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The Spectacle Blog
In an earlier post, I already set out my own attitude of humility before the pope’s encyclical. I recognize the respect due both his office and his tremendous personal learning. There is no question that what the pope has said about the nature of truth is stupendously good.
In that post, I expressed a degree of unease with some of the economic thought, at least as I perceived it, in the encyclical. Looking it over again, here are the parts (more than any others) that cause me the most trouble:
In section 32:
The dignity of the individual and the demands of justice require, particularly today, that economic choices do not cause disparities in wealth to increase in an excessive and morally unacceptable manner and that we continue to prioritize the goal of access to steady employment for everyone (italics original to the document).
And then just a little further:
Lowering the level of protection accorded to the rights of workers, or abandoning mechanisms of wealth distribution in order to increase the country’s international competitiveness, hinder the achievement of lasting development.
Now, when I read those parts of the document, I recognize a type of thinking about the economy that I would typically associate with western Europe and pre-Thatcherite Britain. At least, it is possible to interpret the document in that fashion. When I think about prioritizing “the goal of access to steady employment for everyone” I contemplate the kind of worker security initiatives that slowly bankrupted General Motors or government programs that subsidize anti-productive schemes for workers as a class.
I may be guilty of reading too much into the words I’ve selected because I know the pope is a western European accustomed to exactly the brand of economics which give rise to my concern.
The great question, of course, is what does the pope mean when he says we must provide access to steady employment? Does he mean that we should educate citizens and provide a culture that gives individuals initiative and the desire to be productive so they will be worth employing? Or does he mean that we should attempt great governmental schemes of guaranteed employment for working age people? Or does he mean both? Or something else entirely? I’m not sure we can know because the pope says the church does not offer technical solutions.
And when he writes about protecting the rights of workers and retaining mechanisms of wealth redistribution it is difficult to imagine he is referring to any action of the free market. But again, it is difficult to say because he is purposefully vague. What I keep thinking is that some of those mechanisms could be exactly the things preventing a nation from attaining greater prosperity.
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Mary| 7.12.09 @ 11:57PM
What I keep thinking is that some of those mechanisms could be exactly the things preventing a nation from attaining greater prosperity.
I don't think prosperity is necessarily his first concern. Here his first concern as the Pope is strongly connected to the Second Commandment. And much of the time prosperity is strongly connected to materialism/consumerism which can be a spiritually deadening force. Unless he's able to pass his negative Charism to a ruling, global body, necessity dictates he be vague.
Karl Barth is thought to be one of the greatest theologians of the 20th Century. Apparently even Pope Paul VI admitted as much when they met. To the best of my knowledge Barth was not a Natural Law man. An acquaintance of mine noted that he referred to natural law as anti-Christ. Most probably because Natural Law clashes with the Protestant (Reformed) understanding of Christ, Revelation and Salvation: "Know Jesus, know the Father. No Jesus, no Father."
Barth helped me hold on a little longer before finally letting go. He's a pastoral theologian. The one volume I possess of his Church Dogmatics is indispensable. I think there are 14 in all. I can't remember under which chapter this falls, but he said that those closest to God are those who think they know nothing about Him. I think that's true and probably a very important facet of humility.
The Word of Christ and the World of Culture: Sacred and Secular Through the Theology of Karl Barth is a wonderful book, in case you're interested.
Lastly, a quote from Barth and a reminder that it's important to remember when reading the encyclical in English, Italians say, "Translator, Traitor."
Strange as it may seem, it is still true, that those who fail to understand other churches than their own are not the people who care intensely about theology, but the theological dilettantes, eclectics, and historians of all sorts; while those very men who have found themselves forced to confront a clear, thoroughgoing, logical sic et non find themselves allied to each other inspite of all contradictions, by an underlying fellowship and understanding, even in the cause which they handle so differently and approach from such painfully different angles. But the cause, it may be, is nothing less than Jesus Christ and the unity of the Church.
http://tinyurl.com/mf83bm
MattSwartz| 7.13.09 @ 12:22AM
No matter whether or not one believes that he is Christ's primary representative on earth (as a Protestant, I don't), there is no denying that the Pope has an immensely difficult job.
He is tasked with speaking to the largest, most varied audience in world history. He writes encyclicals to the entire Catholic Church, and it's his job to make sense to Catholics in Paris, Botswana, and Alabama. Translation is a huge concern, but it isn't the biggest one. The world's economic systems are vastly varied. Furthermore, what one observers from one country calls "capitalism", those from another calls a mixed economy, and a third set of observers might call neoliberalism.
I think he's smart (perhaps inspired) enough to know that the key is to be vague and remind people that they need to approach the subject of his encyclical, whatever it is, prayerfully, and in terms of the Church's historical teaching.
