If I had a five dollar bill (nickles and dimes don't cut it in this inflationary age) for every time I heard someone say that the Catholic Church needs to be more democratic, I'd have enough money for a week's worth of gas. Barney Zwartz, who Diogenes informs us is not a Catholic, is giving the same old gimmicky marketing lessons to the Church to make it more appealing:
"Now it is time to try a touch of democracy. Some relatively simple reforms would not affect the church's core teaching of hope and salvation, which are non-negotiable. But how the church operates as an institution should always be open to self-examination."
Barney, we've already got that, it's called an examination of conscience. And speaking of democracy, isn't it interesting how many adherents to the old Faith rooted in tradition constituted the poor, working-class, and politically unpopular? The salt of the earth, the ordinary demos, like SS. Mary and Joseph, held firm as remnants to the ancient Faith. In contrast, we see from the elites, calls for watering down the faith, emasculating the priesthood, and shrilling for infanticide. Why should the Magisterium and Sacred Tradition yield to the adolescent whims of worldly Herods looking for cheap tricks? It's not that such appeasement would satisfy either Herod or Barney Zwartz.
"I have never been able to understand where people got the idea that democracy was in some way opposed to tradition. It is obvious that tradition is only democracy extended through time... Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to a small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking around." -G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
CK
Brilliant quote by Chesterton!
Posted by: SBW | June 25, 2008 at 06:57 AM