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Sourcebook on 
Poverty Development 

and Justice 

UNIVERSITY OR NOT« DAME memorial library 
F E B 1 5 1 9 7 9 

COLLEGE LIBRARY VERTICAL FILE 

©1973 U.S.C.C. O s a c t e d 





SOURCEBOOK ON POVERTY, DEVELOPMENT AND JUSTICE 
Edited by the Education Staff of the 
Campaign for Human Development 

Page 
Introduction 1 
I. Social Justice and Development in the Mission of Christians: 

Scriptural and Doctrinal Foundations, by Frederick J. Perella, Jr., 
Assistant Educational Coordinator, CHD 3 
A. Introduction 3 
B. No Society, Economy or Culture is Sacred 3 
C. Basic Christian Themes 5 

1. Church as Missionary People 5 
2. The Primacy of Service and Love 8 
3. Power and Motivation for Service 9 
4. Poverty. The Primacy of the Poor 10 
5. Renunciation: The Place of Goods 12 
6. The Dignity of Humanity. Freedom and Participation as 

Needs 13 
7. Types of Bondage 17 
8. Christian Mission: Sharing Goods and Building a Just 

Social Order 19 
9. Work for Justice and Liberation 20 

10. An Aside-The Rationale for Christian Involvement 20 
11. The Vision of the Kingdom 21 

D. Cautions 22 
E. Responsibilities 24 

II. The Social Mission of the Church in the United States, by Sister 
Elinor Shea, O.S.U., of the College of New Rochelle, and Frederick 
J. Perella, Jr. 31 
A. Development 33 

1. The Levels of Development 34 
2. Process to Achieve Development 35 
3. Reasons for Failure 36 
4. A Working Definition 41 

B. Liberation 42 
C. Empowerment 45 
D. The Church's Heritage of Service in the United States 56 



III. The Concept of Social Sin, written by Peter J. Henriot, S.J., Staff 
Associate, Center of Concern 63 
A. Social Sin in Light of an Event 63 
B. The Development of Catholic Social Thought 65 
C. The "New" Category of Social Sin 66 
D. Evolution in Our Understanding of Social Sin 69 
E. Latin America: Medellin and Guttierez 71 
F. The Synod's Exposition 73 
G. What is Social Sin? 75 

1. A Structure That Violates and Oppresses Dignity 75 
2. A Situation That Promotes Selfishness 76 
3. Complicity or Silent Acquiescence in Injustice 77 

H. Some Social and Theological Insights 77 
IV. Christianity: A Lifestyle, written by Frederick J. Perella, Jr. . . . . 83 

A. The Spirit and the Virtue of Poverty 86 
B. Community and Simplicity of Lifestyle 88 
C. Christianity as a New Way of Thinking 99 
D. Themes for Discussion Groups 104 

V. Education to Justice, written by Sister Josephine Dunne, S.H.C.J., 
Education Coordinator, CHD 107 
A. Catholic Education as Counter-Cultural 107 
B. The Call to Justice as Part of the Message I l l 
C. Education as Process 115 
D. Education as Curriculum and Institution 116 

1. Transference 119 
2. Reflection 119 
3. Action-living 120 

E. Adult Education and the Community of Faith 122 
F. Practical Steps and Examples 123 

1. Education as Process 123 
2. Education as Accreditation-Curriculum Innovation 124 
3. Education as Institution 125 



INTRODUCTION 
This Sourcebook contains five inter-related essays entitled: 

1. Social Justice and Development in the Mission of 
Christians 

2. Reflections Upon the Social Mission of the Church in 
the United States 

3. Social Sin 
4. Christianity: A Life Style 
5. Education to Justice: Reflections on the 1971 Roman 

Synod Document, Justice in the World 

In publishing the Sourcebook, the Campaign for Human Development 
does not presume to give final answers on these complex topics. Rather, the 
essays are intended to provide resource material to suggest significant 
questions which could be addressed in adult education programs. We have 
attempted here to explore various aspects of the question: What does it 
mean in the United States to be a Christian, carrying out the social mission 
of the Church? 

In a companion reader, Poverty Profile, 1972, which you will receive 
with this booklet, we have first addressed the question of social justice by 
confronting the facts of chronic poverty and inequitable distribution of 
income in our country. In this Sourcebook we hope to explore how those 
facts of poverty relate to our Christian vocation to give life to all people. 

A companion publication entitled Poverty and Justice: An Adult 
Education Handbook, to be published shortly, will provide practical 
techniques, models and thematic development strategies for designing 
education sessions on the topics presented in the Sourcebook. While 
intended as complementary tools, both the Sourcebook and the Handbook 
can be used independently. Comments, requests, and critiqiles can be 
addressed to: 

Campaign for Human Development 
United States Catholic Conference 
1312 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W. 
Washington, D.C. 20005 



Poverty Profile $1.00 (10% discount on order 25 and over) 
Sourcebook on Poverty, Development and Justice, $1.50 (10% discount on 
orders 25 and over) 
Poverty and Justice: An Adult Education Handbook, $2.50 (discount 
applies here also.) 

