successor, “is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful.”⁴⁰² “For the Roman Pontiff, by reason of his office as Vicar of Christ, and as pastor of the entire Church has full, supreme, and universal power over the whole Church, a power which he can always exercise unhindered.”

The title ‘Vicar of Christ’ is very telling of the role the Pope conducts himself upon, that he is the shepherd over seen by God to guide his flock, seen in John 21:

Feed my sheep.

The Duty above of all else is the Pontiff must guide and feed the flock of Christ.  We see this in the Theurgic Operations of the Pope in the act of the Mass and the Consecration of the Eucharistic, which is the highest and most celestial liturgical rituals on the Earth and the whole Universe.

The Lord passes his power down unto his earthly Representative, the Successor of  St.Peter the Leader of the 12 Apostles, the Students of the Greatest Masters: The Lord incarnate, the God Man, lamb of God.

So someone in such a sacred position is bound to posses and exhibit what the layman would call  ‘Supernatural’.  In this essay I will go over and cover the many instances of Popes throughout history channelling and Invoking the very essence of the papa pontifex.  The Bridge Builder.

During Mass, The priest performing the Ritual, Represent Christ, they “Stand in” for the Lord and so do popes as literal manifestations of Peter on earth. When the pope Speaks in Ex cathedra   it is as almost Peter himself is speaking and thus it become  ‘papal infallibility’  

“when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, [the Bishop of Rome] defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church.”

Only the True Successor to Saint Peter who was appointed by God, Could make such actions with the Legal Liturgy of Mother Church, This in itself is Supernatural.
We see this also when Pope Francis called for all people of the World to Pray during the Pandemic. The act showed the Supreme Pontiff’s Universality over all other religions of men and the supremacy of Christianity which leads it to being a “Completion” of the Human Religious experience this in itself is the Supernatural-ness of popes that is more subtle and one could argue Esoteric.

 

St. Clement of Alexandria wrote on the primacy of Peter c. 200: “the blessed Peter, the chosen, the pre-eminent, the first among the disciples, for whom alone with Himself the Savior paid the tribute” (Jurgens §436).