People say the Catholic Church is an anti-democratic institution?

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that the Catholic Church is anti-democratic and that the Church seeks to encourage those principles in any community they find
 
A theocracy is a government under God, and a Democracy is a government of the majority of the populace which may or may not think that they are under God.

Let us look at some cases to examine how this may work.
If God commands something and the people agree. (People following God)
If God commands something and the people disagree (People rebelling against God)
If the Democracy say something and God agrees (People agreeing with God)
If the Democracy say something and God disagrees(People rebelling against God)

I do not find it a coincidence that the Vatican does not vote in the United Nations, as I believe that they are themselves trying to make the planet one state.
 
What’s so great about democracy?

Democracy is two lions and a gazelle deciding what to have for lunch.
 
“Anti-democratic” is too strong a term. It implies that the Catholic Church is opposed to democracy anywhere. A more accurate term is “non-democratic.” The Church is a unique institution that is guided by God, not by the majority vote of the people. However the Church is not opposed to the use of democracy as a governing principle in secular government. In fact, among all forms of civil society, the democratic model ranks among the highest - certainly above self-proclaimed autocracy or dictatorships.

As for the meme that democracy is two lions and a gazelle deciding what to have for lunch, it sounds clever, but it is not very applicable. You see, a gazelle, having little in common with the lions, would never join them in a democracy in the first place. The foundation of a democracy is the recognition that the participants have enough common interests to justify the entry into that form of government. It is hard to imagine such a justification ever having existed between lions and gazelles.
 
sheepovrep said:
A theocracy is a government under God
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A theocracy is a government that is typically set up like a monarchy or oligarchy in which the leaders claim to be doing God’s will, regardless of anyone else’s thoughts or opinions, including God’s.

Iran is a theocracy. They are basically a country in which the top priests run the country. It definitely isn’t following God.
 
Catholicism supports distributism and subsidiarity.
Right now democracy usually means giant media corporations influence which group of people control an ever larger, increasingly centralized government. That government then becomes more dictatorial.

In Catholic social teaching most decisions would be made by families or local businesses and government.
Workers would either be self employed or a group of workers would own the factory they work at.
 
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Maybe I should have just said heaven is more likely a theocracy ruled by God.

I am not going to deny that there has been room for corruption in any government form up to this point on Earth, not just Monarchies or Oligarchies claiming to be Theocracies. It is not until the people at the top of the economic and political ladder work as hard or harder than the people of the bottom of the respective ladder that the system will be fixed. If one person had to do without a home for everyone on Earth to have enough to eat would you be that person? Granted though, you would have to have been a trillionaire. The wages of righteousness are life -Proverbs 10:16
 
It’s not anti-democratic per se. The Catholic Church itself is monarchical (all governmental power in each particular Church is found within its bishop), but has no objection to temporal societies being democratic. What we do object to is the will of the people being a supreme law–just as we would object to a monarch’s will being the supreme law. God and His law must always be supreme. The problem was a lot of the emerging democratic forms in the 18th and 19th centuries were also based on anti-religious principles which denied any public obligation of society towards God and what He has revealed. This kind of approach became so associated with democracy, that the Church became seen as anti-democratic.
 
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LeafByNiggle said:
It is hard to imagine such a justification ever having existed between lions and gazelles.
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Not really. I hear people complain all the time in the US about “that’s not democratic, this isn’t democratic” while not understanding that the US is not, in fact a democracy, and that mob rule can rear its ugly head at any time.
 
SantaMaria said:
hat the Catholic Church is anti-democratic and that the Church seeks to encourage those principles in any community they find
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I’m not sure I understand the question. Are you asking is the Church governing system anti-democratic? or are you saying the Church actively discourages democratic principals?
 
People tend to remember the Democratic process gave us Lincoln, but they forget it also gave us Hitler. Most Kings are not as good as Lincoln, and most kaisers not as bad as Hitler.
 
0Scarlett_nidiyilii said:
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LeafByNiggle:
It is hard to imagine such a justification ever having existed between lions and gazelles.
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Not really. I hear people complain all the time in the US about “that’s not democratic, this isn’t democratic” while not understanding that the US is not, in fact a democracy,
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The system of government in the US is based on general democratic principles. It is not a pure democracy because the people do not vote on every question. We elect representatives and other authorities in a democratic fashion. Majority rule may have it’s problems, but anything else has even more problems.
and that mob rule can rear its ugly head at any time.
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In modern times the ugly head being reared is usually the rule of an autocrat.
 
The corporations that own the major broadcast and cable news networks, the NYT, Google, Facebook. Add in Fox or WSJ.
 
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