The issues are complicated for Catholics, who understand the Church doctrinally as the Bride of Christ, protected from serious error by the Holy Spirit, a hierarchical institution with the proverbial keys to the Kingdom of Heaven. Part of the Church is the magistrate, which teaches a practical right from wrong for Catholics to gain entry into Paradise upon death; another part is the Pope himself, who is chosen by the Holy Spirit through the College of Cardinals, and is the vicar of Christ. It needn't be said that for Catholics these institutions aren't passing political things to be voted out of office or changed through demonstration or revolution. As God is eternal so is the Church, even if it is suppressed (as it was most brutally in ancient Rome, and equally may be today in totalitarian countries like China).
Another issue at play is the understanding of human history as linear. In the Catholic tradition, after the Fall (described in the first part of the Book of Genesis), God chose a people born of Abraham to be His instrument of salvation of humanity. Through their trials and fealty to Him, He was born as a human to them, uniting his perfection to our imperfection in the real person of Jesus. To fully atone for our sins, he--as a human--had to sacrifice himself to God. Without going into the deep ontological logic that describes how the one God could also be two separate persons (much less three, to include the Holy Spirit), He did sacrifice Himself on the cross and redeemed humanity. Yet to fully conquer our sins He had to defeat the punishment for our sins, which was death, and rise from the dead. This, according to Catholic teaching, he did three days after he died. But before he returned to heaven, he commissioned his apostles to preach His good news with His power. Hence the Church and the priesthood was born. Catholicism teaches that at some point he will come again to reconcile all things, ending the sinful world humanity made through the fall by creating it anew as it was before. And so Catholics believe there was a beginning, and there will be an end.
This linear thinking can lead to some odd conclusions. European (and following their lead, American) Catholics seem to have collectively drawn the conclusion that the power and influence wielded by the Church is a sure sign of its favor in the eyes of God. This thinking was most apparent in the 16th century, when the Church was at the height of it's power. Never mind that could look back on some very corrupt episodes in it's history: most of the Crusades, the Avignon Papacy, and the Inquisition, to name a few. But it was priestly misconduct--namely the wanton selling of indulgences--that sparked Martin Luther to nail his 95 Theses to the doors of Wittenburg Cathedral, leading to schism and the offshoot Protestant religions. Yet despite the bitter feuds that followed, spilling over into catastrophic wars, and an attempt at curbing the corruption (the Council of Trent), the Church continued to see itself as condoned by God. This view was aided by the vast number of new conversions in South and Central America and in the Pacific.
The Church suffered other grievances also. The 1789 French Revolution was horribly anti-Catholic and saw most Parisian religious go to the guillotine. Outside the capital, the Church fared better--it's lands and wealth were largely nationalized by the new French government(s), but religious were persecuted and put to death in cities like Reims, Toulon, and Lyon. The humanistic philosophies of The Enlightenment which provided the intellectual foundation of the French Revolution continued to diminish the Church's influence throughout the 18th Century, and in 1917 the revolution in Russia which installed the Soviets (and the subsequent treaty of Versailles, which gave the Soviets outright some predominately Catholic nations, like Ukraine) was accompanied by fresh attack on religion. This one was easier to ignore, perhaps, because the Church that suffered the most was the Orthodox Church, to which most of the citizens of the new USSR belonged. The Spanish Civil War of 1936 hit closer to home, as the liberal side conducted many persecutions of religious in it's territory during the war. And the Second Vatican Council of 1962, which attempted to 'modernize' the Church by making it more accessible to world which knew it little after 500 years of enlightenment philosophy, indirectly resulted in far fewer priests, religious, and laity in the Western World.
While it is clear that the hegemony of the Church is now but a shadow of it's former self (in the 16th century), it is strange that it continues to have such an aura of authority to others. Catholic and non-Catholics alike tend to view the Church as having very broad authority, that its teachings and actions are inviolable. Whether in that context one sees the Church as a force for good or for evil is a matter of faith and perspective, of course. But as an indicator of God's favor, the secular power and influence of the Church throughout history tells a very uncertain story.
The phrase, "the Church is protected from serious error by the Holy Spirit" obviously also requires examination in light of the well-publicized scandals of the Church, from the Crusades on down to the current, probably yet-untold, incidence of sexual abuse by priests. It is facile to simply regard that phrase as untrue. The language is cloudy here, because of course unprovoked wars (with all the attendant horror of war itself), oppression as seen in the inquisition, and the sexual abuse of minors are very serious crimes. But my understanding of the "serious error" is that which specifically endangers the souls of Christians. In other words, as the Bride of Christ, the Church (whatever the intentions of its ministers) is assisted by the Holy Spirit such that it cannot "cause one of the little ones who believe in [Christ] to sin" (Mt 18:6).
That statement itself is fraught with connotations. It is certainly not true that Church ministers have been protected from persuading Christians to sin, both at the macro level (see: Crusades and Inquisition) and at the micro level (i.e. a priest giving unwise or malicious advice to a parishioner, causing him or her to sin). For that statement to be true, the "serious error" must have to do more with the broad teaching of the Church and very little to do with the actions of Christians. And, so far one accepts that explanation, it may be true. The Church has never taught as doctrine or dogma persecution--which nevertheless does nothing to excuse the sins committed in Catholicism's name down the ages.