2 



SOCIAL JUSTICE AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE 
MISSION OF CHRISTIANS: SCRIPTURAL AND 

DOCTRINAL FOUNDATIONS 
FREDERICK J. PERELLA, JR. ASSISTANT EDUCATIONAL 

COORDINATOR, CHD I. INTRODUCTION 
Many Christians have been confused by the growing tendency to 

bring social, economic and political concerns "into the Church"; while 
others are exhausted after spending contributions, taxes, personal effort and 
hopes in ten years of work with mixed results (sometimes it seems, no 
results). They ask: "Is justice in the world possible, is working for justice 
desired by "Christian" society, ought it to be a goal of the Church after 
all?" The movement of Charismatic Renewal has proclaimed, to growing 
agreement, that the proclaiming of the gospel, catechesis and prayer, are 
first necessary before any movement to justice is possible by the People of 
God -- first because true Christian justice can only proceed from a life of 
faith and prayer, and secondly, because failure or inability on the part of 
Christians to accept working for social justice as an integral part of their 
faith indicates that true evangelization and conversion never occurred, or 
was weak. 

Meanwhile the Catholic Church in the United States has created a 
Campaign for Human Development, which announces as its goal the 
development of self-determination and socio-economic power among poor 
people, and the National Conference of Catholic Charities has decided to 
channel efforts and resources to advocacy and social institutional change. 
Do the resurgence of prayer and evangelical activity and the move of social 
arm of the Church into the controversial areas of change, power and 
advocacy stand in opposition to each other? In this chapter, we cannot 
hope to examine completely such a vast question, nor can we presume the 
competence to give a final answer. Our hope is to list briefly some themes of 
our faith and to trace teachings of the Church on social justice in order to 
explore the question: What do the concepts of social justice, development 
and empowerment have to do with Christianity? 
H. NO SOCIETY, ECONOMY OR CULTURE IS SACRED 

What, in our time, does it mean to be a Christian? How does one act 
out his Christianity? What are Christian things to do? Living as a Christian 
may require different forms of action in different times and cultures, 
because life in the Lord is essentially a transcendent reality and it cannot be 
said that actions or practices of one particular culture or time are 
unchanging signs of Christian life. (e.g. cannot be said, as it once was, that 
government through "divine right of Kings" is an eternal, unchanging order 
for society, dictated by God.) In a workshop during the National Congress 
on the Word of God, Father Joseph Komonchok recalled that there is 

3 





throughout the Bible a theme of "desacralization of social and political 
institutions"... The Bible rejects as idolatry any attempt to attribute to 
"specific social or political institutions" an immutable or divine character. 
The prophets continually warned the Jewish people, when their Kingdoms 
grew overconfident of their own power and righteousness and they violated 
the law, to examine their ways and turn back to God. In the same way 
Christians have the continual responsibility to evaluate their own culture, 
society, values and religious practices, in order to stay true to what the 
Holy Spirit may inspire. This does not mean that Christianity is a totally 
spiritual, other-world-oriented faith which deems this world a vale of tears 
and chooses to avoid it as completely as possible. Pope John, in Mater et 
Magistra (No. 5) emphasized that Christianity does occur in time and place 
and, because salvation is won in living, must embody itself in concrete 
actions. Recognizing that conditions, economies and immediate causes of 
things change over time and place, the Christian is faced with the need to 
recall the basic reality of the Church, the teachings of the Lord Jesus, the 
vocation of discipleship-and by applying these to current times and 
life-styles, and by accepting the guidance and power of the Spirit of God, to 
choose forms of action which manifest these themes. In this process, there 
are basic transcendent themes of Christianity which can be examined. 

III. BASIC CHRISTIAN THEMES 
1. Church as a missionary people called to love all men and give life to 

the world. 

The Second Vatican Council described the essential reality of the 
Church, the People of God, in the following passages from its Dogmatic 
Constitution on the Church: 

By an utterly free and mysterious decree of His 
own wisdom and goodness, the eternal Father created the 
whole world. His plan was to dignify them with a 
participation in his own divine life. He did not abandon 
men after they had fallen in Adam, but ceaselessly offered 
them help to salvation, in anticipation of Christ the 
Redeemer . . . He planned to assemble in the Holy Church 
all those who would believe in Christ. Established in the 
present era of time, the Church was made manifest by the 
outpouring of the Spirit. At the end of time she will 
achieve her glorious fulfillment. (No. 2) 

