The dismissal of Bishop Strickland as the Ordinary of the Diocese of Tyler prompts us to consider the pathology of clericalism in today’s hierarchy. In happy times, the following Four Tiers of the Bureaucracy describe the way of the world. In times of doctrinal disobedience, the Tiers facilitate clericalism.
Jesus gives an apt description of garden variety clericalism:
The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat; so practice and observe whatever they tell you, but not what they do; for they preach, but do not practice. They bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with their finger. They do all their deeds to be seen by men; for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long, and they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues, and salutations in the market places, and being called rabbi by men. (Mt. 23:2-7)
Jesus doesn’t criticize the structure of the hierarchy. He objects to the abuses. The caste system found in most bureaucratic organizations helps us understand the mechanics of clericalism.
Organizations have various managerial tiers. Tier One represents the highest ranks. Competent Tier One executives rely on the cooperation and work of Tier Two members. Tier Two representatives are institutionally conservative, don’t make waves, rarely challenge the authority of Tier One players, and respond cheerfully—at least in public—to Tier One policy decisions. They successfully implement organizational objectives.
A much smaller number makes up Tier Three. Tier Three members also share in the mission of Tier One. But they are edgy, opinionated, and occasionally dare to observe that the Tier One “emperor has no clothes”—at least according to their lights. Tier Three members may identify neglected time bombs that could significantly damage the organization.
Most Tier Four members are incompetent, dangerously unreliable, and undermine organizational objectives. Tier Four also includes Tier Three folks who have exceeded their edginess quota. But some may be unrecognized geniuses with profound eccentricities that mask their value to the organizations.
The Four Tier Caste system works well when the entire team, to a large extent, consistently reaches organizational objectives. Competent Tier One executives rely on the cooperation of Tier Two members. The complaints of Tier Three members may be valid, but in the grand scheme, neglecting to attend to their concerns is not significant enough to seriously damage operations. Executives rarely consult the slightly disgruntled Tier Three but trust them to meet the necessary organizational objectives. However, a growing Tier Three may signal a developing revolutionary threat, for good or ill.
The three Tiers systematically eliminate the organizational “poison” of those in the Fourth Tier with terminations and other forms of attrition.
The Four Tiers become dysfunctional when organizations fail to meet their natural objectives. Those in Tier One “circle the wagons” to fend off criticism, often reverting to harsh and unjust authoritarian means. Like ostriches, Tier Two “company men” bury their heads and enable the dysfunctional behavior of Tier One by silence just when healthy criticism is required. The ranks of Tier Three expand, to the chagrin of the first two Tiers. An increasing—but statistically insignificant—number realizes the dangers the organization faces on its present course.
The ranks of dangerous members of Tier Four also expand, but for the wrong reasons. The first two tiers root out perceived enemies and identify them as Tier Four. But the targets are friends of a healthy organization. Misidentified, they are organizational reformers who might have helped put the organization on the right path.
In politics, establishment politicians make up Tier One. The vast majority of elected officials make up Tier Two. A few colorful politicians make up Tier Three and make news by opposing conventional wisdom. Politicians despised by the establishment makeup Tier Four and eventually suffer defeat at the polls. The system works well until the various forms of corruption (the “swamp”) undermine the Tier One establishment and instill a revolutionary spirit.
In the Church, during happy times, Vatican authorities comprise Tier One and the world’s bishops populate Tier Two. After Vatican II, many doctrinal dissidents made up Tier Three and planted long-term revolutionary seeds. Priests departing the sacred ministry made up Tier Four. In the old days, Tier Four clerics populated penitential monasteries.
The Four Tiers remain in place during opulence, faithlessness, and decay. During the time of Henry VIII, most English bishops rallied around the King as his Tier Two cheerleaders. Only Bishop John Fisher objected. He dropped to Tier Three and then to Tier Four before he lost his head.
The Four Tiers of the contemporary Church help us understand our times. The Tier One of the Vatican has become increasingly homosexual-friendly but jealously guards the perquisites of power. Most of the bishops (and priests) are Tier Two. They do their best to “play well in the sandbox” and dutifully respond to Vatican disciplinary and synodal directives.
Some of the bishops—including most of the German bishops—are anxious to draw the obvious conclusions of a homosexual-friendly Vatican. In their haste, they have become Tier Three members of the Church’s hierarchy, threatening to disrupt the Vatican’s controlled revolutionary process. However, there is no chance that they will drop to Tier Four, as Tier One unofficially agrees with them.
Tier Three is not uniformly homosexual activist. On the contrary, a few bishops (and priests) have dropped to Tier Three because of their vocal orthodoxy. For example, Cardinal Mueller and Cardinal Burke are now Tier Three prelates. Several traditional religious organizations have become Tier Three, with the Vatican putting them on notice. One misstep could render them persona non grata and land them in the Tier Four bin.
Those trashed in Tier Four usually have flaws in prudence and character. Enemies magnify the flaws; friends downplay them. Like the Parable of the Wheat and the Tares, it’s hard to distinguish the martyrs from the frauds.
