[ebb tide]

The bishop isn't a partner, a franchisee, a subsidiary, I can't even think of an analogy. Can you?

I can. He's a subordinate.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I think you're right, ebb, he's a subordinate. But in a way that doe not fit in with laws based on employer-employee, commercial or corporate relationships.

That's very plain in the case of a bishop in relation to the Vatican: by most of the criteria you could look at in law, the Vatican's relationship with any particular bsihop is rather tenuous. For better or for worse, most bishops have no strictly "supervisory" superior. A bishop can ignore the USCCB (often should!!)_ and most of the departments of the Vatican unless the is something Gawd-awfully, publicly scandalous going on.

To a much lesser extent, that is also true of diocesan priests. They are not employees of their bishops, even if the bishop is their ecclesiastical superior. The pastors under a Bishop are not paid by the Bishop, nor do they have their day-to-day activities spelled out or determined by the bishop. This bishop, however, can hire and fire in the sense of granting or rescinding faculties, and giving or not giving a parish assignment.

In a sense, priests are like independent contractors. Strange though it seems. I am speaking, of course, about civil law, not ecclesiastical law.