5 



The Son, therefore, came on mission from His 
Father. It was in Him, before the foundation of the world, 
that the Father chose us and predestined us to become 
adopted sons, for in Him it has pleased the Father to 
re-establish all things. (Eph: 1: 4-9 and 10). To carry out 
the will of the Father, Christ inaugurated the kingdom of 
heaven on earth and revealed to us the mystery of the 
Father. By His obedience He brought about redemption. 
The Church, or, in other words, the kingdom of Christ 
now present in mystery, grows visibly in the world 
through the power of God. (No. 3) 

Thus, the Church is meant to be the People of God on earth. Through 
it, the Father has chosen to continually manifest Christ's presence in the 
world. The Father's purpose is to communicate His love for all people and 
all creation, and by dignifying the world with participation in His own 
divine life, to re-establish all things. The kingdom is the work of Jesus, our 
Lord and Savior, and cannot be built without radical total dependence on 
His Spirit, for power and guidance. 

God's design is in fact to communicate Himself (1 John 2: 
1-3) . . . The Father has sanctified the Son and sent Him 
into the world (John 10:36). The Son in His turn has 
sanctified and purified the apostles, and consecrates them 
by sending them to the world. (John 17: 14, 17-19). This 
is the moment of their consecration. (Yves Congar, 
Power and Poverty in the Church, p. 32) 

Thus, being sent into the world, missioned from the Father, is the 
consecration of Christ, His Son; and being sent from Christ as followers, 
disciples, is the consecration of Christians. 

According to Jesus Himself, the "mission" of Christians must be the 
same as His - and Christians cannot accomplish this, except through the 
power of the Spirit. By living as Jesus did, we bear much fruit, and build up 
the kingdom. 

I am the way, the Truth and the Life. No one can come to 
the Father except through Me. If you know Me, you 
know My Father, too. (John 14:6-7) 
I tell you most solemnly, whoever believes in Me will 
perform the same works as I do Myself; he will perform 

6 



even greater works, because I am going to the 
Father . . . If you love Me, you will keep my 
commandments . . . I shall ask the Father, and he will give 
you another Advocate to be with you forever.. . If 
anyone loves Me he will keep My word, and My Father 
will love him, and we shall come to him and make our 
home with him. (John 14: 12; 16-23) 
I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in 
Me, with me in him, bears fruit in plenty; for cut off from 
Me you can do nothing . . . It is to the glory of My Father 
that you should bear much fruit. (John 15: 5,9) 

To do the "works" of Jesus, to live His life, is to find His "way," to become 
"other Christs," to share in the redemptive work and be co-creators of a 
new heaven and a new earth: 

This is My commandment: love one another, as I have 
loved you. A man can have no greater love than to lay 
down his life for his friends. You are my friends, if you do 
what I command you. I shall not call you servants any 
more, because a servant does not know his Master's 
business; I call you friends because I have made known to 
you everything I have learned from My Father. You did 
not choose Me, no I chose you; and I commissioned you 
to go out and bear fruit.. .(John 15: 12-16) 

What Jesus receives from the Father, so we also receive from the Father 
through Jesus, as sharers in His mission. Everyone who considers himself a 
Christian, including the laity, is called to friendship and redemptive mission 
with Jesus Christ. And Christians do not only share His mission as 
individuals, but as a corporate reality ...The People of God. 

It has pleased God, however, to make men holy and save 
them not merely as individuals without any mutual bonds, 
but by making them into a single people, a people which 
acknowledges Him in truth and serves Him in holiness... 
Its goal is the kingdom of God...Established by Christ as a 
fellowship of life, charity, and truth, it is also used by 
Him as an instrument for the redemption of all, and is 
sent forth into the whole world... (Dogmatic Constitution 
on the Church, No. 9.) 

7 



2. The primacy of service and love in giving life. 
The way of the world is quite different and opposed to the Way of 

Jesus Christ, and based upon radically different principles: 
You know that among the pagans their so-called rulers 

lord it over them, and their great men make their 
authority felt. This must not happen among you. No, 
anyone who wants to become great among you must be 
your servant, and anyone who wants to be first among 
you must slave to all. For the Son of Man Himself did not 
come to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a 
ransom for many. (Mark 10:42-45) 

Yves Congar, in Power and Poverty in the Church, summarizes the 
differences between the two very clearly: 

The 'first' man within us longs to dominate, to play the 
Master...Christ came as the 'second Adam,' or rather, as 
St. Paul says, the 'last Adam,'...not a man of domination 
but a man of obedience, giving thanks, a man in 
communion with others or rather complying and 
communing with God in them, a man of God, who is 'all 
in all' (1 Cor. 15"-28).The first Adam has life...He lives,but 
his life constantly wastes away and renews itself by 
devouring, that is, destroying other creatures, appropriating 
them to itself...But normal life, true life, should not be 
sustained by bringing death. Life should come from 
within and communicate life. 'The last Adam is a 
quickening spirit' (1 Cor. 15-45) (p. 28)...The way leading 
to God, who is 'all in all,' leading, that is, to mankind in 
communion, is a state where others are not destroyed to 
sustain life, but where life, coming from God, shines out 
on all men; it is the way of love in humble service... 

