The Phenomenon Of Democracy And Its Impact On The Church: A Theological Reflection on the Church as People of God And a Communion of Believers with Equal Dignity and Specific Calling.
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Date
2003
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Tangaza University College
Abstract
When one hears of the phenomenon of democracy vis-à-vis the Church, what
often comes to one's mind is: "But the Church is not a democratic institution! The
Church can never be a democracy! There is no democracy in the Church, even though the
Church may encourage civil governments to embrace democratic principles!' Whether
these criticisms or remarks can be justified or not, is not the concern of this paper. Our
main objective here is to see how the phenomenon of democracy experienced in the civil
and secular society. impacts on the life of the Church. Our premise is that even though
the Church is hierarchical in structure which means that power and authority in the
Catholic Church are always related to, and proceed from the ultimate source of it's life,
who is Christ Himself, and exercised by those who chosen by him, still when we look at
the civil or secular society, people's perception of decision-making, authority and
'ministry' is rapidly changing. This unavoidably impacts on the life of the Church.
The notion of democracy is not such an alien concept after all. In as much as the
Church is a Divine institution, founded not by human beings, hut by Christ, still we have
to bear in mind that the Church has also a human dimension. It exists in the world.
Therefore, it is both a human and divine institutition. Since people live in the civil
society, (in the world). the social ideologies, such as democracy, that are operative there,
will definitely influence their outlook of life.
What this paper aims at is to see how the Church. after carefully scrutinising the
signs of the times, and having discerned the action of the Spirit in the world, can try to
correlate itself through its members and as an institution with such movements like
democracy. In other words, we intend to see how some good democratic principles
already operative in the civil society can be utilised in the day-to-day life of the Church.
Even though the Church "may not be a democracy". still the Church leadership, and
indeed the whole People of God, can embrace some of the democratic ethos of
participation, consultation, collaboration and co-responsibility without fearing that it will
contradict the hierarchical nature of the Church's leadership.
With this in mind, we begin our Chapter One by exploring and examining the
phenomenon of democracy in the civil society. We shall look at the various theories and
foundations of this phenomenon. We shall also outline the diverse principles operative in
an ideal democracy. Yes, we admit that democracy can be a utopia. Like any other
political and social ideologies, it has its setbacks and problems. Nevertheless, as an
ideology and also a culture for our time, we realise that it is quite attractive and we could
say that it is here to stay for an unforeseeable future. Also when we look at some of its
characteristics or principles, some of the shortcomings become eclipsed.
In Chapter Two, we shall reflect quite extensively on the phenomenon of the
Church as taught by Vatican II. Basically, we shall highlight the fundamental
understanding of the Church as the People of God and a Communion of Believers with
equal dignity and specific calling. We shall focus our discussion on the two essential
principles of equality and diversity among the people of God. These principles will
prompt us to reflect deeper on the questions of the Church as a 'religious' community,
but also a social institution, and how people in that community and social institution
actually gather, configure and structure their common life.
In Chapter Three, we shall look at the Church's practical life vis-A-vis democracy.
In this section we shall not only look at the liturgical ministries that the laity can play within the Church, but also the secular sphere. The laity have a big responsibility in the
civil society where they live, as members of the People of God. By their exemplary lives
and their influence, they could be the moral conscience of the society. Therefore, by
utilising the gifts and expertise of the laity, the Church can become relevant to the society
and also be effective in its mission. Indeed the work of the laity in the Church, wherever
they could be, is an essential and irreplaceable component of the mission of Christ.
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Keywords
Phenomenon Of Democracy, Church, Theological Reflection, Communion of Believers, Equal Dignity, Specific Calling