Where does the authority of the state come from?

[Jerry_Westerby]

But what I meant was that it is debateble to what extent something is mindless fear-mongering in any present situation, no matter the POV where-from the speaker speaks. So in matters of opinion, there should be freedom of opinion.

sure.

And the very lack of a rule whereby the police are civilly liable, it may be argued, is what makes police less effective or more dangerous on the margin.

what do you mean?

Westerby

 

[Nate13]

@Jerry Westerby

You know all of this:

The duties of citizens

2238 Those subject to authority should regard those in authority as representatives of God, who has made them stewards of his gifts:43 "Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution. . . . Live as free men, yet without using your freedom as a pretext for evil; but live as servants of God."44 Their loyal collaboration includes the right, and at times the duty, to voice their just criticisms of that which seems harmful to the dignity of persons and to the good of the community.

2239 It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.

2240 Submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country: …

Does not exist in a vacuum but rather as part of the entire Catechism, right? Pulling these couple lines out of the Catechism to prove your point is no better than Protestants who point to Matthew 23:9 to prove that its a sin to call a priest “Father”. The legitimate religious authority while Jesus was on Earth was the Pharisees and he told his apostles to listen to what they taught, and recognized that they had the ability to “prophesy”. At the same time he still rebuked the legitimate authority multiple times as not practicing the Truth they taught. The same applies to the government authority. On the one hand he tells people to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, but then on the other hand there is no way Jesus would have pledged an oath to Caesar. Thousands of the early Christians died for that same reason as well.

Our religion is about the balance of ideals. Within the same religion we have celibate Trappists monks and people that devote themselves to another person and start a family living in a community.

 

[Jerry_Westerby]

@Jerry Westerby

You know all of this:

Does not exist in a vacuum but rather as part of the entire Catechism, right? Pulling these couple lines out of the Catechism to prove your point is no better than Protestants who point to Matthew 23:9 to prove that its a sin to call a priest “Father”. The legitimate religious authority while Jesus was on Earth was the Pharisees and he told his apostles to listen to what they taught, and recognized that they had the ability to “prophesy”. At the same time he still rebuked the legitimate authority multiple times as not practicing the Truth they taught. The same applies to the government authority. On the one hand he tells people to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, but then on the other hand there is no way Jesus would have pledged an oath to Caesar. Thousands of the early Christians died for that same reason as well.

Our religion is about the balance of ideals. Within the same religion we have celibate Trappists monks and people that devote themselves to another person and start a family living in a community.

cherrypicking quotes is normally understood to mean taking quotes out of context or editing them to alter their meaning, which I haven’t done. as its not possible to quote the entire CCC in a post I’ve picked out paragraphs and referenced them.

you should put the CCC in context. this next comment is important: the Church does not require civil authority to be perfect as a condition of obedience, or it would say so in clear terms, if it did, no government would qualify and “render unto Ceasar” would have no meaing. note: Paul did not hesitate to claim his status as a Roman citizen at times when it helped.

I live in a country with a more or less representative government, guarantees of freedom of speech and worship, due process and equal protection, allows a wide variety of dissent and even civil disobedience even if it sometimes falls short of ideal. so I figure this country is the kind of civil government the CCC requires obedience to, shortcomings or not, since reform is possible and indeed, always going on. unlike, for example a country whose government is imposed by conquest, outlaws dissent, forces churches underground, mandates that I turn in Jews, dissenters, homosexuals, gypsies, mentally handicapped for disposal in a lime pit after suitable gassing. that would be a government that the CCC’s mandate of obedience doesn’t apply to.

Westerby

 

[Bill_7154]

I’m making a point for Catholics who accept the teaching authority of the Church as expressed in the CCC.

and I’m definitely not LEO.

Westerby

Westerby,
Thank you for your reply. Sorry for assuming you were LEO of some sort. I came to that assumption because you pointed out correctly that ‘when he says police have no duty to protect what he means is that they can not civilly be suid successfully’. Not many people know, or whould have known that. But it does go father than just showing up late, as the case in NJ? or somewhere that is of key importance in trying the case demonstrates. Horrible circumstances.

