There has been recent controversy involving Trump’s handling of the capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro. Reactions have been mixed with many Venezuelans cheering the removal of the man who mismanaged the country to a point of destitution while critics have been concerned about the implications of the capture and the claims of violation of international laws. One such institution that has been commenting on this has been the Vatican.
In response to the capture, Pope Leo XIV came out and said “The good of the beloved Venezuelan people must prevail over every other consideration.” Specifically, that what the U.S. did “must lead to the overcoming of violence, and to the pursuit of paths of justice and peace, guaranteeing the sovereignty of the country, ensuring the rule of law enshrined in its constitution, respecting the human and civil rights of each and every person, and working together to build a peaceful future of cooperation, stability and harmony, with special attention to the poorest who are suffering because of the difficult economic situation.” As is noted, just about any action for the church to endorse it must be in line with the common good, so Pope Leo’s call is both unsurprising and appropriate.
Of note, the Pope has seemed to take a different approach than his predecessor. Pope Francis’s papacy spoke of “positive neutrality” with the Maduro regime. Meanwhile, Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin called to “Open unjust prisons…set the oppressed free” during Leo’s papacy. On the other hand, Leo also condemned a desire to go to war with Venezuela. So the Vatican seems to oppose the military option, yet acknowledges problems with the Maduro administration. Keeping in mind that the focus of the church is the wellbeing of the Venezuelan people, that makes perfect sense.
Still, the Pope’s discussions on national sovereignty and some Catholics' questions about international law in light of the Maduro regime’s human rights violations brings questions of where the church should stand on the Maduro capture. Well, this blogpost will make no serious attempt to answer that question as far more qualified individuals are doing that now. Instead, it will discuss some brief points on the history of the church and international law. Specifically, its relationship with institutions and some current trends that may impact the church’s history.
For starters, the church always calls on the faithful to respect just authority. As per Romans 13:1, “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” Similarly, Catholic Catechism section 1900 notes that “The duty of obedience requires all to give due honor to authority and to treat those who are charged to exercise it with respect, and, insofar as it is deserved, with gratitude and good-will.” So all good Christians are called to respect the moral authority of the governing structure in the country they live in, even if they lack the desire.
However, the exception to that rule is that the leader’s authority must come from God and thus be in line with his laws and in service to the common good. Sections 1902 of the Catholic Catechism notes:
Authority does not derive its moral legitimacy from itself. It must not behave in a despotic manner, but must act for the common good as a "moral force based on freedom and a sense of responsibility": [GS 74 # 2] [1930]
A human law has the character of law to the extent that it accords with right reason, and thus derives from the eternal law. Insofar as it falls short of right reason it is said to be an unjust law, and thus has not so much the nature of law as of a kind of violence. [St. Thomas Aquinas, STh I-II, 93, 3, ad 2][1951]
In short, the leader who acts outside of that is no longer acting in line with God’s given authority nor in service to his creation. Why this is important then is because, “A law that is not just, seems to be no law at all” as per St. Augustine, and thus we have a moral duty to oppose it and not follow it. So the points of St. Paul and St. Augustine should always make us ask where authority lies and to whom we should listen to in circumstances where the government is involved, especially when domestic and international law may clash.
Between that divide though, the question becomes where does authority for international law come from? After all, a country has a military and police system that can enforce its laws, and it lacks clear borders where its authority ends. As a result, it seems that organizations like the UN and EU can only enforce their laws with the consent of the participating countries involved, making those laws seem more like polite suggestions or privileges of being part of an organization.
Nevertheless, international law exists on the idea that all men are created with guaranteed rights and those must be respected regardless of nationality. One could point to the U.S. Declaration of Independence as an example of this since it says “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.” However, predating that would be Spanish colonialism where the church stood up for the rights of the natives, an action that has been seen as the originator of international law.
During the 1500s, a group of Dominican friars arrived in Hispaniola, the island that has the countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic on it. They were so abhorred by the maltreatment of the native population that they immediately started condemning it and denied communion to the slave owners there. Such a move received backlash and eventually the Dominicans were called back home.
Still, this made people ask questions about whether or not the indigenous populations deserved the same rights, protections, and considerations the Europeans did. Were the natives human or less than human? Eventually, the church agreed with the Dominicans and the abuse of native populations would be condemned routinely by the church, and nations to follow. Such beliefs and justifications would later be enshrined in international laws and court practices.
So in reality the church was actually the founder of international law and the idea that all people are people. From that, it’s important to remember that international law is a way to guarantee the rights of people across the globe regardless of nationality and to respect the God given dignity all men have. So one should expect the church to respect international law and the institutions that enforce it.
Yet many of the international institutions claiming to protect or enforce it are secular and often have their own agendas. For example, the UN enshrines abortion as a human right and promotes birth control, positions the church condemns. Also, many of the officials of the UN have a history of scandals, many of the prominent countries in the UN like China have a history of cracking down on Christians, and many countries just aren’t good fits for the boards they’re on, like Saudi Arabia chairing the women’s rights commission despite an abysmal history on how it treats women in its own country. So there are plenty of reasons to question the organization’s legitimacy.
