Misunderstanding
of the development of the concept of social justice to counter the “new things”
of socialism, modernism, and the New Age is pervasive in our day. Briefly, many people confuse the act of social
justice with measures directed to the good of individuals, not to the common
good. The act of social justice is not,
however, a substitute or supplement for individual justice or charity, but a
corrective intended to restructure institutions to make it possible for the
individual virtues to function so that individuals can meet their own needs
through their own efforts.
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| Msgr. Luigi Aloysius Taparelli d’Azeglio, S.J. |
Having observed
the damage done by mistakes in philosophy, politics, and theology by acceptance
of the “new things,” Monsignor Luigi Aloysius Taparelli d’Azeglio, S.J. (1793-1862) developed a
principle of social justice to correct the errors of the socialists,
modernists, and New Age adherents. In
1840 he published Saggio Teoretico di Dritto Naturale — “The Theoretical
Essay of Natural Law” — to explain his principle.
Socialist “social
justice” can be summarized as “the
end justifies the means.” Even the
principles of natural law, the capacity for which
defines human beings as human beings, can — according to the New Christian
prophet Henri de Saint-Simon — be set aside to achieve the goal of a better
society.
In contrast, in Taparelli’s principle of social justice, the end does not justify the
means. Everything, even (or especially)
social improvement and the general welfare, must be subordinate to the natural
law as understood in Aristotelian-Thomism, i.e.,
in Catholic belief, to God. (Heinrich A. Rommen, The Natural Law: A Study in Legal and Social History and Philosophy. Indianapolis, Indiana: Liberty Fund, Inc.,
1998, 45.)
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| Aristotle |
This, however,
was not a true social ethics, but individual ethics with a good intention
toward the common good. (Rev. William J. Ferree, Introduction to Social Justice. New
York: The Paulist Press, 1948, 10.) What Taparelli developed was a new principle of social
justice as an application of traditional virtues meant
to benefit individuals directly, but with a general intention to benefit the
whole of society indirectly.
As Aristotle explained in the Nichomachean Ethics
and the Politics, this is sound guidance for the bios politikos, the
life of the individual citizen in the State.
It does not, however, address specifically social problems, such as
flaws in our institutions that inhibit or prevent the exercise of
individual virtue.
Most (if not all)
of the confusion over social justice results from generations of scholars and
advocates attempting to resolve the socialist and the Taparelli versions of social justice and synthesize a consistent definition. Obviously, however, a theory of social
justice that says the natural law is subordinate to the will of the people
(socialism), and one that says the will
of the people is subordinate to the natural law (Taparelli) can never be
reconciled. Any attempt to do so, or
even define it in any meaningful way, can only result in contradiction.
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| Pope Pius XI |
Essentially,
Taparelli’s work did no more than
restate traditional moral philosophy. As
such, it was no more effective at countering socialism and the other new things than papal
condemnations had been. Social justice remained, by and large, a euphemism for
socialism, and people continued to be
alienated from society at an accelerating rate.
There are only
two known Curial uses of the term social justice prior to the pontificate of
Pius XI, and they were consistent with Taparelli’s notion of social justice as
a principle applying individual virtues rather than a particular virtue
directed to the common good. These were
in 1894 in a reference to the demand for reparation when another is harmed (Acta
Sanctae Sedis, 1894-1895, 131) and by St. Pius X in a 1904 encyclical when
he stated St. Gregory the Great was a defender of social justice (Iucunda
Sane, § 3).
Pius XI’s
achievement in moral philosophy was to identify “social justice” as a
particular virtue with a defined act, not merely a principle as Taparelli
did. (Rev. William J. Ferree, S.M.,
Ph.D., The Act of Social Justice.
Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1942, © 1943.)
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