There has been a good deal of discussion and analysis done on Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical. This is, of course, only to be expected, as are the usual comments about the true aims and goals of the Catholic Church’s social encyclicals. Consequently, everyone talks about what is in them, but not what they are, and especially not what social justice is or how to understand it.
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| Father William Ferree |
Understanding something generally requires comprehending the first principle of a thing. In this case, the thing is the virtue of social justice as understood by Pope Pius XI and analyzed by CESJ co-founder Father William J. Ferree, S.M., Ph.D. In particular, the “laws and characteristics of social justice” detailed in Father Ferree’s pamphlet, Introduction to Social Justice (1948).
According to Pius XI, the overriding principle and first law of social justice as stated in § 57 of Quadragesimo Anno is “the common good of all society will be kept inviolate.” Social justice is directed to the common good, not any individual good, however important an individual good may be in its own order.
As Father Ferree noted, “The Common Good is a good so great that very frequently private rights — even inalienable private rights — cannot be exercised until it is safeguarded.” This means people with divergent interests and objectives, sometimes radically so, can come together and work toward a common goal if they keep in mind the first principle of social justice and maintain the inviolability of the common good.
It is essential to keep in mind that social justice does not replace or substitute for individual justice and charity. Rather, the object of social justice is to reform the institutions of the common good, so they are structures of virtue instead of structures of sin. The goal of social justice is to provide the proper environment within which people can become virtuous within the framework of their own faith or philosophy, not to coerce them into others’ ideas of virtue.
The question then becomes how to achieve the desired state of society which respects the dignity of every person. In an age in which capital ownership and thus power has become more concentrated than at any previous time in history, how do we overcome the inherent corruptibility of concentrated power? Leo XIV suggests three things. We must —
· Rediscover truth as a common good,
· Protect the dignity of work, and
· Safeguard freedom against all forms of dependence and commercialization.
Truth means conformity with reality. In Christian and other beliefs, God is the ultimate reality and thus the ultimate, inviolable truth. As the ultimate reality, God manifests in part as the natural law discernible by human reason alone. Chief among the precepts of the natural law, and therefore of social justice, is “Good is to be done, evil avoided.” Conforming the institutions of the common good to the precepts of the natural law thus rediscovers truth not only as a common good, but as the inviolable common good of all people.
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| Pope Pius XI |
The dignity of work is really that of every human person. To address the current emergency, Leo XIV calls for a preservation or restoration of wage labor to make those who can labor productive. He believes this would enable them to meet their needs and those of their dependents. For those who cannot work, he advocates an increase in redistribution of existing wealth.
Economic Personalism expands Leo XIV’s vision to every child, woman, and man by empowering them with capital ownership. Once the immediate needs are met, people can organize and restructure the social order so that everyone can produce both with labor and with capital — and anyone can own capital, even, or especially, those who are unable to labor.
Of course, CESJ recognizes that the need to engage in the work of civilization is far more important than mere economic toil, and the true work of the human person. That is to become more fully human by acquiring and developing virtue. Becoming virtuous, however, becomes more difficult the more energy and time is devoted to economic toil.
Finally, safeguarding freedom against all forms of dependence and commercialization cannot be done if most people are dependent on others for their subsistence. That is the problem when a few private individuals or the community or the State own the means of production and everyone else is restricted to wages or welfare to support themselves and their dependents. No amount of regulation or laws can overcome the tendency of many of those with power to impose their wills on those without power.
There will, of course, always be a need for redistribution, for there will always be people who need assistance. It is important to realize, however, that just as improving wages as the sole compensation for labor does not solve the underlying problem of how to reward people for economic activity, redistribution is not a solution to inadequate income. Both are expedients on the way to a more just arrangement of society. Both are non-sustainable in the mid-term and non-viable in the long-term.
The problem then becomes what arrangement of society is just, sustainable, and viable. We believe Economic Personalism is an optimal response to Leo XIV’s call for everyone to do his or her part without regard to any purely religious doctrine of any faith or philosophy or political differences in or among individuals, groups, or countries.
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