Rerum Novarum promulgated by Pope Leo
XIII on 15 May 1891 is fundamental to Catholic Social Teaching. The encyclical
points to “new things” or “revolutionary changes in the modern world” (McCarthy
55). For centuries the Church’s message was directed primarily to agricultural
societies characterized by cyclical rhythms. Industrialization coupled with the
rise of Marxism prompted the Church to consider the ever urgent worker question. Rerum Novarum is a “defence of the inalienable dignity of workers,
connected with the importance of the right to property, the principle of
cooperation among the social classes, the rights of the weak and the poor, the
obligation of workers and employees and the right to form associations”
(Compendium 119).
Human
work has two dimensions: objective and subjective. In the objective sense, “it
is the sum of activities, resources, instruments and technologies used by men
and women to produce things, to exercise dominion over the earth, in the words
of the Book of Genesis.” The objective dimension of human work is always subject
to change over time as well as under different political, social, cultural and
technological situations. However, in its subjective sense, “work is the
activity of the human person as a dynamic being capable of performing a variety
of actions that are part of the work process and that correspond to his
personal vocation: Man has to subdue the earth and dominate it,” because he is
created in the image and likeness of God. In this subjective sense, human work
represents a stable dimension, “since it does not depend on what people produce
or on the type of activity they undertake, but only and exclusively on their
dignity as human beings” (Compendium 120). In Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII made it clear that all men are created
equal in the image of God, and so “there is here no difference between rich and
poor, master and servant, ruler and ruled, for the same is Lord over all” (RN
40). As such, the human dignity of the worker as a person must be respected. In
fact, Jesus, the Son of God, spent a great part of his life as a carpenter. In
his healing miracles, Jesus taught the crowd that “the Sabbath was made for
humankind and not humankind for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27-28). He asked, “Is it
lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath, to save life or to kill?” (Mark
3:4) Healing to save a man’s life on the Sabbath is therefore a blessing for
both the one who heals and the one who is healed. Human person is always the
subject of work.
In
confronting Marxism which appeared to be attractive to the working class of his
time, Pope Leo XIII put special emphasis on the right to private property. “Every
man has by nature the right to possess property as his own … the principle of
private ownership, as being pre-eminently in conformity with human nature …”
(RN 6-11). The Pope affirmed that it is the right of man, the subject of work,
to own private property which is acquired through work. Quoting from St. Thomas
Aquinas, he also introduced the concept universal
destination of goods: “Man should not consider his material possessions as
his own, but as common to all, so as to share them without hesitation when
others are in need” (RN 22). Again, property should not be deemed the subject
of work, but an object which is being used by the subject, the human person to
serve other people (other subjects) in need.
Pope
Pius X who succeeded Leo XIII, took a different track from his predecessor. His
papal motto was “Instaurare omnia in
Christo – to restore all things in Christ.” He focused on parish-level
spiritual activities: “frequent reception of Communion, reinvigoration of
Gregorian chant during Mass, catechesis practiced in every parish, etc.”
Notably, his encyclical Pascendi Dominici
Gregis (8 September 1907) condemned the errors of Modernists’ thoughts,
which is often seen as a step back from Leo XIII’s social vision. Nevertheless,
from a more holistic viewpoint, Pius X has supplied a “needed emphasis on
spirituality” of the Church Social Teaching for its subsequent development
(Lecture Notes for Lesson 6).
Forty years after Pope Leo
XIII issued Rerum Novarum, Pope Pius XI
promulgated his encyclical Quadragesimo
Anno on 15 May 1931. Besides reiterating Leo’s defence of private property,
the rights of workers for a fair wage to support one’s family and sound working
conditions, and formation of workers’ and professional associations, Pius XI also
pointed out the Catholic social thought actually addressed economic issues
better than the socialists who claimed to be able to solve them. This is
because the Church supplies the spiritual
component of social justice that Socialism obviously lacks. The Pope
stressed that the first and most necessary remedy for “the root of these many
evils” (of the capitalist economic regime) is “a reform of morals” (QA 98). On
the one hand, he put heavy emphasis on the need to attain “common good” of the
society (by mentioning the term 20 times in the encyclical), while on the other
hand, he considered the means to achieve common good is for all individuals to “return
openly and sincerely to the teaching of the Gospel, to the precepts of Him Who
alone has the words of everlasting life, words which will never pass away, even
if heaven and earth will pass away” (QA 136). Moreover, the Pope elaborated on
the principle of subsidiarity in his
encyclical. Smaller and subordinate organizations formed by individuals ought
to play their own roles in the society and should not be “absorbed” into the
larger organizations.
