A remedy for the plague

One of my favourite bits of 16th-century canon law speaks about how ‘the condition of the state is ruined when it is governed by people who are stupid, demanding, and burning with ambition.’

Comment Lee Gatiss

At the same time, it continues: ‘The church of God is struggling, since it is committed to the care of those who are totally incompetent to assume so important a task. In this respect it has fallen very far short indeed of those rules of the blessed Paul, which he prescribed to Timothy and Titus. Therefore we must find an appropriate remedy for so serious a plague on our churches.’