Something has gone seriously wrong in the minds of many Catholics, who cannot say "this is a bad person who abuses authority and needs to repent for his own soul's sake" without concocting hare-brained theories to the effect that a bad person never had any authority. I think it's the general failure of teaching about authority that chara…
Something has gone seriously wrong in the minds of many Catholics, who cannot say "this is a bad person who abuses authority and needs to repent for his own soul's sake" without concocting hare-brained theories to the effect that a bad person never had any authority. I think it's the general failure of teaching about authority that characterizes all modern thought, signally including Counter-Reformation theories of the papacy.
Regardless, it's ugly and stupid.
It's the mirror image of the ugliness and stupidity of refusing to say someone is wicked and abusive *because* he has authority!
"You're not my real daddy" (or mommy), shouts the child in the grocery store (stereotypically; mine just silently bolted whenever they were dissatisfied and I had to go find them. Oh I remember the time one refused to leave the cat food aisle without a stack of cat food for the cat he wished I would get him but fortunately when you get to the checkout you can simply say to the cashier "we are not buying *this*" and they set it aside.)
But I also think it's a pendulum swing from the previous teaching about authority, which put way too much emphasis on blind obedience, or otherwise substituting the brain of those in authority for those under them. It's certainly not the Thomistic view of authority, but it was very popular, in the Church, for a long time.
With this view of authority ensconced, a rational person will either reject authority or will reject bad or stupid authority figures as having valid authority. God cannot command blind obedience to someone who will dump you in a pit. So either, the obedience part must be wrong, or the someone who will dump you in a pit must not actually be an authority.
Simultaneously teaching both obedience, and that it definitely cannot be blind, is hard, therefore it is often not done.
Teaching that Jesus is fully divine and fully human is difficult too. I'm not trying to equate Catholic understanding of discipline with Catholic dogma but just point out that both can be hard to pin down conceptually. Even the Code of Canon Law seems to acknowledge this about discipline, stating in the last canon 1752 to keep in mind the salvation of souls when making judgements about following the law.
I think the concept, at least for discipline, is considerably easier than the practice. Particularly for those who find themselves under an authority figure who frequently gives bad commands. When does their objection arise because the authority figure is fallible, ignorant, evil, or otherwise wrong? When does their objection arise because they themselves are fallible, ignorant, evil, or otherwise wrong? How do we practically get along with someone whose commands are such that they frequently require objection? Particularly if he does not handle being objected to well?
Some of it is just being willing to suffer. But there's also no way to get around the logistical difficulty.
I always think of obedience to Church authorities as being along the same lines as the commandment to obey your father and mother. But St. Paul (and others) expands on this by saying "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." Eph 6:4. While the laity have an obligation to obedience and we hear about that a lot, the clergy (especially the Pope) as spiritual Fathers have a duty to not make obedience more difficult than it ought to be. To expand on Peter's point, "a bad person who abuses authority" is provoking his "children" to anger.
Something has gone seriously wrong in the minds of many Catholics, who cannot say "this is a bad person who abuses authority and needs to repent for his own soul's sake" without concocting hare-brained theories to the effect that a bad person never had any authority. I think it's the general failure of teaching about authority that characterizes all modern thought, signally including Counter-Reformation theories of the papacy.
Regardless, it's ugly and stupid.
It's the mirror image of the ugliness and stupidity of refusing to say someone is wicked and abusive *because* he has authority!
"You're not my real daddy" (or mommy), shouts the child in the grocery store (stereotypically; mine just silently bolted whenever they were dissatisfied and I had to go find them. Oh I remember the time one refused to leave the cat food aisle without a stack of cat food for the cat he wished I would get him but fortunately when you get to the checkout you can simply say to the cashier "we are not buying *this*" and they set it aside.)
Heh. Yeah, I was a "oh-so-helpful helper" and an item-adder aa a kid.
I think you hit the nail on the head.
But I also think it's a pendulum swing from the previous teaching about authority, which put way too much emphasis on blind obedience, or otherwise substituting the brain of those in authority for those under them. It's certainly not the Thomistic view of authority, but it was very popular, in the Church, for a long time.
With this view of authority ensconced, a rational person will either reject authority or will reject bad or stupid authority figures as having valid authority. God cannot command blind obedience to someone who will dump you in a pit. So either, the obedience part must be wrong, or the someone who will dump you in a pit must not actually be an authority.
Simultaneously teaching both obedience, and that it definitely cannot be blind, is hard, therefore it is often not done.
Teaching that Jesus is fully divine and fully human is difficult too. I'm not trying to equate Catholic understanding of discipline with Catholic dogma but just point out that both can be hard to pin down conceptually. Even the Code of Canon Law seems to acknowledge this about discipline, stating in the last canon 1752 to keep in mind the salvation of souls when making judgements about following the law.
I think the concept, at least for discipline, is considerably easier than the practice. Particularly for those who find themselves under an authority figure who frequently gives bad commands. When does their objection arise because the authority figure is fallible, ignorant, evil, or otherwise wrong? When does their objection arise because they themselves are fallible, ignorant, evil, or otherwise wrong? How do we practically get along with someone whose commands are such that they frequently require objection? Particularly if he does not handle being objected to well?
Some of it is just being willing to suffer. But there's also no way to get around the logistical difficulty.
I always think of obedience to Church authorities as being along the same lines as the commandment to obey your father and mother. But St. Paul (and others) expands on this by saying "Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." Eph 6:4. While the laity have an obligation to obedience and we hear about that a lot, the clergy (especially the Pope) as spiritual Fathers have a duty to not make obedience more difficult than it ought to be. To expand on Peter's point, "a bad person who abuses authority" is provoking his "children" to anger.