8 Comments
User's avatar
DF's avatar

So they went from the Monarch making the decision, to the Prime Minister making the decision and submitting it to the Monarch, to the Crown Nominations Committee making the decision and submits it to the Prime Minister who then submits to the Monarch.

Democracy leads to bureacracy should be a useful lesson not to follow for the Catholic Church.

Johannes's avatar

Your statement is not a critique of democracy, per se. A monarch has to delegate, as no one person can possibly make all the decisions in a kingdom. The monarch's role should be primarily to select good delegates who can act on his or her behalf. Ultimately, the monarch is responsible for the activities of his delegates, and get's the ax (literally) if his delegates fail.

Granted, in the current British system, it largely feels (at least from a poorly educated, American perspective) that royalty has miniscule if any actual power, and ever decreasing "soft power." The "delegates" in modern democracies are selected by the people, who cannot be ultimately held responsible for poor delegate selection. This is the challenge of modern democracy (at least idealized modern democracy): if "the people" as a collective are responsible for choosing the delegates, who suffers consequences should the delegates behave poorly?

DF's avatar

Agreed it's more just a statement of fact, whether you view it as a critique or not is just reflective of whether you think a bureacracy is a good system or not.

I do not enjoy rule by the majority nor it's repercussions, so I don't like democracy.

To answer your question though, everyone suffers the consequences who is not capable of utilizing the majority for their benefit. That's by design, otherwise you get into utopic thinking that somehow nobody will ever use the system to benefit themselves.

Christopher David Preston's avatar

This brings to my mind Churchill's statement "No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.…’". Which of the other forms would you prefer?

Dan Kearns's avatar

The direct line from the cause of St. John Henry Newman starting the Oxford Movement and writing his “Tracts” to this news is rather startling!

It’s the same thing he sensed from the beginning, but now, almost exactly 2 centuries later, having come into a rather strange and baroque form!

Christopher David Preston's avatar

Keble rather than Newman is normally regarded as the person who started the Oxford Movement.

ALT's avatar

On the one hand, it is difficult to see Anglican bishops as being much beyond political appointments, when confirmation by non-Anglicans is required for appointment.

On the other hand, the CCP has a hand in the selection of Catholic bishops, and they probably try to throw their weight around a lot more than the UK PM does or can.

Personally, I wouldn't want to have a hand in the confirmation of an Anglican bishop. That leads inevitably to a pretend consecration.

Sacramentum Journal's avatar

Things are moving according to plan.