What a Priest May Do – and What He May Not

Just because a priest holds a special mandate does not mean that he stands above the faithful in every area of life. He is to explain the teaching of the Church. His personal opinion has no place there. It is not part of the teaching, nor is it the teaching of the Church itself. In everyday life, however, the two are gladly mixed up. This begins already with the liturgy. The priest may not remodel the Holy Mass according to his own taste. It belongs neither to him nor to the congregation. Even if a personal idea is well-meant, the liturgy remains something the Church has received and must faithfully hand on. It is similar in pastoral care. Priests are meant to help align the conscience with the truth and with the commandments of God. Something must also be said when an act is sinful. But this must not extend to claiming every personal decision as its own. What profession someone chooses, which medical treatment one accepts after careful consultation, or how a family organizes its daily life—these are not decisions for the priest to make. Spiritual guidance must never lead to spiritual dependency.

Thomas Aquinas writes on obedience that a superior can only claim obedience in the area that falls under his authority (Summa theologiae II–II, q. 104, a. 5). This also applies to bishops and priests. When a bishop sets forth Catholic doctrine, he speaks by virtue of his office. When he assesses a political party, an economic measure, or an individual medical question, he can be just as mistaken as anyone else. This has happened frequently of late. Before the state election in Saxony-Anhalt, Bishop Heiner Wilmer declared that the Church could not issue voting instructions. At the same time, he explicitly warned against voting for the AfD party (katholisch.de, September 2, 2026). The Archbishop of Berlin, Heiner Koch, went even further: the Church must accept the risk that AfD voters withdraw from the parishes. Nevertheless, in the same interview he assured: “As a Church, we do not act paternalistically” (katholisch.de, September 3, 2026). This does not add up. One cannot emphasize the maturity of the faithful, dictate to them the outcome of their examination of conscience, and then knowingly accept their withdrawal. A bishop may measure the concrete positions of a party against Catholic teaching. His ordination, however, does not give him the right to appropriate the political decision of the faithful and then abandon them simply because they hold a different political opinion.

In this concrete case, it would be Catholic—truly priestly—to measure all parties by the same standard. The priest may and must criticize concrete positions when they contradict human dignity or Catholic teaching: the unborn child possesses the same human dignity as the migrant. The elderly and the sick deserve the same protection as any threatened minority. If a warning against an unchristian voting choice is issued for only one party, this does not look like a complete application of Catholic teaching. It looks political.

The German bishops already identified this danger clearly back in 1973—wise as they were: “However, when it comes to questions on which Catholics may, without prejudice to their faith, hold differing opinions, the priest should not take sides publicly” (Declaration on the Party-Political Activity of Priests, 1973, p. 5). The reasoning, too, leaves no room for doubt: “Otherwise there is a danger that pastoral access to part of the faithful will be made more difficult for the priest, or even rendered impossible.” Finally, it states there: “The personal responsibility of the laity is not restricted by the ecclesiastical office.” Solemnly granting Catholics their freedom of conscience, only to then tell them which party is not an option for them, violates this very insight. One risks access to the faithful and damages one's own authority.

For church authority becomes incredible when its boundaries blur. The priest does not speak with the same binding force on every occasion. When he expounds the teaching of the faith, he acts within his office. When he comments on the choice of a party, he is giving a political judgment. And if this important distinction is not made clear, one is, consciously or not, using the weight of the office to lend more importance to one's own opinion. The faithful notice this. They also notice when political preferences are suddenly treated as demands of the faith. In the long run, not only does the individual statement lose weight, but the office itself comes to be perceived as weaker.

This loss later becomes apparent in a completely different area. The same priest or bishop who hardly trusts the faithful to form their own judgment when voting then wants to tell them something about conscience, sin, and conversion. There, after all, his word should carry real weight. But the political and personal interference clings to him. What is heard is no longer the pastor proclaiming the faith of the Church, but once again the political commentator. In this way the priest's actual task is damaged. Not by his opponents, nor by disobedient believers, but by an office-holder who can no longer cleanly distinguish his personal opinion from his mission.

In the Name of Christ

Augustine described his own episcopal office with a remarkably honest sentence: “For you I am a bishop, with you I am a Christian” (Sermo 340,1). His office did not place him above the Gospel, nor did it make him the superior of the faithful in all matters. Before God, even the priest remained a baptized man who had to confess his sins and strive for his own salvation.

A priest possesses great authority. But precisely for a clear mission: to accompany people on their way to God. As Jesus once did. In His person, priests are to continue doing this until Christ comes again. This is what they were ordained for. Their authority shows itself at the altar and in the confessional, at the bedside of the sick, and wherever someone has lost the faith. Not in taking political decisions away from the faithful or in lending their own opinion the weight of ordination. A priest must know his limits. Precisely by doing so, he protects the authority of his office. And through this he remains authentic, and thus accessible to people as a pastor in the first place.