The Spirit of possessiveness destroys; agape, love, which is 
poured forth within us by the Holy Spirit, shines forth 
and edifies. (1 Cor. 8:1) (p. 29-30) 

Thus Jesus, the Washer of dirty feet, He who has "emptied himself, taking 
the form of a servant," (Philippians 2:6-11), He who dies on the cross-pours 
His life out in love and service to give life to His fellow mankind. 

8 



I have come that they may have life, and have it to the 
full. (John 10:10) 

Therefore, being a Christian inherently includes giving life in the full 
to fellow humans, through service to them. As Father Avery Dulles, S.J., in 
his introduction to Lumen Gentium (Documents of Vatican II, American 
Press, 1966), states, this is part of the three-fold mission of the Church for 
every Christian, including the laity: martyrion (witness), diakonia 
(ministry), koinonia (fellowship). Each comprises one type of lifegiving, 
interrelated and inherently part of being a Christian. 
3. Power and Motivation for Service - Christ's Love -¡^The Freedom of 

Sons of God. 
The power and motivation to do this comes not from humankind's own 

power, for we are weak and disposed towards self-centered activity from the 
fact of sin. Rather, they come from the freedom given by God's love and 
the fact that He will never neglect us, even at death. This joy, this unmerited 
gift, can only be received from the Lord if we surrender any illusions of 
self-sufficiency or power, and let Jesus be our Lord. Then, freed from fear, 
from the need to save ourselves, we can let go and give life instead of taking 
it: 

This doctrine...is the primacy of God's grace in 
welcoming man in spite of his sinfulness and prior even to 
any effort by men to 'justify' himself before God. It is 
present in Jesus' preaching of the Kingdom of God, which 
comes, not as the work of man and not according to a 
careful balance of reward and punishment, but as the pure 
favor of God, breaking through the narrow world of 
human expectation—For Saint Paul, we do not stand 
confidently before God because we have done the works 
of the Law, but solely because God has loved us in Jesus 
Christ. Our common alienation is overcome by his 
initiative, and with it is also overcome the alienation of 
Jew from Greek, freeman from slave, male from female. 

In Gospel and Epistle, Christian moral striving 
arises in response to the saving initiative of God. Rather 
than the desperate attempt of man to make himself 
acceptable to God, Christian moral concern is the struggle 
of one, accepted despite his unacceptability, to lead a life 
not unworthy of such free graciousness. That is why 

9 



God's mercy and the example of Christ become the norms 
of Christian living,...owing his freedom to the forgiveness 
of God, how can the Christian not forgive?" 

Fr. Komonchok, from "Preaching and 
Social Development," an address 
delivered at the National Congress on 
the Word of God, Concurrent 
Conference on Preaching and Social 
Development. 

God has love us first. Our only response is to be selfless, grateful, to 
love in return, to share the Good News which is the source of our joy 
beyond human expectation: 

We are to love, then, because he loved us first. 
Anyone who says "I love God" and hates his brother, is a 
liar, since a man who does not love the brother he can see 
cannot love God, whom he has not seen. (I John 4:19-20) 

True humility and unpretentiousness are needed, however, before a 
person can fully accept God's love, for acceptance implies admission of 
limitation and creaturehood. From the day of the garden of Eden, this has 
been man's great difficulty. Therefore, God's kingdom is especially directed 
at the poor and unpretentious. 
4. Poverty. The Primacy of the Poor. 

The Lord, and His Church after him, have stated clearly that the poor 
of the earth, the rejected and powerless, are those for whom His ministry is 
especially intended. There seems to be, however, some obscurity in what 
poverty the Lord means. Most certainly, He states that His kingdom is 
meant for unpretentious (people) persons who have no illusion of their own 
centrality to the world, who realize they are creatures and humbly accept 
their nothingness in the absence of a redeeming, dignifying Power. That 
Power is the life of God, grace, the Lord's love. Admitting our essential 
nothingness and limitations brings openness and disposition to the Word and 
Power of God, which alone can save us and humanize the world. This is the 
virtue of poverty of spirit. 