And I have great respect for the police, they put their lives on the line and are rapid responders to dangerous situations, putting themselves inbetween dangerous people and their intended victims. Unfortunately, IMO, politicians have corrupted their job. They have put them in chage of probably 10’s of thousands of different laws and enforcing them, in particular the one’s I’m referring to are the numerous traffic laws. Police are so busy learning and enforcing tons of different laws, their key function, what they are trained to do and expert at, gets interferred with.

And this causes a riff between the police and the citizens in general. You know, the citizens who are not out there robbing and raping and killing and beating people and doing things like this. Their job is quite stressful, and that stress comes across when they interact with ‘citizens’ while they are doing things other than rapidly responding to dangerous situations. It creates unnecessary tension between police and citizens.

Immagine if Firemen, in addition to having as their duty to rapidly respond to dangerous situations, also had as part of their job riding around and sitting around in public looking for people who may be violating one of one hundred thousand different laws that have to do with fire safety of one kind or another. They pull over cars with a little liquid dripping out of their tail light, and then pressure some of those people (whom they size up as potentially having something in thier car that would be another violation) and pressure them to get out of the car so they can search and check the ashtray to make sure it is not full, check the lighter in the car to make sure it is functioning properly, check under the hood to see if there are any oil spills or leaks that may potentially be a fire hazzard, check the wiring, etc, etc, etc… and give out tickets for what they find.

Everyone loves firemen, not everyone loves the police. IMO this is at the crux of why. And as I said, IMO politicians are responsible.

But you still haven’t explained how you can fairly assert that “I take the law into my own hands” rather than… in a very limited number of circumstances feel it’s my duty to protect myself and others and will act in accordance with the law to protect msyelf and other innocent parties.

Or backed up your claim that i’m “unthinking”. The opinions I have come to were not arrived at by being an unthinking individual.

Also, is it possible to perform ‘civic’ duties without respecting government? Is it possible to perform civic duties while feeling that government is overgrown, self interested, corrupt, and performs many actions (or allows) that I feel (and many other people here, including you I presume) feel are morally wrong?

Thanks for taking the time to read my post and respond.
Peace and God Bless,
Bill

 

[Bill_7154]

Disagreeing with the non-infallible magisterium depends on how good and authoritative your argument is. So perhaps you could disagree with something on the apparent authority of the bible which is surly more infallible than non-infallible.

But I think the Church does have its own infallibly true political doctrine.

What is the passage from the bible where Jesus tells a rich man something like “a camel will sooner fit through the eye of a needle than you will find your way to heaven?” I"m hoping I didn’t bungle that up too much.

The way I see government (by government I primarilly mean those with considerable influence and power, also very frequently accompanied by very significant wealth) is that it is a machine that has long since been out of control, has been growing and growing for it’s own sake, to the detriment of the citizens it is supposed to serve.

Rich people get candidates pictures on TV so they have a shot at getting elected. There are thousands and thousands of well educated very moral, possibly uncorruptable people who have no chance at getting elected because they do not have the backing of very rich people. And if someone is going to tell me that the rich people who are responsible for getting candidates to high office elected don’t get special favors in return I am not going to believe them. This happens with both parties.

I really find it hard to believe that people actually do trust politicians (I’m not talking about some local alderman or whatever). And I find it hard to believe that people are satisfied with the way government is run or has been run in recent years/decades. So I take exception to that and use strong language to convey my opinions on the matter.

Does this make me exempt from being a Catholic?

 

[Bill_7154]

@Jerry Westerby

You know all of this:

Does not exist in a vacuum but rather as part of the entire Catechism, right? Pulling these couple lines out of the Catechism to prove your point is no better than Protestants who point to Matthew 23:9 to prove that its a sin to call a priest “Father”.

