social justice

Question 1

Positive law

Answer 1

Man-made law enacted by proper authority for the government of an organized society

Question 2

Legal positivism is a school of thought in within the philosophy of law. Its principal claims are:

Answer 2

• Laws are rules made by human beings

* There is no inherent connection between the validity of law and ethics or morality

Question 3

Natural Law

Answer 3

: One of the major sources of moral theology and answers the question: “How do I know what is good and evil?

Question 4

Natural Law

Answer 4

• It is not dependent on a particular religion or belief system, rather it is the belief that God made the world in such way that the laws guiding the actions of all created beings are built into these beings.
• The knowledge of right and wrong is written on our hearts.
• There is an objective moral order that is imprinted on humanity that directs humanity to God.
• Therefore to violate natural law is to go against our own humanity: We are to do good and avoid evil.
• But this can change over time; organ donations, sweatshops, child labour, slavery.

Question 5

Social Justice

Answer 5

• Based on the concepts of human rights and equality.
• A world which affords individuals and groups fair treatment and an impartial share of the benefits of society.
• Different political ideologies have different conceptions of what a ‘just society’ actually is.

Question 6

Social Justice RIGHT AND LEFT

Answer 6

• Often employed by the political left to describe a society with a greater degree of economic equality, which may be achieved through progressive taxation, income redistribution, or property redistribution.
• The right also uses the term social justice, but generally believes that a just society is best achieved through the operation of a free market, which they believe provides equality of opportunity and promotes philanthropy and charity.
• Both the right and the left tend to agree on the importance of rule of law, human rights, and some form of a welfare safety net.

Question 7

Catholic Teaching on Social Justice

Answer 7

• Doctrine that treats the collective aspect of humanity.

* Distinctive feature of Catholic social teaching is its concern for the poorest members of society.

Question 8

Catholic Teaching on Social Justice

Answer 8

• This concern echoes elements of the prophetic books of the Old Testament, and recalls the teachings of Jesus Christ, such as his declaration that “whatever you have done for one of these least brothers of mine, you have done for me.”
• Another distinctive feature of Catholic social doctrine is the way in which it has consistently critiqued modern social and political ideologies both of the left and of the right: communism, conservatism, socialism, libertarianism, capitalism, liberalism and Nazism have all been condemned, at least in their pure forms, at one time or another.
• The state has a positive moral role to play as no society will achieve a just and equitable distribution of resources with a totally free market.
• All people have a right to participate in the economic, political, and cultural life of society.

Question 9

Eight Key themes of Catholic Social Teaching:

Answer 9

life and dignity of the person
family
rights and responsiblities 
preferential treatment for poor and vulnerable
dignity of work and right of workers
principles of solidarity 
principles of stewardship 
the common good

Question 10

Life and dignity of the person

Answer 10

• The foundational principle of all Catholic social teachings is the sanctity of human life. Catholics believe in an inherent dignity of the human person starting from conception through natural death. Therefore, human life must be valued above material possessions.
• Oppose acts considered affronts to human life; abortion, euthanasia, genocide, torture, and the direct and intentional targeting of noncombatants.
• Accepts the principle that the state has the right to take the life of a person guilty of an extremely serious crime, and that the state may take appropriate measures to protect itself and its citizens from grave harm,
• Oppose war, being guided by the principles of the just war doctrine.
• Both war and the death penalty must always be a last resort.

Question 11

The family

Answer 11

• Genesis: Immediately after creating Adam, the “LORD God said: “It is not good for the man to be alone.”
• Human beings are not only a sacred but also social.
• The family is the first and most basic unit of society.
• Families form communities, communities a state and together all across the world each human is part of the human family.

Question 12

Rights and responsibilities

Answer 12

• Every person has a fundamental right to life and to the necessities of life.
• In addition, every human has the right to what is required to live a full and decent life, things such as employment, health care, and education.
• Also, the right to exercise religious freedom publicly and privately by individuals and institutions along with freedom of conscience is fundamental.
• The Church supports private property and teaches that “every man has by nature the right to possess property as his own.”, but the right to private property is not absolute. It is theoretically moral and just for its members to destroy property used in an evil way by others, or for the state to redistribute wealth from those who have unjustly hoarded it.
• Corresponding to these rights are duties and responsibilities—to one another, to our families, and to the larger society.

Question 13

Preferential option for the poor and vulnerable

Answer 13

• Jesus taught that on the Day of Judgment God will ask what each of us did to help the poor and needy: “Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.”
• The Church’s law states, “The Christian faithful are obliged to promote social justice and, mindful of the precept of the Lord, to assist the poor from their own resources.

Question 14

The moral test of any society is

Answer 14

how it treats its most vulnerable members. The poor have the most urgent moral claim on the conscience of the nation. We are called to look at public policy decisions in terms of how they affect the poor.”

Question 15

Dignity of work and the rights of workers

Answer 15

• The economy must serve people, not the other way around.
• Workers have a right to work, to earn a living wage and to form trade unions to protect their interests.
• All workers have a right to productive work, to decent and fair wages, and to safe working conditions.
• Workers also have responsibilities—to provide a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay, to treat employers and co-workers with respect, and to carry out their work in ways that contribute to the common good.

Question 16

Principle of solidarity

Answer 16

• We are our brother’s keeper, even though we may be separated by distance, language or culture.

