Is it possible to be anarchist and catholic at the same time?

Question

Is it possible to be anarchist and catholic at the same time?

Answer 1

If you're interested, this is a popular forum for Catholic Christians, you may find more answers here...

http://christianforums.com/forumdisplay....

Answer 2

Now that is a new and interesting question.

Anarchism is the theory or doctrine that all forms of government are oppressive and undesirable and should be abolished.

Catholicism disagrees with this doctrine.

"Human society can be neither well-ordered nor prosperous unless it has some people invested with legitimate authority to preserve its institutions and to devote themselves as far as is necessary to work and care for the good of all."  Pope John XXIII

For more information, see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, sections 1897-1904: http://www.nccbuscc.org/catechism/text/p...

With love in Christ.

Answer 3

Yes. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_a...

"The Catholic Worker Movement has consistently protested against war and violence for over seven decades. Many of the leading figures in the movement have been both anarchists and pacifists."

-------

According to Amnesty International, 83 people were killed between March 10 and 14, 1980 in El Salvador. In San Salvador on March 23, the sunday morning after soldiers had killed a student at a Catholic university, Archbishop Oscar Romero pleaded:

"My brothers, they are part of our very own people. You are killing your own fellow peasants. God's law, "Thou shalt not kill!" takes precedence over a human being's order to kill. No soldier is obliged to obey an order that is against God's law. No one has to obey an immoral law."

Romero had consulted a team of priests, sisters, and lay people for his sermon - they had agreed that the amount of violence justified a direct challenge to the military. Romero was shot while saying mass the next day. His funeral was the target of a bomb and automatic weapons. The church would later document 588 murders that month, almost entirely the work of official government and unofficial right-wing agents.

"Those moments - that sermon, Romero's murder, his funeral - are among the most important in my life. They also express the core of liberation theology...

"What I have learned there, the ideas of the theologians as well as commitment like Archbishop Romero's, has been a kind of compass for my own life, however errantly I may follow it...

"Institutionally, moreover, the church was [in the 1960s] disproportionately serving the privileged, since priests and sisters were concentrated in the larger cities, often in Catholic schools for the rich. To the extent he began to be socially conscious, such a priest became aware of the church's complicity with an unjust social order...

"...Hosea has the Lord say, "For it is love that I desire, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than holocausts" (6:6). Such a notion is indeed a revelation to those accustomed to seeing Catholicism embodied in ornate churches, incense-filled ceremonies, and solemn, brocaded ecclesiastics. Some have taken to heart this critique. In El Salvador, Archibishop Oscar Romero left the cathedral construction unfinished in order to use the church's scarce resources for the poor and for pastoral work.

"...practical material aid for one's neighbor is the criterion of a just life. Furthermore, in the person of those who are poor and in need stands Jesus himself, although neither those who aid nor those who refuse to do so recognize him. The criterion is not whether one considers oneself Christian or not - one might even be an atheist - but whether one has served the needs of others.

"...Previously accustomed to seeing the church as the priest, or the large church building down in the town, or an organization with its own authorities like those of the government, they now begin to see themselves as the church. Jesus said, "Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in their midst" (Matt. 18:20).

"They learn that in fact the first several generations of Jesus' followers did not have special church buildings but met in their own homes. Speaking of the first Christian community in Jerusalem, the Acts of the Apostles states:

"The community of believers were of one heart and one mind. None of them ever claimed anything as his own; rather, everything was held in common. With power the apostles bore witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great respect was paid to them all; nor was there anyone needy among them, for all who owned property or houses sold them and lay them at the feet of the apostles to be distributed to everyone according to his need. [Acts 4:32-35; see also 2:42-47]"

From Phillip Berryman, Liberation Theology, 1987, Pantheon Books, New York.

Answer 4

For a truly religious person it,s very hard not to be an anarchist especially if you are a down trodden worker .But its impossible if you are rich even if you pretend you are religious.

Answer 5

That depends on your definition of anarchist. If you believe that anarchism is a political ideology that only focuses on society organized without a coercive state, then you can be both. But if you’re an anarchist that believes all organizations are oppressive and need to be abolished then no.

Answer 6

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Day

Answer 7

i guess so---isn't anarchy the absence of law and order

Answer 8

No. Enjoy going to h**l.