Pope Francis died Monday morning, Cardinal Kevin Ferrell, the Vatican camerlengo, announced.“ At 7:35 this morning, the Bishop of Rome, Francis, returned to the home of the Father.
Sucks that he died, but got me thinking. How is the Pope any different from a Dictator? He’s literally one person at the top who has the authority to decide how an entire group of people should think and act and believes he has divine authority to do so?
He has some. He has direct control over church matters, and a lot of people willingly follow the church. So if the church says “no red meat on Fridays”, the people will do that.
He is elected though? It is not as easy to depose a pope as a president, but there is no military coup, secret police or other things associated with dictatorships.
In his position as pope he has no state power, only spiritual, and in his position as monarch of the Vatican, well there’s only church employees living there and Italy has an eye on things. Generally speaking unless otherwise stated Italian law applies within the Vatican.
Also he’s elected. Not that that means much it means that he’s a mouthpiece of the oligarchs (cardinals) electing him. But while we’re at elected monarchs, there’s one rather curious case: The French president is co-prince of Andorra, that is, their head of state, he shares that position with the local Bishop. Nearly 800 years ago the Andorrans said “yeah let’s not get invaded” and gave the title to the French head of state, then revolution happened, now the French are electing the Andorran head of state.
Sucks that he died, but got me thinking. How is the Pope any different from a Dictator? He’s literally one person at the top who has the authority to decide how an entire group of people should think and act and believes he has divine authority to do so?
Except that he has no executive power over those people.
And he is also elected (not by the people, but elected nontheless)
*anymore.
He has some. He has direct control over church matters, and a lot of people willingly follow the church. So if the church says “no red meat on Fridays”, the people will do that.
Yeah, but not in an enforced way.
He is elected though? It is not as easy to depose a pope as a president, but there is no military coup, secret police or other things associated with dictatorships.
In his position as pope he has no state power, only spiritual, and in his position as monarch of the Vatican, well there’s only church employees living there and Italy has an eye on things. Generally speaking unless otherwise stated Italian law applies within the Vatican.
Also he’s elected. Not that that means much it means that he’s a mouthpiece of the oligarchs (cardinals) electing him. But while we’re at elected monarchs, there’s one rather curious case: The French president is co-prince of Andorra, that is, their head of state, he shares that position with the local Bishop. Nearly 800 years ago the Andorrans said “yeah let’s not get invaded” and gave the title to the French head of state, then revolution happened, now the French are electing the Andorran head of state.