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I think the time has come for Catholicism to chart a new future for
itself. This new future should not include the papacy. There is no need
to have a Pope. Jesus himself never called for the creation of an
office of the Pope. The Bible does not speak of a papacy. Why does
there need to be a centralized authority in the Roman Catholic Church?
Why should there be an intercessor between ordinary Catholics and God?
Why not cut out the middle man?
The papacy is not a necessary
part of Christian tradition. And there is no conceivable reason for the
Vatican to be located in Italy. Jesus never traveled to Europe. In
fact, he never left the Middle East. Wouldn't it make more sense for
the Vatican to be located in Israel? The papacy was created by the
Romans. They were interested in consolidating power, and they did not
hesitate to use the Christian religion to do so.
However, the
Pope of today does not have the same powers that Popes did over the
course of the last two millennia. The Pope can no longer declare a
Crusade. He can no longer ban science. He can no longer persecute and
oppress minorities. So then what is the purpose of having a Pope in the
21st century? A thousand years ago, it made sense to have a Pope so
that he could control the lives of his subjects.
But today, the
Pope has little control of the destinies of a billion Catholics
worldwide. The Pope of today is merely a spiritual figure. The role of
the Pope today appears to be as a sort of guide. He has studied the
Catholic faith and doctrine intensively. And he guides Catholics around
the world and advises them on how to practice their faith. But then
why should their be only one Pope? Why can't there be dozens of Popes
in the Catholic Church? Or perhaps hundreds?
In Islam, there is
no centralized authority. There is no hierarchy. There is no Muslim
Pope who has the sole authority to give a fatwa. Instead there are
millions of Islamic scholars who can give fatwa. The Catholic Church
needs to get rid of the church hierarchy because it does not serve a
real purpose. There is no need for it.
Each Roman Catholic
priest that is well-versed in the study of Catholicism should be
allowed to act as a guide for Catholics. This would be better than
having just one guy - Pope Benedict XVI - act as the only guide for all
Catholics. There is diversity of opinion on matters of faith in Islam
primarily because of the absence of any centralized authority. This
absence needs to be present in Catholicism as well.
Otherwise,
the Catholic Church will not only lack diversity of opinion on matters
of faith, but the entire system upon which the Catholic Church is built
will be destroyed if the supposedly infallible Pope is seen to have
committed (at the very least) a gross misjudgment or (at the very most)
a serious crime.
Free the Catholics from the papacy!