"How happy are the poor in spirit; theirs is the kingdom of heaven." 
(Matthew 5:3) Only the poor in spirit can receive the Power of God, only 
they are humble enough to allow it to enter their lives. 
10 



I tell you solemnly, anyone who does not welcome the 
kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it. 
(Mark 10:15) 

The Lord Jesus repeated frequently that He came to minister to sinners, the 
disenfranchised, those in need of help. By implication, He said His mission is 
not to the "powerful," those who don't think they need help, but to those 
in need. 

listen, my dear brothers: it was those who are poor 
according to the world that God chose, to be rich in faith 
and to be the heirs of the kingdom which He promised to 
those who love Him. (James 2:5-6) 

What is to be given to the "poor?" 
The Spirit of the Lord has been given to me for He has 
anointed me. He has sent me to bring the good news to 
the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and to the blind 
new sight, to set the downtrodden free, to proclaim the 
Lord's year of favor. (Luke 4:18-19) 

liberation, the good news of God's love for humankind. The liberation is: 
freedom from fear because the Lord loves us and we will live forever by His 
power, if we will accept it; and freedom from the Law, because we no 
longer have to try to justify ourselves (prove ourselves worthy) before God 
by living up to the Law. [We could never, on our own weak abilities, fulfill 
the Law anyway.] Only by accepting the love of God in Jesus Christ, can 
we be saved. He loves us in spite of ourselves. But, as St. Paul states 
(Galatians 5), this freedom of the Spirit is not chaos or license to do 
anything we want. Salvation requires a stance of repentance, acceptance, 
allowing the Lord to take us, a life of gratitude. This life can only be lived 
by the Power of the Holy Spirit, at his guidance. There are requirements, 
then — we must live as Jesus lived, as was pointed out before. Here is the 
paradox of poverty — for the Lord lived as a poor man, in order that others 
might be enriched. Christians are called to do the same. 

Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but 
the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. (Matthew 
8:18) 

11 



If you wish to be perfect, go and sell what you own and 
give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in 
heaven; then come, follow Me. (Matthew 19: 21-22) 

5. Renunciation: The Place of Goods. 
In the Sermon on the Mount, Christ referred to the sharing of the 

goods of this world — if a man ask for your cloak, give him your tunic as 
well. Thus, the good things of life are to be shared, not hoarded. The 
function of koinonia (fellowship) is the sharing of ourselves, our time, our 
personal care and attention. The function of diakonia (service) is the sharing 
of our goods, our resources. The function of martyrion (witness) is the 
sharing of our faith, the Word in us. These are the good things, and Jesus 
call us to share them all. 

The Church has always taught that the world is given to all men for 
their development and use: 

God intended the earth and all that it contains for the use 
of every human being and people. Thus, as all men follow 
justice and unite in charity, created goods should abound 
for them on a reasonable basis...In using them, therefore, 
a man should regard his lawful possessions not merely as 
his own but also as common property in the sense that 
they should accrue to the benefit of not only himself but 
of others. (Constitution on the Church in the Modem 
World, No. 69) 

Things, the goods of this earth, insight — these are gifts of God, meant to 
enable man to create and ennoble himself, serving as manifestations of 
God's love for humankind. The divesting of goods which the Lord required 
of His followers is therefore a two-fold act: the act of setting one's heart on 
God, His love and power, as the primary dignity to which man is called, 
requires people not to place their trust and treasure in goods, in material 
security, but to place these things in perspective. Their use is to give all 
people the stuff with which to be co-creators of a redeemed world. 
Secondly, the use of goods to give sustenance to the poor is a way of 
witnessing God's love through our concern for other persons and their 
needs. It frees them from want, suffering, and dependency, and becomes a 
fruit of God's love working through His people. In short, the poverty of 
spirit of more affluent Christians, choosing the Lord for their lot and 
putting worldly goods and power into perspective — as means to God, as 
gifts to be used for all — this very virtue of poverty becomes the key to 
enrich and liberate and love the poor of the world. In this way, the world is 
12 



humanized, created goods can abound for all, God's love is manifested and 
men are liberated in history, from fear of judgment (by God's love), from 
fear of death (Christ's resurrection), and from fear and bondage of poverty 
and oppression. Christians, by their model, should invite the world to a 
meaningful use and evaluation of goods and power. (Security does not come 
from these things - but they can be signs of and fruits of the Lord's love.) 
Christians do not see things as equivalent to the Lord's love - but as a fruit 
of His creative love, fulfilled. Thus, Christians, if they share goods, are not 
inviting the poor to materialism, but to a minimum degree of freedom, 
which if fulfilled by faith, can lift men to full human life. It is freedom that 
can issue from God's love - in spirit and in the world In sharing, Christians 
love God as well, because the Lord made it clear that He identifies with the 
poor and unpretentious: 

Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty, sick or in 
prison, and did not come to your help? Then He will 
answer, "I tell you, most solemnly, in so far as you 
neglected to do this to one of the least of these, you 
neglected to do it to me. (Matthew 25:44-46) 

Christ's commandments are a unity - love the Lord with one's whole self -
love one's neighbor as onself. They cannot be separated (1 John 4:21). If 
Christians follow the Lord in this way, liberation in fact from fear and want 
occurs in time and place. So the Church has taught, from the beginning: 

