Pope Leo XIV and the Present Eclipse of Authority

By Robert Mixa

Recently, while helping my wife prepare for her exam to become a licensed tour guide in Kraków, I found myself on a guided tour of Saints Peter and Paul Church. Once a Jesuit church and now under diocesan care, this first baroque church in Poland radiates symbols of both spiritual and temporal authority. Looking around inside, it occurred to me how the art, symbols, words, texts, and practices handed on to us from the past challenge contemporary assumptions and invite us to reconsider how we think about the world today, especially on topics like power and authority.

Everywhere in the church, signs of papal authority abound, all rooted in the legacy of St. Peter and his successors. At the center of the high altarpiece, the papal tiara and keys are framed by the inscription: "They have taught us your law, O Lord," a tribute to the apostolic mission of Saints Peter and Paul. To the left, a throne bears an image of the Pope enthroned, accompanied by the words of St. Augustine: "Peter sat in this seat of the Roman Church... let no one raise objections." To the right, another throne shows the Pope supported by bishops and Church Fathers from both East and West, with an inscription from St. Cyril of Alexandria: "We who are members of Christ must be firmly united to the Apostolic See, our Pontiff."

Outside, the church’s façade reflects spiritual and temporal authority as well, adorned with Polish royal symbols: the crowned White Eagle and statues of Saints Sigismund of Burgundy (King of the Burgundians and patron of Bohemia, the kingdom that contributed to the Christianization of the Poles) and St. Ladislaus I of Hungary (born in Kraków, a "Pole in his ways and life", and King of Hungary and Croatia). Below them are the Jesuit founders (Saints Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier) and young Jesuits (Saints Aloysius Gonzaga and Stanislaw Kostka) with the Jesuit seal of the Divine Name, the IHS monogram surrounded by the sunburst, at the center. Just in front of the church grounds are sculptures of the apostles united around St. Peter. The entire structure is a powerful testimony to the intertwining of ecclesial and national identity, of divine and earthly authority. Pope John Paul II’s parents were providentially married in this church dedicated to Peter. During Poland's Communist years, acid rain poured on Kraków, destroying much of the art within the city. And while the large statues of the twelve apostles had to be replaced, Saints Peter and Paul Church remains. Its symbols of authority remain. In fact, with  Kraków's recent renovation, they shine forth.

All of this prompted me to reflect more deeply on the nature of authority and its importance—something already on my mind due to the recent election of Pope Leo XIV. 'Authority' is a term in disrepute, often connoting something negative like authoritarianism and totalitarianism. But the Italian philosopher Augusto Del Noce did not see it that way. He believed that our age is experiencing a profound crisis of authority. In his long, illuminating essay "Authority and Power", Del Noce argues that "the eclipse of the idea of authority is one of the essential characteristics of today's world; in fact, it is the most immediately observable characteristic." Authority is linked to "the metaphysics of the primacy of being over becoming." But in our age, what he calls the "Marxian option" has prevailed in a large part of contemporary culture, as the "belief that the concept of authority is reducible to the concept of power." This 'radical critique of authority' where once authority was rooted in enduring institutions—parents, teachers, pastors, monarchs, even the Pope— has now largely eclipsed and given way to volatile forces: wealth, brute power, digital influence, and volume. Authority, as a subset of power, is tyranny, and all connection to authority from the past must be eliminated. 

On the contrary, authority rightly understood is not about domination and enslavement. True authority augments. It brings order, peace, and unity to a fractured world. Del Noce cites 19th century Italian philosopher and priest Antoni Rosmini, who, in his theory of authority, regards "theologically infused being...as the foundational element of order, so that order calls out for an authoritative presence of being and is an epiphany of being itself." He even links the idea of authority with the idea of freedom, usually seen as opposites. 

The very etymology of “authority” relates to growth and augmentation.  Del Noce points out that auctoritas derives from augere, "to make grow", which shares etymological origins to words Augustus (he who makes grow), auxilium (help provided by a higher power), augurium (a vow to obtain divine cooperation in growth). True authority does not oppress; it nourishes. It does not depend upon others but is secure in itself. It does not cut down; it cultivates. Like the gardener tending his garden or the shepherd caring for his flock, a genuine leader fosters the flourishing of others. It is beyond power.

For Christians, ultimate authority, the ultimate presence (even incarnation) of being, resides in Christ (the Son of the Father), enthroned not in coercion but in love, overcoming the negations of sin and death not through force but through the self-emptying love of the Cross. He is the Good Shepherd, who rules by laying down his life for his sheep.

This is also the vision of Pope Leo XIV. While a student at the Angelicum, he wrote his thesis on the office and the authority of the local prior in the Order of St. Augustine, drawing heavily from St. Augustine’s view of authority as service. This Sunday, he will be formally installed at the Papal Mass of Inauguration. The Pallium—a woolen band symbolizing his pastoral care and unity with bishops—will be placed on his shoulders. He will ascend the cathedra, the authoritative seat of teaching and governance, and receive the Fisherman's Ring as the successor of Peter. Cardinals will pledge obedience to him. 

On the same day, Poland holds its presidential election—a reminder that even in secular governance, the figure of the president serves with the authority as Head of State in a parliamentary system like Poland’s. There’s a providential convergence in these events: spiritual and civic expressions of authority occurring side by side.

After the tour, while my wife went to class, I waited in a chapel where Eucharistic Adoration was taking place—a common and beautiful feature of royal Kraków churches. There, in the quiet presence of the Blessed Sacrament, my thoughts on authority came into sharper focus.

Before me was the model of all authority: Christ present in the Eucharist—silent, humble, and yet radiating peace. There was the authority that does not compel by fear but draws by self-emptying love. There was the One who "ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father" yet chooses to appear as bread. There was kenosis himself, the self-emptying of God for the sake of others. And it is in this humility that His authority augments rather than diminishes, frees rather than enslaves, and unites rather than divides. 

Pope Leo XIV has chosen as his motto: “In Illo Uno Unum”— “In the One, we are one”—a quotation from St. Augustine. At a time when the Church is plagued by factionalism and polarization, this Augustinian Pope seems uniquely positioned to call us back to unity. May he, unlike another Augustinian,Martin Luther,who fractured the Church, be an instrument of healing and reconciliation. May he lead not with worldly power, but with the authority of the Vicar of Christ, handed down from Peter and entrusted to him anew. May he follow the example of the first Leo, St. Leo the Great, who as Pope saw in the papacy the visible source of unity and authority for the whole Church. May he, like Leo the Great defending Rome from the destruction of Attila the Hun, protect the Church from all forces of destruction. And may he look to Christ, the King enthroned in humility, giving himself for the life of the world to come, and guide the Church in today's world, which as Del Noce notes, is undergoing an eclipse of authority and, hence, a nihilistic crisis.