Pope to Nigerian priests: You'll be fired if you don't obey

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

Pope to Nigerian priests: You'll be fired if you don't obey

By FRANCES D'EMILIO, ASSOCIATED PRESS VATICAN CITY — Jun 11, 2017, 1:54 PM ET

Pope Francis has laid down an ultimatum to defiant Nigerian priests: lose your job if you don't obey me and your bishop.

Francis met June 8 at the Vatican with a delegation from the Ahiara diocese, where priests have been refusing to accept the 2012 appointment by the then pontiff, Benedict XVI, of the local bishop.

Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, reporting the pope's unusually harsh order, said Sunday that Francis was acting "for the good of the people of God" by threatening to suspend the priests from the ministry if they didn't pledge in a letter, by July 9, "total obedience" to Francis and accept Bishop Peter Okpaleke's appointment.

Francis told the visiting delegation he was "very sad" about the priests' refusal to obey and ruled out tribal loyalties as explaining the refusal.

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Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pope-nigerian-priests-fired-obey-47969025

[TexasProgresive]

1. Before these priests were ordain as priests they were ordained as deacons

From the rite of ordination of deacons:
Then the candidate goes to the bishop and, kneeling before him, places his joined hands between those
of the bishop. If this gesture seems less suitable in some places, the conference of bishops may choose
another gesture or sign.
If the bishop is the candidate's own Ordinary, he asks:
Do you promise respect and obedience to me and my successors?
Candidate:
I do.
If the bishop is not the candidate's own Ordinary, he asks:
Do you promise respect and obedience to your Ordinary?
Candidate:
I do.
Bishop:
May God who has begun the good work in you bring it to fulfillment.

This is again repeated when ordained as priest:
Promise of Obedience

16. Then the candidate goes to the bishop and, kneeling before him, places his joined hands between those of the bishop. If this gesture seems less suitable in some places, the conference of bishops may choose another gesture or sign.

If the bishop is the candidate's own Ordinary, he asks: Do you promise respect and obedience to me and my successors?

Candidate: I do.

If the bishop is not the candidate's own Ordinary, he asks: Do you promise respect and obedience to your Ordinary?

Candidate: I do.

Bishop: May God who has begun the good work in you bring it to fulfillment.

[Igel]

2. There was an amusing report about obedience I heard recently.

On the one hand, an organization needs obedience, loyalty, and structure. Remove it and you have a bunch of people trying to get to their own goals in their own way, but using resources that somehow have to be allocated. It stops being an organization. It becomes anarchy.

At the same time, many orders are just plain unreasonable and even reasonable ones have moments when they become unreasonable. Nobody's omniscient, writing rules applicable to every person in every situation can be difficult without knowing what "every situation" means and who "every person" is. At those points, the idea of workers and employees having some free will becomes important because they then alter or reject the unreasonable orders.

The military runs on this kind of balance. Most military folk in these situations get the balance about right--they might get yelled at, but it doesn't affect them. Some screw up and get in trouble for following obviously unreasonable orders; some screw up and get in trouble for not following orders when they were reasonable.

It's the same for any organization.

[Lordquinton]

3. Why are they rejecting this Bishop?

Seems like there is something to this story that isn't being told.

[nil desperandum]

5. They are from a different clan

than the Bishop, the priest and the bishop are Igbos but not the same clan, thus they are not inclined to subordinate themselves to a different clan.

Apparently clan loyalty trumps the god loyalty...

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-40245752

[Lordquinton]

7. So the church is attempting to break the local culture

I'm a little torn on my reaction here, because if it were, for example, a female Bishop they were refusing to subordinate to then I'd say fire the lot. But that's a whole different situation, and misogyny is not a deeply held cultural position, it's universal opression.

The Pope is in the wrong here if he can't understand the harm he's causing.

[AtheistCrusader]

4. So, they're willing to fire these guys, but obstructionists that shuffled and hid molesters

get airlifted off to some obscure post to live out their days?

wtf

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/03/20/cardinal-steps-down-over-sexual-impropriety-allegations-a-first-for-a-cardinal-since-1927/?utm_term=.5531c105d053

[nil desperandum]

6. But of course

the child molesters aren't refusing to accept the orders of the Bishop so their sins can be forgiven.

But the guys who don't like a Bishop from another clan? Not so much...