It
is an injustice and at the same time a grave evil and disturbance of right
order to assign to a greater and higher association what lesser and subordinate
organizations can do. For every social activity ought of its very nature to
furnish help to the members of the body social, and never destroy and absorb
them (QA 79).
The principle of subsidiarity “presupposes that individuals and
communities have proper activities, social functions with intrinsic integrity
and value.” In other words, certain forms and activities of the social order,
e.g., marriage, family and organizational hierarchies, are in the natural order
having particular functions and responsibilities. As such, subsidiarity “is not
so much a principle about rights – the license to act without interference from
above – as it is about duties or vocational responsibilities.” In its authentic
sense, it is about a mission, a vocation, a gift of service, a principle which
“regulates the plurality of gifts within a community” (McCarthy 120-121). In
the Pope’s view, the restoration of social order depends largely on the practice
of virtues by individuals as the principal means of realizing common good as
well as the reinvigoration of the civil society through respect of the
principle of subsidiarity by the State (Benestad 156-158).
During
the brief pontificate of John XXIII from October 1958 to June 1963, the Pope
was most recognized for convening the Second Vatican Council which commenced in
October 1962. This was emphasized by the aggiornamento
(a bringing up to date) theme that characterized the discussions and teachings
arising from the Council. Although John XXIII died in the middle of the Council
in June 1963 and was unable to see it to completion, the Council has
far-reaching implications on the reform of the Catholic Church in the areas of liturgy,
ecclesiology, central role of the Scripture, and the Church’s teaching on
humanity’s relationship to society. Indeed, Pope John XXIII’s contribution to
bringing the Church in positive dialogues with the modern world has been widely
acknowledged. His encyclical Pacem in
Terris (11 April 1963) is the first encyclical addressed to “all men of
good will,” in addition to addressing conventionally to bishops, clergy and the
lay faithful. Until John XXIII, popes were often seen as shepherds for the
flock within the Catholic Church. But John XXIII saw his role as the shepherd
of the Church and the world, with the
mission to bring peace to the world through a consolidation of efforts from all
fronts.
The
Pope began Pacem in Terris with the
dignity of man who is created in the image of God and redeemed by the blood of Jesus
Christ. As such, it is by the natural law that “every man has the right to
life, to bodily integrity, and to the means which are suitable for the proper
development of life” (PT 11). The encyclical essentially echoes the “rights
language” of Rerum Novarum
promulgated by Pope Leo XIII. Yet John XXIII also put special emphasis that
rights come with corresponding duties, and most obviously are acknowledging and
respecting the rights of others. “Those, therefore, who claim their own rights,
yet altogether forget or neglect to carry out their respective duties, are
people who build with one hand and destroy with the other” (PT 30). Similar to
Pius XI, John XXIII also appealed to the moral nature of individuals for
building a well-ordered society. A civil authority must operate on moral force
and appeal to the conscience of individual citizens in order to enable them to
collaborate to achieve common good (PT 48). The Pope extended the moral order
to the whole human family and urged different nations to seek “universal common
good” and “lend mutual assistance to others in their efforts for improvement.”
But to achieve this end, the Pope stressed that although “individuals will be
found to differ enormously, in knowledge, power, talent and wealth, no
justification is ever found for those who surpass the rest to subject others to
their control in any way” (PT 87). The Pope strongly advocated that “there can
be no peace between men unless there is peace within each one of them” (PT
165).
Pacem in Terris certainly has a strong
influence on the Magisterium social teachings of the Second Vatican Council,
especially Gaudium et spes which
stipulates the Church constitution on humanity’s relationship with the society.
With John XXIII opening the windows of the Church to the world, his successor
Pope Paul VI who convened the remaining sessions of the Second Vatican Council
which ended in December 1965, issued the encyclical Populorum Progressio in 26 March 1967 on the developments of
peoples, with a particular emphasis on the poor and marginalized to appeal for
“a more active improvement of their human qualities.” Again addressing to “all
men of good will,” the Pope stated that in the light of the spirit of the
Second Vatican Council, the Church develops “a renewed consciousness of the
demands of the Gospel, (which) makes it her duty to put herself at the service
of all, to help them grasp their serious problem in all its dimensions, and to
convince them that solidarity in
action at this turning point in human history is a matter of urgency” (PP 1). The
Pope echoed the social doctrines of his predecessors, Leo XIII, Pius XI and
John XXIII on the importance of recognizing human and work dignity as well as
moral progress and spiritual growth on top of purely economic and technological
developments: “economics and technology have no meaning except from man whom
they should serve. And man is only truly man in as far as, master of his own
acts and judge of their worth, he is author of his own advancement, in keeping
with the nature which was given to him by his Creator” (PP 34).