Many bishops are hiding in the weeds of Tier Two, hoping this papacy will pass soon. But in their hearts, they are Tier Three bishops waiting for a happier day of Tier One orthodoxy.
Bishop Strickland never played the Tier Two game. His witness to Catholic orthodoxy was unabashed, vocal, and occasionally reckless. He was “Tier Three and proud!” (to coin a slogan). He “disrupted the process” of Tier One and became a target for removal. He has become Tier Four, at least for the moment. His removal is a study of institutional clericalism.
History demonstrates that, in extreme times, organizations rely on Tiers Three and Four for candidates to save the world. General George Patton was Tier Four for a significant part of the war. How would the Battle of the Bulge have ended without him?
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“Many bishops are hiding in the weeds of Tier Two, hoping this papacy will pass soon.”
The Bishops aren’t alone, but the problem is that Pope Tier IV is filling the bureaucracy with incompetent, dangerously unreliable, and those determined to undermine organizational objectives.
Benedict unfortunately made two mistakes. One was not burying Bergoglio in some drafty archive after he opined about the Regensburg address; the second was resigning and abandoning us to the subversive elements.
The Airborne troops believed that Patton wasn’t needed for them to break out in the Battle of the Bulge. God will save His Church. Forget Patton and the Tiers, we need a Pope Saint to clean up this mess.
Lest we forget, Christ is the Head of this Church and must somehow be considered in this Tier Paradigm.
I suspect that many in Tiers 3 and 4 will no longer acknowledge the two upper Tiers in any practical sense when they conclude that Tiers 1 and 2 are leading the bureaucratic structure into bankruptcy. There then is a “run on the bank”, people remove their investments and stake in the bank for fear of bank failure. Those in Tier 1 and Tier 2 are in panic and lock the doors of the bank to prevent the failure of the bank. This strategy inevitably fails and those in Tier 3 and Tier are inclined to take even stronger measures to prevent their assets from disappearing. The basic cause of the impending bank failure: The bank officers in Tiers 1 and 2 gave out too many unsecured loans to shady actors in far too many venues. When Tiers 3 and 4 went to access their accounts there were insufficient funds. Obviously the bank cannot return to “business as usual” and the first thing that must be done is that bank officers in Tiers 1 and 2 must be fired and new, more competent and trustworthy officers must be found to restore financial integrity to the bank. Silencing those warning about bank mismanagement is never an effective strategy. But rallying around the failed bank President – even if he was duly elected by the corporate board – will only exacerbate the confidence in the bank.
aleteia.org/blogs/aleteia-blog/pope-francis-the-evil-of-clericalism-is-a-very-ugly-thing/
Francis has taught that clericalism is a very ugly thing, concluding a talk in 2016 with this sentence: “Today, too, Jesus says…even to those who are seduced by clericalism: ‘The sinners and the prostitutes will go before you into the Kingdom of Heaven.’
If Francis does not approve of clericalism, calling it evil and ugly, then why has his Vatican engaged in its practice? It appears that Francis has a bigger problem on his hands than clericalism. That problem is hypocrisy.
Many of the dioceses are beset an undesirable form of clericalism that is not discussed directly in this article. That form of clericalism is the use of incompetent and, often arrogant, lay people in their employ. Such individuals have guided these dioceses to make mistakes. Thus, we have the tragic, continuing decrease in the respect for the teachings expressed by the bishops.
About dysfunctional bureaucracy, is the Crisis of 2002 only the canary in the mineshaft–signaling many other witless betrayals in moral theology, sacramental theology, ecclesiology, and elementary clarity?
And about the Four Tiers (tears?) of bureaucracy, might we also consider how every front office delegates its responsibilities to minions more-or-less outside of these tiers? As CIA agent Morgan Freeman remarked, in “the Sum of all Fears,” as he counseled a backroom writer, “choose your words carefully, words have a way of becoming policy.”
And as George Weigel also wrote in his “The Courage to be Catholic” (2002): “Too many bishops [“facilitators”?] in the United States have traded the rich evangelical, pastoral, and sacramental patrimony that is theirs for the mess of pottage that is contemporary management theory” (p. 96).
“Bureaucracy is a giant mechanism operated by pygmies” (Honore de Balzac).
The most clerical Pope in the world who uses his powers most arbitrarily is the biggest critic of “clericalism,” applauded by syoncophant clerics who sing his “anti-clerical” praises.
I wonder if you emailed this on-point analysis to Francis he’d understand it.
Probably not given it does not tickle his ears.
I am appalled by the Pope and stories I have heard about the behavior of the Pope and other high ranking priests in the Catholic Church. I pray everyday for a change. I also believe what Mary, our Blessed Mother said; “In the end, My Immaculate Heart will prevail.” God has this world in His Hands and He will not forsake us. The Catholic Church has been in this mess before and there has always been a hero/saint to bring us out of this. I remember that St. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake by Bishops of the Catholic Church. We all suffer when one person sins; but there is more scandal and suffering when the Priests sin.