Quote:
Originally Posted by Ohio
It's rare, however, to meet a believer who has problems with all established church authority, only when that authority is taken advantage of.
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Hey
Ohio! Its been a while...
This is the perfect thought to begin to discuss this problem.
For centuries now, believers have taken the default position that there is no problem at all with established church authority (as in offices held by human beings). And then, when the authority is taken advantage of, they have no tools with which to deal with it!
Its happened over and over and over and over again in church history, and it doesn't raise the question: maybe there's a problem with "having no problem at all with established church authority."
At every occasion of abuse by "established church authority" we seem capable of only looking at the immediate abuse and calling that specific issue the problem. And yet, when it happens over and over and over again in so many different ways and forms across church history - nobody asks "Wait, maybe the problem isn't this
particular manifestation of abuse, but rather the structure we set up in the first place...."
That said, I don't necessarily have issue with an given "established church authority" as they exist in a particular iteration. But if our default is that there "should be" such mediators, then perhaps we leave ourselves vulnerable to the abuses when the do (inevitably) arise...
In Love,
Peter