Vatican
II’s aggiornamento theme raised high
expectations on change of all sorts in the Catholic religion. One of which was
on birth control. In fact, the growing popularity of oral contraceptives around
that time accelerated the need for a church response. And from 1957, moral
theologians were publishing articles about birth control, with different
questions being asked. Before John XXIII died in 1963, he appointed a
theological commission to examine the issue. Paul VI expanded the group to
include medical experts and some lay Catholics. Led by the Jesuit Josef Fuchs
who was appointed by his peers as the principal draftsman of the report that
represented the views of fifteen of the nineteen theologians, it recognized
that “married people in conscience needed to determine whether the serious
issue of birth control ought to be a means toward realizing themselves as
responsible persons.” And that these people needed to be educated “to assume
responsibility and not just to follow the law” (Keenan 3261). Nonetheless, Paul
VI did not consider himself having the moral authority to overturn the birth
control teaching of Pius XI in his encyclical Casti Conubii and eventually rejected the majority report (Keenan
3276). He issued the encyclical Humanae
Vitae on 25 July 1968 to reinforce the teaching of Pius XI, which taught
that under the precepts of the natural law, “each and every marital act must of
necessity retain its intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life”
(HV 11). Besides, it is by divine will that the unitive and procreative ends of
the marital act are inseparable (HV 12). Following similar arguments as Pius
XI, Pope VI taught that artificial birth control is intrinsically evil and may
not be justified as a “lesser evil” (HV 14). The only lawful birth control
method is to resort to infertile periods for engaging in marital intercourse
(HV 16). The encyclical caused a major shock to lay Catholics and theologians.
The former interpreted it as imposing a barrier on their conscience while the
latter considered “married lay persons were in fact more competent to judge the
moral liceity of birth control in their particular marriages” (Keenan 3345). Humanae Vitae was apparently a setback
of the Church’s growing consciousness in respecting human dignity.
Pope
John Paul II, who succeeded John Paul I after his very brief pontificate, invented
a new metaphor: “theology of the body” in a series of his teachings from 1979
to 1984. He emphasized on the married couple’s physical complementarily as an
important part of God’s creation plan as well as their procreation through conjugal
acts as participation in God’s creation of a new life. As such, artificial
birth control acquires a spiritual significance – because it is a “direct
denial of God’s gift to life.” Sex is not merely a material and physical
encounter or otherwise persons will become “objects,” but married couples are
“gifts” to each other with their children being another precious gift to both
of them (Lecture Notes for Lesson 5). The “subject” and “object” themes are
thus not only confined to human work, but to the entire human person – body and
soul in unity. The Pope also extended this understanding to the family, the
smallest unit of human community. In his encyclical Centesimus Annus (1 May 1991) to commemorate the hundredth
anniversary of Rerum Novarum, he
described the family as the “sanctuary of life,” which is the place “in which
life – the gift of God – can be properly welcomed and protected against the
many attacks to which it is exposed, and can develop in accordance with what
constitutes authentic human growth” (CA 39).
In his
encyclical Veritatis Splendor (6
August 1993), the Pope specifically strengthened the importance of the natural
law in Catholic moral teaching and the inseparability of body and soul in
determining the morality of an act. He condemned moral relativism of various
natures as well as totalitarianism resulted from both Socialism and a
“democracy without values” (VS 101). He called for a spiritual response to the
difficult situation modern man are facing. Only with the help of divine grace
as a result of the saving power of Jesus, we would be able to obey God’s
command, overcome our weaknesses and evangelize the world (VS102-106). In his
encyclical Evangelical Vitae (25
March 1995), the Pope combined the Church’s teachings in a number of social
issues, including abortion, euthanasia, birth control and death penalty. Under
the theme of “Gospel of life,” the Pope taught that every person of good will
“should come to recognize in the natural law written in the heart the sacred
value of human life from its very beginning until its end, and can affirm the
right of every human being to have this primary good respected to the highest
degree” (EV 2). Again, he put the human person at the center of his teaching, and
a human person, in his entirety, should never be “used” as an object, but be
respected and loved. While it is obvious that John Paul II has adopted a more
personalist and less neo-scholastic approach in Catholic social teaching than
his predecessors, some moral theologians were still quite angry with his implicit
charge against them in advancing moral relativism (Keenan 3570).