Thank you. This is the point I was trying to make when I asked for all potentially relevant documents, passages, etc from all sources in order to evaluate and potentially modify my present view. Since there are probably dozens, if not hundreds and hundreds of passages from the bible alone that could be looked at as relevant, it certainly seems unfair to pull a couple of paragraphs from somewhere other than the bible or church doctrine in order to ‘prove’ me wrong with no if’s and’s or but’s about it.

Peace,
Bill

 

[Bill_7154]

I live in a country with a more or less representative government,

Westerby

If you live in the USA, as I do, I would very much disagree with this.

IMO candidiates (to high levels of office) are cherry picked by very rich people who back their campaigns, get them on TV on a regular basis, without this happening the masses would have no idea who they were and therefore would not even be able to consider voting for them.

How many million dollars does it take to run a presidential or senatorial campaign? Where does the money come from? Does it come from the average Joe? Do random citizens nominate their neighbors whom they know to be of outstanding moral character with qualifications that would enable them to successfully adapt to the office they are nominating them for… and then go around and shake a tin cup to their other neighbors who also agree that this person is of outstanding moral character… and this person gets their face on TV like the typical candidates, gets talked about on the news like the typical candidates, etc, etc?

I think not. This is why I disagre that the government is representative of the people.

It is also openly reported by the president and other high ranking government officials that we are a democracy and we have the duty to spread democracy through the world.

We are a CONSTITUTIONAL republic, emphasis on constitutional. That means the rights spoken of in there can not be whittled away at regardless of whoever holds positions of power, whoever sits on the supreme court. Our rights are our rights, period.

Democracy is 2 wolves and 1 sheep ‘voting’ on what’s for dinner. And millions and millions of citizens believe that our government is a democracy. This is baffling to me (actually it isn’t, I expect as much from the government they way I understand it to be).

 

[fakename]

What is the passage from the bible where Jesus tells a rich man something like “a camel will sooner fit through the eye of a needle than you will find your way to heaven?” I"m hoping I didn’t bungle that up too much.

The way I see government (by government I primarilly mean those with considerable influence and power, also very frequently accompanied by very significant wealth) is that it is a machine that has long since been out of control, has been growing and growing for it’s own sake, to the detriment of the citizens it is supposed to serve.

Rich people get candidates pictures on TV so they have a shot at getting elected. There are thousands and thousands of well educated very moral, possibly uncorruptable people who have no chance at getting elected because they do not have the backing of very rich people. And if someone is going to tell me that the rich people who are responsible for getting candidates to high office elected don’t get special favors in return I am not going to believe them. This happens with both parties.

I really find it hard to believe that people actually do trust politicians (I’m not talking about some local alderman or whatever). And I find it hard to believe that people are satisfied with the way government is run or has been run in recent years/decades. So I take exception to that and use strong language to convey my opinions on the matter.

Does this make me exempt from being a Catholic?

Well a proper baptism makes one Catholic no matter the degrees of Catholicity.

If by government you mean what you say you do (by government I primarily mean those with considerable influence and power, also very frequently accompanied by very significant wealth) then your suspicion of governments seems to be unobjectionable, in that I see no reason why power and riches=good.

What the Church would call “government” (in its documents) IMO, would be good government (for why would you write a moral treatise which did not treat of an object like gov. in an amoral manner?). So a good government deserves obedience and such.

One may ask if governments are always bad. I think the Church would, with magisterial augustness, claim that sometimes it is and sometimes no. For political science in the classical sense is moral science, and since the Church does practically follow that paradigm, it follows that it has the authority to determine whether governments can always be bad. My argument, which I think is implicit in the learning of the Church, is that since natural things are things which happen for the most part (especially in human affairs) and since good government is natural to man (in a sense) then it must be that governments are more often good than bad.

But here I advice you to gradually check out the social encyclicals and the Politics of Aquinas as well as the parts of Aristotle’s Ethics dealing with politics to see for yourself.

josephkenny.joyeurs.com/CDtexts/

All with the convenience of the Internet!

 

[fakename]

Now as to the authority of the state: it must lay in some service it provides which is unique to its organization and it must be a good that is shared by all.