If a man who was rich enough in this world's goods saw 
that one of his brothers was in need, but closed his heart 
to him, how could the love of God be living in him? (1 
John 3:17) 

6. The Dignity of Humanity - Freedom, Participation as Needs for 
Human Development. 
Man was created in the "image and likeness of God," is capable of 

knowing and loving His creator and fellow man, and was appointed by God 
as master over all earthly creations that he might subdue them and use them 
to God's glory. (Gaudium et Spes, No. 12). Moreover, the glory of man is 
his mind, soul, ability to seek and recognize truth, to gain wisdom, to create 
meaning and order, to choose and thus shape his own destiny. It is to this 
end that freedom of mind and choice are crucial. They are manifestations of 
God's love and respect for man - they are also fruits of his creative and 
redemptive work. And the result of Christians living in the world should be 

13 



that this freedom, and reverence for the dignity of a man is extended to all 
men as a manifestation of and means toward God's Kingdom. 

Full human development is both the call and responsibility of a human 
being: 

In the design of God, every man is called upon to 
develop and fulfill himself, for every life is a vocation. At 
birth, everyone is granted, in germ, a set of aptitudes and 
qualities for him to bring to fruition. Their coming to 
maturity, which will be the result of education received 
from the environment and personal efforts, will allow 
each man to direct himself toward the destiny intended 
for him by his Creator. Endowed with intelligence and 
freedom he is responsible for his fulfilment as he is for his 
salvation. 

However, this self-fulfillment is not something 
optional. Just as the whole of creation is ordained to its 
Creator, so spiritual beings should of their own accord 
orientate their lives to God, the first truth and the 
supreme good...But each man is a member of society. He 
is part of the whole of mankind. It is not just certain 
individuals, but all men who are called to this fullness of 
development. (Development of Peoples, Pope Paul VI, 
Nos. 15, 16 and 17.) 

Pope Paul VI described the characteristics of a more humanized world (and 
thus, more divine) in this way: 

If further development calls for the work of 
more and more technicians, even more necessary is the 
deep thought and reflection of wise men in search of a 
new humanism which will enable modern man to find 
himself anew by embracing the higher values of love and 
friendship, of prayer and contemplation. This is what will 
permit the fullness of authentic development, a 
development which is for each and all the transition from 
less human conditions to those which are more human. 

Less human conditions: the lack of material 
necessities for those who are without the minimum 
essential for life, the moral deficiencies of those who are 

14 



mutilated by selfishness. Less human conditions: 
oppressive social structures, whether due to the abuses of 
ownership or to the abuses of power, to the exploitation 
of workers or to unjust transactions. Conditions that are 
more human: the passage from misery towards the 
possession of necessities, victory over social scourges, the 
growth of knowledge, the acquisition of culture. 
Additional conditions that are more human: increased 
esteem for the dignity of others, the turning toward the 
spirit of poverty, cooperation for the common good, the 
will and desire for peace. Conditions that are still more 
human: the acknowledgement by man of supreme values, 
and of God their source and their finality. Conditions 
that, finally and above all, are more human: faith, a gift of 
God accepted by the good will of man, and unity in the 
charity of Christ, Who calls us all to share as sons in the 
life of the living God, the Father of all men. 
(Development of Peoples, Pope Paul VI, Nos. 20-21.) 

These condition's cannot be seen necessarily as sequential stages 
through which one must pass to find the Lord. Rather, they are parts of a 
whole vision, which is a world of justice. In the Old Testament, justice 
constituted the existence of desired relationships among people, and 
between people and God. A just man lives in harmony, in ordered 
relationships, with God (humility, thanksgiving, worship, praise) and with 
fellowmen (sharing the goods of this earth, reverence, respect, peace, love.) 

From his revelation we can understand why God 
hates injustice. He calls us to live in a harmonious 
community... Cruelty, violence, preying on one another 
destroys this harmony... (Justice: God's Vision, Man's 
Discipleship - Pastoral letter of Bishop Carroll Dozier, 
Memphis, Christmas 1972.) 

Freedom is the proper environment in which humanization can occure. 
It is both a means and an end, therefore, a characteristic and a goal of the 
mission of the people of God. 

The heritage of this people (messianic people) are 
the dignity and freedom of the sons of God, in whose 
hearts the Holy Spirit dwells as in His temple. Its law is 
the new commandment to love as Christ loved us (cf. Jn. 
13:34). (The Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, No. 
9.) 15 



Only in freedom can man direct himself toward 
goodness. Our contemporaries make much of this freedom 
and pursue it eagerly, and rightly so, to be sure. Often, 
however, they foster it perversely as a license for doing 
whatever pleases them, even if it is evil. 