I think this newest encyclical does that. If he praised the "free market", some might think he was praising Madoff, Halliburton, et al. He keeps it vague, knowing that everyone is ultimately individually answerable to God and he can do no more than remind them to keep paying attention to that fact.
I
Teflon93 | 7.13.09 @ 7:57AM
The Holy Father writes to the world, not simply the U.S. He is not a policy wonk but the Vicar of Christ on Earth---his prescriptions should be read as spiritual requests and not policy demands.
"Access to steady employment" means what it says. There are parts of the world where the ruling regimes do not allow certain types of people to work. If they cannot work, they cannot provide for their families, with all the corrosive self-loathing such a condition entails.
Similarly, we've seen what happens when Western aid flows into such places. The ruling class or family simply takes the cash. In this encyclical, the Pontiff refers several times to the problems of globalization, not least of which is various tyrannical regime essentially enslaving their labor force to pad their pockets thru international trade. This is precisely what the Chinese have done.
Caron| 7.13.09 @ 9:04AM
Jesus said "let the children come unto me, for such is the kingdom of Heaven." Also from scripture.."to know him, and to make him known." I wouldn't want to claim that I would be closer to God by remaining ignorant about Him. Jesus was the Word in the flesh - a lifelong education, but a child can start and understand that path. Theologians often muddy the water.
Mike| 7.13.09 @ 9:47AM
Mr. Baker,
As you think about the parts of the encyclical that give you pause, you may want to take a look at the parable of the rich man.
Hunter Baker| 7.13.09 @ 10:24AM
Mike, I'm all too familiar with the parable of the rich man. But I haven't said anything to you about how I dispose of my income or whether I give to the poor. What I have been talking about is economic policy for a government. I don't recall the parable of the rich man being directed against a government that failed to redistribute wealth.
John - TMF| 7.13.09 @ 11:10AM
I am a Catholic, and the Encyclical seemed to be more of an exercise in design by committee than a clear functional instruction on how a Roman Catholic should treat his responsibilities to his fellow man within the world of business, commerce, and economy.
The creepy "Social Justice" pap just keeps rising to the top like pond scum on a hot day. The dark secret of Social Justice is that it is "Liberation Theology" draped with a new robe of genteel respectability... The former sounds so good and pure, the latter sounds restive, potentially violent, and blatantly Marxist.
So, the Lefties relabel their Christic Marxism and re-peddle it to the perpetually guilty feeling masses. (Apt word there...)
The problem is that the modern Church's dance with Socialism is done in complete disregard for its fundamental underpinning - Utilitarianism. The Church, my Church, is dancing with the devil. It seeks to impose the "Kingdom of God" upon the "Kingdom of Man" and will rapidly find itself serving the Earthly wants of men, while failing to guide us through the narrow door to God.
At least there has been some debate sparked. I am not convinced that the issue will be resolved soon, but the reality is that the Church is still flirting with serving Mammon.
r/John - TMF
Mary| 7.13.09 @ 12:24PM
Jesus also said that only the childlike would gain admission to Heaven. The point is to remain a child; to wonder like a child without stepping outside the wonder to “hook,” and destroy wonder’s power to live and let live. That’s what the person who doesn’t think he knows much about God understands. You missed Barth’s point. When asked to explain or summarize his theology he replied: “Jesus loves me this I know, because the Bible tells me so.”
In Culture and Value, Wittgenstein wrote that Christianity says live the day and accept the evil and the good that is sufficient unto it, Heaven and Hell are God’s business and no one else’s.
An Anglican priest I know of delivered a wonderful homily on the difference between God as Event and God as a set of propositions. I think that as an event Jesus can live, but as a set of propositions he cannot. Witness Obama’s use of him. He’s a set of propositions to be used, but whose name must be covered.
Liberal Reader| 7.13.09 @ 12:48PM
The two passages you cite from the pope's encyclical are completely in line with traditional western thought on the obligations of societies.
It has always been considered dangerous to the health and fortunes of a society to have too much disparity of wealth.
When this country was founded, there was a wealthy class, but the distance between it and the vast majority of Americans was, by today's standards, very, very small.
Wealth disparity has grown since the 1980s, as the middle class has been squeezed (you hear their resentful cries of pain here, aimed at the wrong elite) and as the top 1% has seen its wealth grow exponentially.
This is not good for American society. It leads to rancor and uncivility in political discourse and in general a fragmented culture.
As for the second passage, the pope is reminding us that workers are human beings. They are not just an asset to be used and then discarded.
The fantasy of capitalism is that human beings can be made liquid, invested or withdrawn as the market dictates. But the human stomach will be fed, despite what the grey-faced bean-counters predict, and social well-being and order require useful employment.
Mike| 7.13.09 @ 1:00PM
Mr. Baker,
As I read the encyclical, the concern isn't solely for individual action, but is also for corporate action.