While
Pope John Paul II is a prominent public figure “putting the Church’s voice and
presence before the world,” his successor Benedict XVI adopted a quieter and more
intellectual approach to his papacy (Lecture Notes for Lesson 6). In his first
encyclical Deus Caritas Est (25
December 2005), the Pope reflected on the three Greek words on love: eros, philia and agape. While philia is
used to express the relationship between Jesus and his disciples, the Pope
noted that New Testament writers prefer the use of agape to eros in
describing Christian understanding of love. However, he taught that eros, which is normally used to describe
the love between a man and a woman, is nothing bad unless it is “reduced to
pure sex, has become a commodity, a mere thing to be bought and sold, or
rather, man himself becomes a commodity” (DC 5). In fact, he saw agape – descending, oblative love (typically
Christian) and eros – ascending,
possessive or covetous love as inseparable. “Even if eros is at first mainly covetous and ascending, a fascination for
the great promise of happiness, in drawing near to the other, it is less and
less concerned with itself, increasingly seeks the happiness of the other” (DC
7). In other words, eros, which is
rooted in man’s very nature for sex and marriage, can be purified to become
love with agape. In a certain way,
Pope Benedict XVI further adds to the spiritual repository of marriage of John
Paul II from the love perspective.
In his
encyclical Caritas in Veritate (29 June 2009), Pope Benedict XVI used an
Augustinian approach to emphasize that love must be guided by truth, or else
true integral human development cannot be achieved. “Without truth, charity
degenerates into sentimentality. Love becomes an empty shell, to be filled in
an arbitrary way … It falls prey to contingent subjective emotions and
opinions, the word love is abused and
distorted, to the point where it comes to mean the opposite” (CV 3). Discussing
on economic development, the Pope stressed that “the economy needs ethics in
order to function correctly – not any ethics whatsoever, but an ethics which is
people-centred.” For genuine development,
business ethics must be built on two pillars: respecting human dignity and
recognizing the transcendent value of the natural law (CV 45). The Pope also
saw the need for the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity to work
together: “the principle of subsidiarity must remain closely linked to the
principle of solidarity and vice versa, since the former without the latter
gives way to social privatism, while the latter without the former gives way to
paternalist social assistance that is demeaning to those in need” (CV 58). On
the new developments such as globalization, social media and more critically
bioethics, the Pope reiterated that economic and technological developments are
grossly insufficient, but rather “development must include not just material
growth but also spiritual growth,
since the human person is a unity of body
and soul, born of God's creative love and destined for eternal life” (CV 76). Essentially, the Pope argues that “the
practice of the virtues by all participants in modern economies is more
important for a functioning market than the pursuit of self-interest or any set
of structures devised by policy makers” (Benestad 466).
We see
a progressive development of the personalism theme in papal social teaching
since Pope Leo XIII introduced the concept in human work and right to private
property in the late 19th century – from more material based
discussions to putting more emphasis on the integral development of the full
human being in body and soul, with the spiritual component further strengthened
by Pope John Paul II and Benedict XVI; and from more personal or individual-based
to a more community-based model, starting from the smallest unit of a family,
since personalism also implies inter-personalism. Pope Benedict XVI rightly
pointed out:
As
a spiritual being, the human creature is defined through interpersonal
relations. The more authentically he or she lives these relations, the more his
or her own personal identity matures. It is not by isolation that man
establishes his worth, but by placing himself in relation with others and with God (CV 53).
Although the concepts of subsidiarity and solidarity
might have been first introduced to counter the socialist advocacy to
centralization, they have also developed over time to focus not so much on the
structural issues but on the spiritual aspects to ensure integral human development
in tandem with political, economic, social and technological progress. Finally,
while the neo-scholastic approach continues to be adopted by the recent popes, they
have taken a more “historicist” mindset in applying reason in defending truths
that are deemed unchangeable, recognizing that it has become ever more urgent
in protecting them against modern errors, while at the same time evangelizing
the world with the help of God’s grace.
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