It’s not that surprising though as the Vatican, or specifically church leadership since the country hadn’t been formalized yet, was actually snubbed during the creation of the forerunner to the UN, the League of Nations. Specifically, they were not invited to the Paris Peace accords, an action church leadership took personally and found it somewhat hypocritical since countries, like Britain, whose king was head of the state church were invited. So there has been a disconnect between the secular international law institutions and the church. So if the UN is not acting in line with the natural law, then its laws should be disregarded as any other.
(This particular paragraph is based on the bias of the author. There are many perspectives on the UN/League of Nations and the Catholic Church that are complex and worth discussion. Also, the Vatican does currently have permanent observer status. However, that’s how the author views it and will be used as part of this discussion.)
As for Venezuela, there are many justifications to the idea that the Maduro regime was not acting in line with natural or international law. From killing protestors to stealing companies’ assets to fabricating election results to bad economic policy that caused an economic crisis and then a refugee crisis that impacts the globe, it’s hard to say Maduro is acting in line under any law other than his own. It’s also a bit of a slap in the face that there's a video of him singing the John Lennon song “Imagine” while his people starve. So the Maduro regime is hard to justify.
Which brings us back to the original article: Trump’s capture of him. Again, the Maduro regime is not good but critics have questioned his capture in regards to just war, national sovereignty, and international law. Mentioning problems with the UN earlier though, there may not be a proper governing body to properly analyze it. As to whether or not the action is in line with the common good for the people of Venezuela, only time will tell.
However, taking a look at the Trump administration itself, there are some interesting developments. For example, Trump is in the process of creating a “Board of Peace” which will serve as a governing body which will be designed to implement a 20 point plan to bring peace to the Middle East, primarily for Gaza. Fascinatingly, the Vatican has been invited to join it.
There has been interest from the Trump administration in working with the church, such as bringing in bishops like Timothy Dolan and (my hometown bishop) Kevin C. Rhoades to be on his Religious Liberty Commission, as well as having many Catholics in his administration. This brings on other successes that Catholics should be happy with, such as appointed judges that overturned Roe v Wade, an HHS that is prioritizing public health, allowed exemptions for the Obamacare free birth control mandate, and implemented executive action on gender to fight harmful gender ideologies. So, if I was trying to be a partisan man, I’d argue that this is a sign that Trump is overall good for the church.
However, the purpose of this post wasn’t to spin a narrative about the alleged pro-Catholic sentiment of the Trump administration, but to have a discussion on just authority and the purpose of government action in relationship to God. Unfortunately, if unsurprisingly, the Trump administration has quite a few problems.
There won’t be too much discussion on Trump’s handling on immigration since many in the Catholic sphere do and it is extremely one sided, but the refusal for ICE to allow giving communion to detainees is a huge error on the part of the administration. Besides that, he has taken steps that have gotten him justified condemnation, such as The Archbishop who oversees all U.S. Catholic chaplains telling troops it was okay to disregard orders from the White House if it violates their conscience at the time the President refused to rule out force as a way to take over Greenland. Similarly, his return to the White House has seen a disappointedly mixed record on abortion during his second term. A growing sense of militarism from the administration has also received condemnation, as it goes against one of the beatitudes, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” So there is quite a bit of criticism of Trump worth having in regards to doing the work of God, especially since he said his only limits are “My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that could stop me.”
Now many of the issues discussed will be the subject of future blogposts. There is much to discuss in terms of context and future developments, especially in regards to Venezuela and Greenland, but the purpose of this post was to discuss authority, and specifically who has it, what justifies, and how Catholics, and more broadly Christians, should act. Unfortunately, it looks like most people in leadership fail to honor the calling they have.
Christ once said “Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” The same could probably be said of politicians and leaders in general. After all, the Habsburg family is very much associated with the Catholic Church, but only one of their family members is on the way to the sainthood (and the rival Prussian Hohenzollerns, who became protestant, already have a saint).
Still, the world is changing. Old empires die, new ones form, but God and sin go on forever. Perhaps Trump’s Board of Peace will create a new international institution that will replace the UN and redefine international law, or perhaps the Trump administration will be a blip on history and replaced with business as usual. Perhaps it will all fail and something else will take its place.
Which is also true for Venezuela. Will the removal of Maduro be good for the people of Venezuela? Will it destroy the country? Will Venezuela become the 51st state? Only time will tell, but it will only be good if the answer to the first question is unequivocally “YES!!!”
That is true though for all leaders for their authority comes from the almighty, and when a government forsakes that, it will be built on shaky ground. And when that happens, all manners of horrors happen, for as Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn once said “If I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous Revolution that swallowed up some sixty million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.” All we can do is be obedient, trust in God, and know he’ll win out, for Christ has already overcome the world.
(This post is dedicated to AJ Boggs, who was kind enough to proof it and whose interest in the topic gave me the passion to write it)
