Yes, total and unqualified power
is not meant for mortals to exercise. Absolute power is power that is
independent and autonomous. It is not accountable and submits to no one. An office
with absolute power makes laws for other people but lives above the laws it has
made. It cannot be questioned and owes nobody any explanation. Absolute power
exercises unguarded freedom without boundaries. This freedom is the reason why
the occupiers speak freely and often carelessly. They can say anything, do
anything and expect nothing else from those listening or watching them but to
accept everything without questions. People with absolute power normally do not
have good men around them. Praise singers, hypocrites and yes-men are the only
ones that can hang around for a long time because they are the only ones that
can be accommodated. Good men and old friends can only be accommodated at the
early stages of the assumption of office, but once they settle down, they begin
to drop their old friends one after the other.
The fact is that some offices, at
their creation, do not have absolute power but some demagogues and power
mongers can convert it into such by changing the laws and intimidating the people.
The power of the office can also be converted into absolute power when they are
raised above criticism, favoured and judged unlike other men and some mysteries
created around them and their positions. Through this conversion, we have
created tyrants on pulpits, thrones and other seats of power.
I dare say that God, the Creator,
never made anyone to exercise absolute power. No one, I repeat, no one is
endowed with the qualities and character to carry and discharge absolute power.
The fallen man does not have the capacity to handle absolute power. He needs a
horizontal as well as a vertical accountability in order to discharge justice
and do what is right.
Any office that has absolute
power will produce unintended monsters as its occupants. Put a saint to occupy
an office that has absolute power embedded in it, it will not turn him differently.
He may manage to resist at the beginning but give him many years to come, he
will become what others before him became – monsters. Any office, be it religious
or political, with absolute power embedded in it explicitly or implicitly, is a
killer of morality. It is a pit and a grave yard, even for the most pious.
Many that exercise absolute power
do not seem to understand what they have turned into until they leave office,
if the position has that provision and the occupants allow the transition to continue.
Then looking back, many ask themselves, “who did these despicable things? Who wrecked
these havocs?” They will see that they have left in their trail broken lives
trampled upon, dreams caged or destroyed, crying and weeping souls who could
not save themselves from their cruelty and others just crushed because they
dared to have an opposing view. There are some who unfortunately do not have the
privilege of after-office reflection. They die in the position of power and are
only left at the mercy of history.
Every office, whether political
or religious, except occupied by the spirits, must have a sort of regulations
and laws that guide the actions and or inactions of the occupants. The occupants
do not make the laws that regulate the office, they submit to the laws that
established the office.
Lord Acton’s words in 1887,
contained in the letter
he wrote to Mandell Creighton, who later became the bishop of England, are
very instructive here. Mandell was writing on “The Papacy in the Reformation
Epoch” but instead of presenting history the way it was, he tended to ignore or
defend the atrocities committed by the Roman Catholic Popes who used the “papal
courts of the Renaissance”, the inquisitions and tribunals to convict
people unjustly and tortured and burnt many at stakes. Lord Acton accused
Creighton, “you say that people in authority are not to be snubbed or sneered
at from our pinnacle of conscious rectitude. I really don’t know whether you exempt
them because of their rank, or of their success and power, or of their date… I
cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men,
with a favoured presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption
it is the other way against holders of power, increasing as the power
increases. Historic responsibility has to make up for the want of legal
responsibility. Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not
authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of
corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office
sanctifies the holder of it.” Most of the Popes exercised absolute powers
and like already mentioned, they turned out to become one of the worst
dictators in the history of Europe.
If we want to live in a decent
society, we must not fall into the fallacy that the office sanctifies the
holder of it. Because every office is occupied by fallen men, we must
create accountability structures that will help the occupiers to do what is
right. Constructive criticisms and engagements must be advocated at all times
without fear or favour. Though often bitter, but it reminds us that we are
mortals. Even when the position is religious or the occupier is pious, we must
not pretend or assume that the occupier cannot do any wrong or that the office
has sanctified him or her. If you are the person in position, do not destroy
the accountability structures you met on assumption of office. Strengthen them
instead. Accept your critics as a gift and resist the temptation of increasing
your powers, except you want the office or position to destroy your morals and
integrity. Because you are a mortal being, absolute power will also corrupt
you. Yes, absolute power is not meant for mortals. It is meant for only the Immortal
God to exercise.
Finally, we need each other to
remain the humans God wants us to be. Our hearts, as fallen men, need to be transformed
and tamed. Only the acceptance of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and continual submission
to the Holy Spirit can do this great work in your heart and mine.