The reason for criteria 1 is that if the state’s functions could be fulfilled by something else then there would be no reason for a so-called natural state nor if the function is something shared by many orders, could a state exist period.

The reason for criteria 2 is that in every justification of the state, people will cite “the common good”. Therefore, there must be some "Common good’ which the state is uniquely capable of handling.

But what could this “Common Good” be? It cannot be defense (if we believe in Anarcho-capitalism and the practicality of insurance-based private defense forces), it cannot be an economic service if we believe in laissez-faire, and it cannot be religious if we believe in the Church. So then what is the “Common Good” which the state and it alone is capable of providing?

 

[Bill_7154]

Westerby,

I have not paid attention to whether or not you hold a postion on welfare, food stamps, or any other government programs where taxes taken from workers are given to people who don’t work, but, and I quote from something you have quoted:

2239 It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.

2240 Submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country: …

This suggests to me that you should be a good dutiful citizen and pay your taxes to continue to support those on welfare and others on other entitlement programs since it is God who has granted the government the authority to follow through in enacting and seeing all these programs stay intact. And actually, in all likelyhood, increased over time.

So if you have posted in objection to any of that type of stuff, since you have posted the above in objection to me quetioning government, I suggest you follow your own advice and sit back and feel blessed to pay the taxes you pay for all of those programs and every other program. After all, who are we to question government or consider it to be corrupt or not trust it? I see no reason why anyone should be exempted from which you claim that I must be beholden to.

If I am somehow misunderstanding please enlighten me.

Thanks,
Bill.

 

[Jerry_Westerby]

Westerby,

I have not paid attention to whether or not you hold a postion on welfare, food stamps, or any other government programs where taxes taken from workers are given to people who don’t work, but, and I quote from something you have quoted:

2239 It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community.

2240 Submission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country: …

This suggests to me that you should be a good dutiful citizen and pay your taxes to continue to support those on welfare and others on other entitlement programs since it is God who has granted the government the authority to follow through in enacting and seeing all these programs stay intact. And actually, in all likelyhood, increased over time.

So if you have posted in objection to any of that type of stuff, since you have posted the above in objection to me quetioning government, I suggest you follow your own advice and sit back and feel blessed to pay the taxes you pay for all of those programs and every other program. After all, who are we to question government or consider it to be corrupt or not trust it? I see no reason why anyone should be exempted from which you claim that I must be beholden to.

If I am somehow misunderstanding please enlighten me.

Thanks,
Bill.

(emphasis added)

I haven’t given an opinion “on welfare, food stamps, or any other government programs where taxes taken from workers are given to people who don’t work”, but thank you for illustrating how one can misrepresent another’s position so thoroughly and then argue against it. that’s called a “strawman” argument.

since you’ve asked, let me explain how you prevent these misunderstandings. pay attention and read only the words I write and not what you think I’d write.

FYI, that “something” I quoted was the CCC.

hope that helps.

Westerby

 

[Bill_7154]

(emphasis added)

I haven’t given an opinion “on welfare, food stamps, or any other government programs where taxes taken from workers are given to people who don’t work”, but thank you for illustrating how one can misrepresent another’s position so thoroughly and then argue against it. that’s called a “strawman” argument.

since you’ve asked, let me explain how you prevent these misunderstandings. pay attention and read only the words I write and not what you think I’d write.

FYI, that “something” I quoted was the CCC.

hope that helps.

Westerby

Maybe you missed the ‘qualifier’ where I clearly stated SO, if you have…

 

[Jerry_Westerby]

If you live in the USA, as I do, I would very much disagree with this…

you’re free to dissent, that’s one of the treasures of living in the USA.

my observations are based on a long and satisfying life here, your mileage may vary.

Westerby

 

[Jerry_Westerby]

Maybe you missed the ‘qualifier’ where I clearly stated SO, if you have…

I didn’t miss the qualifier. a conditional false attribution is a standard way of making a strawman argument.

Westerby