Bishop Carl Robinson asked:

Who is the church leader with the most authority over the church under Jesus? Is it the Apostle or the
Office of Bishop?

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I can answer you by words of Fiodor Dostoyevsky. One chapter of Brothers Karamazovnames the
Legend about Great Inquisitor. Dmitry Karamazov tells his brother this story about dialogue between
the Great Inquisitor and Jesus.

This event happened in the Middle ages in Spain. One man was arrested and brought to the Great
Inquisitor. In the course of the event Great Inquisitor learns that this man is Jesus, who came to the
land for the second time. And they spoke about the problem of your question. I can retell their
dialogue:

"Why you do not perform a miracle?" the Great Inquisitor asks, "Why you do not prove people
that you are Jesus? You are only returning, but you do not rescue the world."

"People must trust in me," Jesus answers, "The real trust is that trust, which is not buttressed
by the facts. If I will do a miracle everyone will trust me, but the real believer trusts me without
miracles.

"But this is the more difficult way to Christianize people. You give them only the expectation,
but I give them the real symbol — Church."

So, for a lot of people it is more pellucid to visit the church and follow all the traditions and rituals, but
it is too difficult to live with idea of God everyday. I think for a lot of people in Russia the Office of
Bishop and Temple have more authority than the Bible and the Apostle's words. One of my friends
(he is a Bishop of Anglican Church) said "people are more likely to be converted to a deep faith from
a nominal faith than from no faith whatsoever. The sincere, committed, serious Christians are the
depths; the large numbers of nominal believers are the surface."

Temple is real and concrete that is why it has more authority for a lot of people. The Apostle's words
are demands reflection. To visit Church and perform the rituals is more simple therefore more popular
then thinking and living in God. It is known that man always longs for simplicity, especially in our
atomic epoch, when knowledge and diversity grows each day.

And now, a lot of people visit the temples, because it came into fashion. They consider that visiting
church every Sunday they save their soul. "Everyone who visits temples will get to Heaven, those
who do not visit the temple will go to the hell" — this is the trivial, but too commonly held logic. Many
people come to divine service, but a lot of them have no ideas about the sense of divine service.

You see I live in Russia and describe the concrete situation. But I know that perhaps 7 per cent of
people go to church in England regularly, and most of them are not Anglican. I think that a few
sincerely believing parishioners are better than mass of unbelievers. I do not think that religion must
be popular. It is better to have one man who believes in the Apostle's authority than a hundred who
take for gospel the words of the Bishop. Unfortunately, many people prefer words of Bishop.

I am, Sir, yours cordially,

Dmitry Olshansky
Urals State University
Yekaterinburg City
Russian Federation

I assume from the question, and the way in which you style yourself, that you are associated with the
Latter-Day Saints. If I am correct in this, you will doubtless know of the various splits which have
occurred in the church over the years on this very question. This is, as we will see, hardly surprising.

First, I think it is important to distinguish between power and authority. I have power over someone
when I am in a position to direct their actions, irrespective of their own wishes. I would have power
over someone if I had them in an arm-lock. Likewise, a street thief may well have power over his
victim, but he would scarcely be said to have legitimate authority, for authority is not something which
can be taken. Rather, authority is something granted by those who willingly submit to it when they
transfer a part of their own potential for freedom of action to someone else. There are many reasons
why someone might do this — out of sympathy for tradition, because they recognise the other person
as having greater skill than them, or in return for some similar gift of control over the other. Whatever
the reason, it is vital to understand that authority is granted only by those who are subject to it.
Genuine authority cannot be taken by force, or demanded, nor can it ever be made necessary by
historical precedents. Even if you, say, decide so submit to the authority of bishops because you are
persuaded by certain historical and scriptural explanations, it was still you who made the decision to
submit. No matter that you might argue that the reasons given on behalf of the bishops were
absolutely irrefutable, it was still you who was convinced by them.

So, back to you I'm afraid! Authority is legitimate only when it is freely chosen, and as you are the one
who is going to be subject to it, it is you who will have to decide.

Glyn Hughes