The Need for Authorities

Only those who follow the church have a sure guarantee for the fact that, in their obedience to Christ, they have not really followed just their own know-it-all wisdom.
~ Hans Urs von Balthasar, The von Balthasar Reader
Or, to put it in a more Protestant manner:
It is better to submit to an authority that is sometimes wrong, than it is to submit to no authority whatsoever.