Question 17

Principle of stewardship

Answer 17

• The world’s goods are available for humanity to use only under a “social mortgage” which carries with it the responsibility to protect the environment.
• The “goods of the earth” are gifts and are intended for the benefit of everyone. We were given dominion over creation as sustainers rather than as exploiters.
• We cannot use and abuse the natural resources God has given us with a destructive consumer mentality.
• Generally, the poor are the most vulnerable to environmental impact and endure disproportional hardship when natural areas are exploited or damaged.

Question 18

The common good

Answer 18

• Creating social conditions that permit all people to participate and realize their human dignity.

Question 19

Das Kapital

Answer 19

Critical analysis of capitalism and its practical economic application.

Question 20

Rerum Novarum (Of New Things):

Answer 20

• Subtitled “On Capital and Labor”, an encyclical issued by Pope Leo XIII in 1891 that addressed the relationships and mutual duties between capital and labor, as well as between government and its citizens.
• A response to the social instability and labor conflict that had arisen in the wake of industrialization and had led to the rise of socialism.
• Of primary concern was the need for some relief from “the misery and wretchedness pressing so unjustly on the majority of the working class”.
• So, support the rights of labor to form unions and collective bargaining, rejected socialism and affirmed private property rights.
• Also recognized that the poor have a special status in consideration of social issues: the modern Catholic principle of the “preferential option for the poor” and the notion that God is on the side of the poor found their first expression in this document.

Question 21

Rerum Novarum (Of New Things) also rejects

Answer 21

unrestricted capitalism: Let the working man and the employer make free agreements, and in particular let them agree freely as to the wages; nevertheless, there underlies a dictate of natural justice more imperious and ancient than any bargain between man and man, namely, that wages ought not to be insufficient to support a frugal wage-earner. If through necessity or fear of a worse evil the workman accepts harder conditions because an employer or contractor will afford him no better, he is made the victim of force and injustice.

Question 22

Quadragesimo Anno (In the Fortieth Year):

Answer 22

• Subtitled “On Reconstruction of the Social Order”, is an encyclical by Pope Pius XI, issued in 1931, as a response to the Great Depression.
• This encyclical expanded on Rerum Novarum, noting the positive effect of the earlier document but pointing out that the world had changed significantly since Pope Leo’s time. Pius XI reiterated Leo’s defense of private property rights and collective bargaining, and repeated the belief that blind economic forces cannot create a just society on their own:

Question 23

Quadragesimo Anno (In the Fortieth Year):

Answer 23

• Just as the unity of human society cannot be founded on an opposition of classes, so also the right ordering of economic life cannot be left to a free competition of forces. For from this source, as from a poisoned spring, have originated and spread all the errors of individualist economic teaching. Destroying through forgetfulness or ignorance the social and moral character of economic life, it held that economic life must be considered and treated as altogether free from and independent of public authority, because in the market, i.e., in the free struggle of competitors, it would have a principle of self direction which governs it much more perfectly than would the intervention of any created intellect. But free competition, while justified and certainly useful provided it is kept within certain limits, clearly cannot direct economic life…

Question 24

Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth).

Answer 24

pope john
• It linked the establishment of world peace to the laying of a foundation consisting of proper rights and responsibilities between individuals, social groups, and states from the local to the international level.
• Issued at the height of the Cold War, it also included a denunciation of the nuclear arms race and a call for strengthening the United Nations.

Question 25

Pope Paul VI, Populorum Progressio (The Development of Peoples):

Answer 25

• Released in 1967, it asserts that free international trade alone is not adequate to correct all economic disparities, and supports the role of international organizations in addressing this need.
• It called on richer nations to meet their moral obligation to poor nations, pointing out the relationship between development and peace.

Question 26

Laborem Exercens (On Human Work).

Answer 26

Pope John Paul II
• On one hand there is a growing moral sensitivity alert to the value of every individual as a human being without any distinction of race, nationality, religion, political opinion, or social class. On the other hand these proclamations are contradicted in practice. How can these solemn affirmations be reconciled with the widespread attacks on human life and the refusal to accept those who are weak, needy, elderly, or just conceived? These attacks go directly against respect for life; they threaten the very meaning of democratic coexistence, and our cities risk becoming societies of people who are rejected, marginalized, uprooted, and oppressed, instead of communities of “people living together.”

Question 27

Liberation Theology

Answer 27

• Is a school of theology that focuses on Jesus Christ not only as Redeemer but also as Liberator of the oppressed.
• Its focus is to bring justice to the poor and oppressed, particularly through political activism.
• Explores the relationship between Christian, particularly Roman Catholic, theology and political activism, particularly in areas of social justice, poverty and human rights.

Question 28

• The main methodological innovation of liberation theology is

Answer 28

is to approach theology from the viewpoint of the economically poor and oppressed.

Question 29

• Liberation theology strove to be

Answer 29

be a bottom-up movement in practice, with Biblical interpretation and liturgical practice designed by lay practitioners themselves, rather than by the orthodox Church hierarchy.

Question 30

• Emphasis is placed on those parts of the Bible

Answer 30

where Jesus’ mission is described not in terms of bringing peace (social order) but bringing a sword (social unrest
• These passages are interpreted as a call to arms to carry out what proponents see as a Christian mission of justice – literally by some.

Question 31

• Official Vatican pronouncements, including from the pope, have said that liberation theology is

Answer 31

is only partially compatible with Catholic social teaching and that large portions of it should be rejected due to its use of Marxism and a propensity to align with revolutionary movements.