Unto the Least of These: Caring at the Margins by Authority or Power?
Matthew Vest, PhD, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
St. Paul teaches that each Christian no longer lives as “I” but is given a new identity as Christ (Gal. 2:20), and this emphasis on identity offers a substantive point of contact in our modern society. “How one identifies” is key language that applies to race, gender, sexuality, politics, ideologies, and more. Identity is inevitable, and as a mode of cultural engagement, Christians do well to lean more, not less, into the question of identity. In particular, if we understand identity as a theological or metaphysical matter, we are able to see the depth and significance of the (post)modern will to make each into his or her own self, apart from identification with family, parish, place, and tradition. This autonomy—image bearing persons apart from the divine Creator—is an essential mark of modernity’s approach to “freedom,” regardless how closely (or not) we may link the fragmenting impulses of self-making to the violent cultural history of the 20thcentury.
Critiques of modern autonomy are plentiful, however, and so the aim of this paper is a more detailed understanding of another feature in modernity—the triumph of power over authority—that greatly affects how medicine and religion may serve those at the margins. Italian philosopher Augusto Del Noce brings attention to the “eclipse of authority” in favor of power, noting that “the study of the idea of authority leads us to the heart of today’s crisis” particularly for the way that power evokes ideas of brute strength or force, directing attention to external means and material forces (The Crisis of Modernity, tr. Lancellotti, 2014). In other words, when external power reigns supreme, spiritual authority is eclipsed, collapsing transcendence into immanence, metaphysics into ideology, being into becoming, and, notably, religions are validated only in terms of historical factors.
The consequences of confusing power and authority are immense, and Del Noce draws attention to the etymological roots of authority that help distinguish the spiritual vitality of authority; auctoritas, from augere, means “to make grow.” Relatedly, auxilium (“help from a higher source”), and augurium (“religious vow seeking divine cooperation”) are additional hints of the meaning of “authority,” including the idea that “humanitas is fulfilled in man when a principle of non–empirical nature frees him from a state of subjection and leads him to his proper end.”
Regardless these life-giving connotations, authority is not a popular concept today, and this paper will examine some of the theological factors that undergird the loss of authority as a source of humble life-giving. In particular, Del Noce’s description of the “Marxian option” traces the nascent atheism that undergirds the framework of power: in Marx’s words, “A man who lives by the grace of another regards himself as a dependent being. But I live completely by the grace of another…if he is the source of my life” (Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, 1844). For Marx, dependence is enslavement, and yet can there be a more significant contrast to religious life that seeks belonging, harmony, and ultimate dependence upon the Divine? Without assuming this framework is exhaustive, we do well to ask with Del Noce what similar patterns of atheistic independence may become engrafted into traditional religious thinking? Much is at stake for serving Christ by serving the “least of these” who are His brethren (Matt. 25.40). Even before medical resources are allocated, access to healthcare is enabled, or other strategies of humanitarian service begin, what do we see in others? Who are they to us? Regardless how they identify, do we identify them in Christ? Can this clarity of identity serve to free us from external power mechanisms into harmony of life within the life-giving authority of Christ (Eph. 1.22)?
Critiques of modern autonomy are plentiful, however, and so the aim of this paper is a more detailed understanding of another feature in modernity—the triumph of power over authority—that greatly affects how medicine and religion may serve those at the margins. Italian philosopher Augusto Del Noce brings attention to the “eclipse of authority” in favor of power, noting that “the study of the idea of authority leads us to the heart of today’s crisis” particularly for the way that power evokes ideas of brute strength or force, directing attention to external means and material forces (The Crisis of Modernity, tr. Lancellotti, 2014). In other words, when external power reigns supreme, spiritual authority is eclipsed, collapsing transcendence into immanence, metaphysics into ideology, being into becoming, and, notably, religions are validated only in terms of historical factors.
The consequences of confusing power and authority are immense, and Del Noce draws attention to the etymological roots of authority that help distinguish the spiritual vitality of authority; auctoritas, from augere, means “to make grow.” Relatedly, auxilium (“help from a higher source”), and augurium (“religious vow seeking divine cooperation”) are additional hints of the meaning of “authority,” including the idea that “humanitas is fulfilled in man when a principle of non–empirical nature frees him from a state of subjection and leads him to his proper end.”
Regardless these life-giving connotations, authority is not a popular concept today, and this paper will examine some of the theological factors that undergird the loss of authority as a source of humble life-giving. In particular, Del Noce’s description of the “Marxian option” traces the nascent atheism that undergirds the framework of power: in Marx’s words, “A man who lives by the grace of another regards himself as a dependent being. But I live completely by the grace of another…if he is the source of my life” (Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, 1844). For Marx, dependence is enslavement, and yet can there be a more significant contrast to religious life that seeks belonging, harmony, and ultimate dependence upon the Divine? Without assuming this framework is exhaustive, we do well to ask with Del Noce what similar patterns of atheistic independence may become engrafted into traditional religious thinking? Much is at stake for serving Christ by serving the “least of these” who are His brethren (Matt. 25.40). Even before medical resources are allocated, access to healthcare is enabled, or other strategies of humanitarian service begin, what do we see in others? Who are they to us? Regardless how they identify, do we identify them in Christ? Can this clarity of identity serve to free us from external power mechanisms into harmony of life within the life-giving authority of Christ (Eph. 1.22)?