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Entry: Authority Issues -- Is There Sovereignty Beyond the State? Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/authority_issues_is_there_sovereignty_beyond_the_state#32674 Post contents: Bravo, Dr Woods! In regards to Johannes Althusius and the family as sovereign: I put forward that sovereignty actually is actually shared among all units of society, and that the family must answer to the village in the same way the village must answer to the family. Likewise, a man must answer to his family as well as his guild, his village, and, finally, his king. The king must answer to his kingdom and, in Christendom, the Church - which is the force that holds family, village, and kingdom together. On issues of faith and morals, the Vicar of Christ is sovereign, on everything else, among the people blessed with the Faith, sovereignty lies within the Body of Christ, the Church Militant, the clergy, the Sacraments, the Church visible and invisible - those things that hold society together. The sovereignty of the Church isn't just the pope crowning kings (which he SHOULD do, by the way), but also the paterfamilias being compelled to partake in the Sacrament of Confession frequently, as well as the pastor of a parish organizing a Corpus Christi Procession, as well as a local guild sponsoring a needy family, etc. It is necessary that a strong cultural institution underly this sense of "shared sovereignty". Without a cultural institution, society collapses in on itself and explodes in an orgy of violence. In France, the Revolution can be directly traced to the weakening of that Thing that bound the Kingdom together - as Mr Zmirak pointed out in an earlier article, the Jesuits, for example, were suppressed in France, and the Church became an arm of the State of France, and less of an independent cultural institution. Not that it was the direct cause of the Revolution, but the Gallicization of the Church was factor in it proceeding violently. Again, thank you, Dr Woods, an excellent article! Sent at: 2008 12 01