Mary| 7.13.09 @ 2:38PM
It was Franz Rosenzweig’s book that made me look at wonder as he prescribed.
http://tinyurl.com/lzoqbd
Liberal Reader| 7.13.09 @ 2:58PM
The Church's stance on abortion and euthenasia, as well as stem-cell research, is informed by the very same principles that inform the pope's argument about what makes a society just.
Every individual matters; every human being is a meaningful end in himself; every human being is a creation of God.
Markets, left unattended, treat human beings like things or tools (see 19th century). The government has a role in protecting workers and seeing to it that they can form affiliations designed to increase their security.
I'm not exactly sure how or where a "conservative Protestant" begins to disagree with the pope, or what principles he can base his disagreement on, unless they are a kind of amalgam of Social Darwinism and the most hideous strands of Calvinism.
Hunter Baker| 7.13.09 @ 6:16PM
Mike, you instructed me to read the parable of the rich man. I'm answering with regard to how I read it, not the encyclical. And I read the parable to be speaking to me, not to a government.
Teflon93 | 7.13.09 @ 7:23PM
Liberal Reader is largely spot-on regarding Church teaching. The Church in general, and this Pope in particular, are predominantly concerned with individual dignity and spiritual freedom.
It is true that markets have a tendency to commoditize people, reducing them simply to transactions.
But of course, government has a far more lethal tendency to do this. While those folks at the Stock Exchange might tend toward callousness toward individual investors, at least it doesn't try to get them killed, as government does, when it's not succeeding in killing them outright.
This is why leftists overreach when they try to yoke the Pontiff to nationalized healthcare (meaning mandatory abortions and euthanasia) or other totalitarian "new ideas".
The Church does not share the Left's vision of a boot stomping on a human face forever.
Liberal Reader| 7.13.09 @ 8:10PM
Teflon --
I think I can agree with most of what you write, particularly above when you remind people that the pope is the leader of the Catholic Church, not a "policy wonk."
And clearly the pope does not believe he is giving particular instructions on tax policy or laws that govern unions.
I will say, however, that as an American your experience of markets has been buffered by considerable protections. Had you been born to coffee farming in El Salvador, as many in the pope's flock have, you might think -- if you had the leisure time -- a little more skeptically about the alleged eternal goodness of the market's Invisible Hand.
Tom De Lay can go to the Marianna Islands and give a speech saying "This is what capitalism is all about," and ignore the concentration camp like conditions in which women there toil, the ease with which they are lured into prostitution, the enforced abortions, the sweat shops, but the Vicar of Christ cannot. It falls to him to remind the world that capitalism may produce great wealth and great opportunities, but it also produces -- when left to its own devices -- great misery and waste and squalor. Capitalism has a troubling affinity for slavery -- why pay for labor when you might get it for free or for next to nothing? -- and just because we now keep our slaves on distant Pacific Islands does not exculpate us.
I am a liberal and I assure you I have no love for the idea of a boot stomping on a human face forever -- nor will I advocate for you or anyone else ever to be dragged off to the Ministry of Love, and neither would any liberal I've ever known. I think sometimes you might check whether these generalizations you use accurately reflect reality, or whether you might be slipping over the rhetorical cliffs.
Teflon93 | 7.14.09 @ 8:08AM
Liberal Reader-
Free markets aren't magic---their primary focus is to link people with money to people with goods. Markets are agnostic as to the intentions of these people or to the moral worth of the goods---markets work whether the goods are television sets or slaves.
So what enables the trade in the one or the other?
The government.
Markets don't steal liberty---government does.
While the Holy Father quite rightly doesn't engage in market worship, liberals---and liberal Catholics in particular---need to rethink their government worship.
No immanentizing the eschaton for we Catholics, right?
But thank you especially for calling attention to the contrast between the invisible hand and the boot stomping on a human face forever---that is precisely what I was going for.
Teflon93 | 7.14.09 @ 6:54PM
It should also be noted relative to Liberal Reader's larger point that conservatives should not have a religious faith in the power of the market to right all wrongs. Slaves were market goods for quite a long time----indeed, the Bible doesn't even forbid the practice---and would persist still on a wider scale had not the Civil War and other social disruptions not put an end to the acceptance of it.
Markets won't immanentize the eschaton either, although they are preferable to government in that subsidiarity is the rule of the free market whereas tyranny is the inevitable aim of government.
Core to Catholic teaching is that one cannot do evil to do good, which is where statist Catholics leave the room.
Patsy Anne| 7.15.09 @ 12:59AM
Liberal Reader professes to be a principled Catholic yet worships at the feet of Obama, a professed baby killer.
Don't lecture us about piety, jerk; your hypocrisy is mind-numbing.
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