For its part, authentic freedom is an exceptional 
sign of the divine image within man. For God has willed 
that man be left "in the hand of his own counsel" (Sirach 
15:14) so that he can seek his Creator spontaneously, and 
come freely to utter and blissful perfection through 
loyalty to Him. Hence, man's dignity demands that he act 
according to knowing and free choice. Such a choice is 
personally motivated and prompted from within. It does 
not result from blind internal impulse nor from here 
external pressure. (The Constitution on the Church in the 
Modern World, No. 17.) 

Freedom can be abused, but not if kept in the context of justice, 
harmonious relationships voluntarily ordered by God's Spirit of Love: 

Man achieves such dignity when, emancipating himself 
from all captivity to passion, he pursues his goal in a 
spontaneous choice of what is good, and procures for 
himself, through effective and skillful action, apt means to 
that end. Since man's freedom has been damaged by sin, 
only by the help of God's grace can he bring such a 
relationship with God to full flower. (The Constitution on 
the Church in the Modem World, No. 17.) 

Freedom, love, peace unity, sharing — these are characteristics of the 
kingdom of God. Full human growth is a part of the fulfillment of 
redemption, then, since the true human image is a reflection of God. The 
Lord's goal is to give full life, to help us truly be human, to be free because 
our life line is His love and His will - the freedom of the sons of God. It 
follows then that "whatever dehumanizes people diminishes and acts against 
the image of God, the fulfillment of the Kingdom. Whatever frees man — 
'liberates' him — for further self-development and self-fulfillment by that 
fact also furthers the creative work of God and the visibility of His image in 
the world." (Komonchok, p. 7) 

16 



7. Types of Bondage 
There are many types of bondage, internal and external, personal and 

social: the bondages of sin, pride, fear, death - these the love of Christ can 
break; the bondage of egoistic attempts at self-sufficiency or the fear to lose 
the false security of excessive goods - these can be loosed by a more 
realistic concept of life and a more human, sharing-oriented economy and 
society, which works towards community and the common good. Then, 
there are the bonds of poverty and oppression, often created for others 
because the rich and powerful are caught in the bonds mentioned above: 

Now a man can scarcely arrive at the needed sense of 
responsibility unless his living conditions allow him to 
become conscious of his dignity, and to rise to his destiny 
by spending himself for God and for others. But human 
freedom is often crippled when a man falls into extreme 
poverty, just as it withers when he indulges in too many 
of life's comforts and imprisons himself in a kind of 
splendid isolation. Freedom acquires new strength, by 
contrast, when a man consents to the unavoidable 
requirements of social life, takes on the manifold demands 
of human partnership and commits himself to the service 
of the human community. (The Constitution on the 
Church in the Modern World, No. 33.) 

In this vein, Pope John had stated earlier: 
Beginning our discussion of the rights of man, we 

see that every man has the right to life, to bodily integrity 
and to the means which are necessary and suitable for the 
proper development of life... (Pacem in Terris, No. 9) 

Included in Church social teaching is the desirability of self-help, 
freedom of choice, the deciding upon one's own destiny, taking life into 
one's own hands, as much as possible and on a relatively equal basis with 
all others in society. In addition to poverty and greed, Pope John considered 
oppressive governments or societal conditions to be unjust limits to freedom 
and dignity: 

The dignity of the human person also requires 
that every man enjoy the right to act freely and 
responsibly. For this reason, therefore, in social relations 
man should exercise his rights, fulfill his obligations and, 

17 



in the countless forms of collaboration with others, act 
chiefly on his own responsibility and initiative. This is to 
be done...without being moved by force or pressure 
brought to bear on him externally. (Pacem in Terris, No. 
34) 

8. Christian Mission: To Share Goods and Build a Just Social Order. 
The Council reaffirmed John's emphasis upon the rights of political 

involvement and self-determination, and, as quoted above, saw poverty and 
want as other chains limiting freedom of choice and action. The Council 
constantly stressed that Christians are responsible for promoting conditions 
which foster the "Common good" (Constitution on the Church in the 
Modern World, Nos. 26, 31); saw a reasonable minimum of physical goods 
as pre-conditions or means to social participation, freedom and the 
opportunity to participate as co-creators; and saw social participation and 
shared decision-making as basic situations for the opportunity for dignity 
and freedom to be achieved. All of these goals are part of the Christian 
social mission: 

For the rest, the right to have a share of earthly 
goods sufficient for oneself and one's family belongs to 
everyone. The Fathers and Doctors of the Church held 
this view, teaching that men are obliged to come to the 
relief of the poor, and to do so not merely out of their 
superfluous goods. If a person is in extreme necessity, he 
has the right to take from the riches of others what he 
himself needs. Since there are so many people in this 
world afflicted with hunger, this sacred Council urges all, 
both individuals and governments, to remember the saying 
of the Fathers: "Feed the man dying of hunger, because if 
you have not fed him you have killed him. According to 
their ability, let all individuals and governments undertake 
a genuine sharing of their goods. Let them use these goods 
especially to provide individuals and nations with the 
means for helping and developing themselves. (Emphasis 
ours.) (Constitution on the Church in the Modem World, 
No. 69.) 