Yet these arguments render the Church practically ineffective. In the rarefied world of doctrine and dogma the Church may indeed be "holy and without blemish" (Catechism #1426), yet in the world of material influence the Church has to account for at least a great deal of evil. This brings forth the question of it's practical purpose. If the ministers and body of the Church do evil, why should it continue? And certainly no amount of offsetting good (through charity, etc.), valuable as it may be, can be expected to repair great evil. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains that the Church's purpose on earth is to faithfully continue Christ's work: "[T]he Church's mission is not an addition to that of Christ and the Holy Spirit, but is its sacrament: in her whole being and in all her members, the Church is sent to announce, bear witness, make present, and spread the mystery of the communion of the Holy Trinity" (Catechism #738). The language of this excerpt puts the Church into a role of providing sacrament (the tangible rendition of God's Grace) to the world. There is nothing in either the stated mission or the idea of a sacrament, notably, that implies a mandate of material authority over people, either to tell them how to think or punish their actions.
In fact, sacrament lies at the very center of the Church. In discussing the first sacrament, Baptism, the Catechism provides a clear picture of the holiness available to humans contrasted with the natural tendency of humans to sin.
Conversion to Christ, the new birth of Baptism, the gift of the Holy Spirit and the Body and Blood of Christ received as food have made us "holy and without blemish," just as the Church herself, the Bride of Christ, is 'holy and without blemish.' Nevertheless the new life received in Christian initiation has not abolished the frailty and weakness of human nature, nor the inclination to sin that tradition calls concupiscence, which remains in the baptized such that with the help of the grace of Christ they may prove themselves in the struggle of Christian life. This is the struggle of conversion directed toward holiness and eternal life to which the Lord never ceases to call us. (Catechism #1426)Therefore the call to holiness, and the necessity of the sacraments for receipt of Grace, is universal (one might even say, Catholic). It is the primary imperative for humanity as described by Christ when he said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment" (Matthew 22:37). It applies to all people, whether Christians or not. And more significantly, it applies to all Christians, to include the priests, bishops, cardinals, popes, nuns, and laity. In the same way concupiscence applies to all Christians. And the Church makes no claim of infallibility as regards its ministers--the claim applies only to the collective action as regards dogma, an example of which being that the mission of the Church is to be sacrament for the Holy Spirit, succinctly stated thus:
The seven sacraments [of the Church] are the signs and instruments by which the Holy Spirit spreads the grace of Christ the head throughout the Church which is his Body. The Church, then, both contains and communicates the invisible grace she signifies. It is in this analogical sense, that the Church is called a 'sacrament.' (Catechism #774)The language of the Catechism, which interprets the teaching of Christ, puts the focus of Christianity squarely on the holiness of the individual Christian, which itself proceeds solely through the Grace of God as administered by the Church through the Sacraments. Holiness is manifestly not something bestowed by the Church upon people, but by God upon people, because God is the only source of Grace. The Church functions as a conduit of Grace in the Sacraments, but it cannot limit God (for He is by definition illimitable) by stopping Grace. For this reason, the Church teaches the primacy of conscience: "A human being must always obey the certain judgment of his conscience" (Catechism #1790), which protects the freedom implied in Jesus' second great commandment, "Love your neighbor as yourself" (Matthew 22:37).
Furthermore, as the Church may enjoy the special protection of the Holy Spirit in its mission as sacrament, its practical value lies not itself but in its body.
Because they are members of the Body whose Head is Christ, Christians contribute to building up the Church by the constancy of their convictions and their moral lives. The Church increases, grows, and develops through the holiness of her faithful, until "we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God." (Catechism #2045)It is appropriate that the Church is called a 'mystical body,' because insofar as it exists in the realm of the angels, beyond our tangible and material world, it is 'holy and unblemished.' No doubt this Church, called the Church Triumphant, has all more power and glory than humanity can imagine. But the practical Church of this world, in its divinely-ordained role of assisting people in the struggle for holiness, is called the Church Militant and, as it is ordered and ministered by humans, it is no more protected from concupiscence than the rest of humanity. There is a great mystery in the fact that both Churches are, in fact, the same entity (much like, perhaps, the Trinity constitutes one God), and it is therefore indeed mystical. The fact remains, however, that Christians--even priests or other religious--are no holier than the rest of the mass of humanity.
Therefore the secular power, influence, and glory of the Church falls into this category: "Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity" (Ecclesiastes 1:2). The sacramental nature and mission of the Church, however, is the legacy of the apostles and the rock that underlies the institution (cf Matthew 16:18). The Church deserves a special reverence because of it's power to administer the sacraments and assist humanity in receiving the Grace of God, but "special reverence" is demanded only by the Church's role as the Bride of Christ and the conduit of Grace, and not for any material manifestation. Neither should "special reverence" be construed as to imply that the Church is above reproach. A cursory examination of the tragedies perpetrated and suffered by the Church, in fact, indicates that it most deserves reproach most when it seems to forget about the individual ministry of sacrament and turns it's attention toward propagating or protecting its secular power and influence. But that is a discussion for historians and theologians. What is beyond discussion entirely is that the chief practical value of the Church is in the sacraments, and by extension the Grace and divine assistance which proceed from those sacraments.
(It's important to note here that the objective value of the Church lies in it's very identity as the Bride of Christ. For that reason alone it is good, and for that reason it obligates Christians to reverence. Its participation in the material world, however, animated as it is by humans, is prone to the same sins as the humans itself.)
The abdication of Pope Benedict XVI amid the increasing evidence of great scandal in the Church is a great issue for the administration of the entire Church and for the administration of the diocese affected. As the Church is called to participate in the world, those Church members (laity and religious) who commit crimes ought to be punished accordingly, by the laws that apply to them as participating citizens under the jurisdiction of their government. For the rest of the Church, the sins of its members serve as a sad reminder that nothing in this world is immune from the inclination to concupiscence, and therefore Grace that flows from the sacraments is all the more urgently needed.
Let the world eagerly watch proceedings in the Vatican. Let Christians more eagerly turn to the sacraments and answer the call to holiness; let us more eagerly seek to follow Christ's two great commandments.
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