It is time to get serious about Catholic social doctrine

Here is William McGurn, from his column in yesterday's WSJ:

Paul Ryan shocked the gentle souls at Georgetown University when he traveled up to their campus last Thursday and said: "We believe that Social Security legislation, now billed as a great victory for the poor and for the worker, is a great defeat for Christianity. It is an acceptance of the idea of force and compulsion." The Wisconsin Republican went on to lament that "we in our generation have more and more come to consider the state as bountiful Uncle Sam," and that citizens justify what they get from the state by saying, "We got it coming to us."

Sure sounds like Mr. Ryan was channeling Ayn Rand.

Except for one thing. The words are not Mr. Ryan's. They come from a 1945 column by Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker, in which she complained about how state intervention limits personal freedom and responsibility. Day's skepticism about government was reflected in her nickname for it: "Holy Mother State."

Or, in the words of Pope Benedict XVI, in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est (2005): "The State which would provide everything, absorbing everything into itself, would ultimately become a mere bureaucracy incapable of guaranteeing the very thing which the suffering person—every person—needs: namely, loving personal concern. We do not need a State which regulates and controls everything, but a State which, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, generously acknowledges and supports initiatives arising from the different social forces and combines spontaneity with closeness to those in need. The Church is one of those living forces: she is alive with the love enkindled by the Spirit of Christ." ...

Continue reading on the CWR blog.

Some related Ignaitus Insight links:

• Rerum Novarum and Seven Principles of Catholic Social Doctrine | Barbara Lanari
• What Is Catholic Social Teaching? | Mark Brumley
• Caritas in Veritate: "Its Principal Driving Force" | Fr. James V. Schall, S.J.
• CWR Round-Table: Caritas in Veritate | Catholic World Report

Comments

[Gail Finke]

I like this piece, Carl. I have been debating the "Ryan vs. Catholic Social Teaching" issue with various people on Facebook lately, and it always comes down to this: "I [liberal person] think Catholic Social Teaching means thus-and-such [usually a Democratic program], therefore Ryan is wrong" vs. my argument, which is always, "Catholic Social Teaching is a body of principles, there are different ways to apply them and still be Catholic, and I don't see anything about Ryan's explanations that make me think his application of those principles is not Catholic." We never get to the "is the way Ryan applies the principles practical and/or will it work at all?" question because none of them have ever accepted my point.