Catholic Social Teaching
Refugees, Immigration, and Catholic Discourse
I think it might be a general experience that Thanksgiving Day tends to bring extended families together more than even Christmas Day. I’m not sure why this is or whence this came about. My own recollections of Thanksgiving as a kid take me to my grandparents’ basement where two long tables were spread with all the fixings. It…
Confusions about Social Justice
The phrase “social justice” is relatively new, appearing first with frequency in the writing of Pius XI, most notably in Quadragesimo Anno (1931). Despite its more frequent use among contemporary Catholics, social justice is now widely confused with its kindred virtues, “commutative justice” and “distributive justice” The failure to distinguish these virtues leads to basic…
Catholic Social Teaching: Discernment
In earlier decades of the twentieth century, Catholics in America felt they were bound to a higher loyalty. As St. Thomas More put it, the King’s servant and God’s servant first. Social problems like abortion, poverty, and moral decline were viewed as departures from the normal values and truths society held. Now these problems are…
Catholic Social Teaching and The American Detour
What Happened? Living and working in the world but not of it may have been the mantra of Catholic thought and education in the first half of the twentieth century, but the tsunami of societal revolution in the 1960s upended rationality in favor of action-oriented programs in the name of social justice. The wisdom of…
Catholic Social Teaching and The Common Good
Part of the renewal of the temporal order to which Catholics are called involves an understanding of man’s ultimate Common Good, God Himself, and the need to direct our actions toward attaining this Good in an increasingly secular society. In examining the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church as promulgated over the last 120 years,…
Farm Subsidiarity and Obama
The wizards of smart in the Obama administration never cease to amaze. By now all thinking Catholics should realize that this administration is anything but friendly to the Church or her doctrines. Yet some still support the President claiming that his initiatives are consonant with Catholic Social Doctrine. Now comes the latest assault on common…
