Contradiction of Authority From God

[Mavzylor]

[Romans 13]
{13:1} Let every soul be subject to higher powers. For there is no power but from God: and those that are ordained of God.
{13:2} Therefore, he that resisteth the power resisteth the ordinance of God. And they that resist purchase to themselves damnation.

Paul didn’t want Christians to resist the authority of Rome, because he said all authority came from God. However if an authority is successfully overthrown and a new authority is established, then is that authority from God? Did God want the British colonies to resist authority? Rome was converted through martyrdom, but how are you supposed to know when to die a martyr and when to fight?

 

[veritatisstella]

All legitimate authority comes from God. When an authority is not or ceases to be legitimate, then it has no right to rule and is not God-appointed.

CCC n.1903: Authority is exercised legitimately only when it seeks the common good of the group concerned and if it employs morally licit means to attain it. If rulers were to enact unjust laws or take measures contrary to the moral order, such arrangements would not be binding in conscience. In such a case, “authority breaks down completely and results in shameful abuse.”

 

[runningdude]

All that is good and true comes from God. Abuse of authority does not. Each person has a natural right to defend themselves against evil, including evil from an otherwise lawful authority.

Thomas Jefferson was not Catholic, but he was first-rate philosopher on this matter:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.