Richard R. GAILLARDETZ.  By What Authority? Foundations for Understanding Authority in the Church.  Revised and Expanded Edition.  Liturgical Press Academic.  Collegeville, Minnesota.  246 pages.  ISBN: 978-0-8146-8788-8.  Reviewed by: Michael McCALLION, Sacred Heart Major Seminary, Detroit, Michigan. 

This expanded edition of Gaillardetz’s important book is written in the spirit if Vatican II, as was the first, but with the additional insights and works of Pope Francis who, as the author argues, “has offered a distinctive re-reception of conciliar teaching and is already enacting a bold re-imagination of the exercise and structures of authority in the church” (p.xiv).  There are four parts to the book: fundamental themes; the authority of scripture and tradition; the authority of the magisterium; and the authority of the believing community – with a total of 12 chapters and an epilogue.

Three main themes in the book that I briefly comment on are community, magisterium, and the faithful.  The communal dimension IS repeated throughout the book to the extent that even non-sociologists will easily recognize and appreciate.  Catholicism is a communal religion and that sense of community is evident throughout his discussion of the magisterium and the laity as well.  Catholicism, as the author makes clear throughout, is not a monolithic reality, whether dogmas or doctrines or the deposit of faith is under review.  Indeed, he makes clear that it is not an individual Pope or individual Catholic that determines what the Holy Spirit is saying to the church but rather a long communal process of listening and interacting between popes, bishops and laity that assesses the Spirit’s intentions for the church.    

Examining chapter 10, for example, “What is the Sense of the Faithful?’, Gaillardetz puts forth the case that Pope Francis has developed the importance of the laity to the church more so than other popes, especially Francis asking the laity to communicate to the hierarchy their thoughts and feelings about an array of issues before any church documents are promulgated.  As he writes, “more than any of his predecessors, Pope Francis has highlighted the significance of the council’s teaching on the ‘sense of the faith.’  In his address celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Synod of Bishops he echoed the insights of Newman, reminding us that the council’s teaching on the sensus fidei “prevents a separation between an Ecclesia docens and an Ecclesia discens, since the flock likewise has an instinctive ability to discern the new ways that the Lord is revealing to the Church” (p.188).

Although each chapter provides many compelling insights and clear understandings of how authority in the church works, I would like to say more about Chapter 10 because of its discussion of popular religiosity and the ways in which the sensus fidelium emerged out of popular religious practice.  Gaillardetz, for example, describes how the wisdom of the people is embedded to a large degree in their popular devotions, pilgrimages, and devotions which, as he develops in more detail throughout this chapter, is also Pope Francis’s understanding of the sense of the faithful.  Pope Francis was greatly influenced by the ‘theology of the people’ when in Argentina and still is today, for he understands that popular religious practice is as much a bearer of the Catholic living tradition as conciliar decrees.  Hence, Gaillardetz argues that Pope Francis has given new impetus to the challenge of becoming a community of dialogue and discernment or a truly synodal church.  The Pope has made listening a fundamental ‘epistemic practice’ in the church, “by which he means a fundamental way of accessing the truth of God.” 

Near the end of chapter 10, Gaillardetz quotes one of Pope Francis’s evocative images – providing not only a good example of Pope Francis’s challenge to the normal way of authority operating in the church but also an apt way to end this review.  In Evangelii Gaudium (pp.235-36) Pope Francis states: “Here our model is not the sphere, which is no greater than its parts, where every point is equidistant from the centre, and there are no differences between them.  Instead, it is a polyhedron, which reflects the convergence of all its parts, each of which preserves its distinctiveness. . . .  Pastoral and political activity alike seek to gather in this polyhedron the best of each.  There is a place for the poor and their culture, their aspirations and their potential.  Even people who can be considered dubious on account of their errors have something to offer which must not be overlooked.  It is the convergence of peoples who, within the universal order, maintain their own individuality; it is the sum total of persons within a society which pursues the common good, which truly has a place for everyone” (p.196).

Francis never shies away from mentioning how our faith is a communal faith and how authority exercised in the church must always consider all of the voices in the church, especially voices of the poor.