Q: I would like to ask a question about diocesan bishops and episcopal authority, but I don’t know how to formulate it. I hope you’ll bear patiently with me, there’s a confused jumble of ideas in my head!
These ideas mostly center around the many decrees (if that’s the right word) of Pope Francis regarding what bishops can and can’t do. For example, they can’t allow the Old Mass in their dioceses without permission now; they can’t allow the establishment of new religious orders in their dioceses without permission now; they can object to Fiducia Supplicans, according to Cardinal Fernandez’s explanation, except that in another sentence he says they can’t because Pope Francis said so. I am not a theologian … [but] to me this all seems random and inconsistent. Excessively restrictive too, as if bishops are nothing but papal minions.
… Another idea I have floating in my brain concerns subsidiarity, and the 20th-century emphasis on allowing local parishes and dioceses to make many decisions for themselves, instead of mutely waiting for Rome to tell them how to do every single thing and even how to think…. For years we heard that centralized power in the Church was bad, in fact Pope John XXIII wanted to let the bishops at Vatican II tell him their opinions and what they wanted to do. If “the spirit of the Council” is our Catholic “guiding light,” why does so much of what the Pope says and commands seem to restrict what bishops may want to do?
If I am confusing multiple separate issues in the asking of this “question” I would greatly appreciate your help in clarifying them….—Tamara Continue reading
Canon lawyers are not responsible for the content of canon law. The Supreme Legislator is. Only Pope Francis can change the Code of Canon Law, so if you're not happy with what the law says, please take it up with him.