This responsibility applies to affluent and poor Christians alike. Referring to 
economic development programs, Pope Paul spoke of the principle of 
self-help and self-determination in his "Development of Peoples": 

18 



Such programs should reduce inequalities, fight 
discriminations, free man from various types of servitude 
and enable him to be the instrument of his own material 
betterment, of his moral progress and of his spiritual 
growth. To speak of development is in effect to show as 
much concern for social progress as for economic growth. 
(Development of Peoples, No. 45) 

Speaking of international development programs, Pope Paul stated that 
the goal must be to "discover the ways that will allow peoples which are still 
underdeveloped to break through the barriers which seem to enclose them 
and to discover for themselves, in full fidelity to their own proper genius, 
the means for their social and human progress" (No. 64), so that all peoples 
can become "artisans of their own destiny." (No. 65) The Roman Synod of 
bishops stated in their Justice in the World'. 

...we have nevertheless been able to perceive the 
serious injustices which are building around the world of 
men a network of domination, oppression, and abuses 
which stifle freedom and which keep the greater part of 
humanity from sharing in the building up and enjoyment 
of a more just and more fraternal world. (Introduction) 

...it is impossible to conceive true progress 
without recognizing the necessity — within the political 
system chosen — of a development composed of both 
economic growth and participation; and the necessity too 
of an increase in wealth implying as well social progress by 
the entire community as it overcomes regional imbalance 
and islands of prosperity. Participation constitutes a right 
which is to be applied both in the economic and in the 
social and political field. (Section I) 

The Church has clearly affirmed the values of self-help, personal 
decision-making and shared social decision-making as means to personal 
human development and as signs of basic fulfillment having begun. A 
Christian has the duty and the right to all of this, and the responsibility to 
assist others in doing these things, so that human development of the whole 
and the common good may be pursued, and human community be built up. 
Every person and group has a right before God to the goods and social 
conditions needed for them to be free and to live in dignity, in order that 
they be responsible agents in their own lives and full participants in 
extending these conditions to others. In this way, harmony and justice are 

19 



achieved. Provision of needs, participation and respect are therefore 
conceived of as signs of and means to freedom. The Lord Jesus constantly 
went about healing, providing, forgiving, proclaiming liberty to all kinds of 
captives. Freedom is man's vocation, the path to human development. In 
this context, then, any true program of "development" must lead to 
freedom, liberation from bondage of all kinds. The existence of such 
liberation as a fact issues in harmony - the condition of justice, as 
mentioned above. 

9. Work for Justice (Harmony) and Liberation - A Requirement of Being 
a Christian. 
The Roman Synod of Bishops emphatically stated that "action on 

behalf of justice and participation in the transformation of the world fully 
appear to us as a constitutive dimension of the preaching of the Gospel, or, 
in other words, of the Church's mission for the redemption of the human 
race and its liberation from every oppressive situation" (Introduction, 
"Justice in the World"). Moreover, "Christian love of neighbor and justice 
cannot be separated. For love implies an absolute demand for justice, 
namely, a recognition of the dignity and rights of one's neighbor." (Part II, 
Justice in the World ). 
10. An Aside r- The Rationale for Christian Involvement in Social Change. 

The position reached by the bishops of the Church and the Pope in his 
teachings are based upon growing understanding of how human 
development occurs. The study of history and social science's examination 
of the effect of environment (social, physical, technological) on the 
personality have revealed that certain needs, certain experiences and certain 
social conditions profoundly affect human freedom and how people feel 
about themselves. The Church has recognized this, as revealed above in 
quotations from the teachings of Vatican II. The Synod of bishops in Rome 
developed this concept further, in speaking of social conditions, economic 
arrangements and the status of political power, which do not liberate 
people. 

...new divisions are being born to separate man 
from his neighbor. Unless combatted and overcome by 
social and political action, the influence of the new 
industrial and technological order favors the 
concentration of wealth, power and decision-making in 
the hands of a small public or private controlling group. 

20 



Economic injustice and lack of social participation keep a 
man from attaining his basic human and civil rights 
(Justice in the World, I). 

This desire, however (for self-development) will 
not satisfy the expectations of our time if it ignores the 
objective obstacles which social structures place in the 
way of conversion of hearts, or even of the realization of 
the ideal of charity. It demands on the contrary that the 
general condition of being marginal in society be 
overcome, so that an end will be put to the systematic 
barriers and vicious circles which oppose the collective 
advance towards enjoyment of adequate remuneration of 
the factors of production, and which strengthen the 
situation of discrimination with regard to opportunities 
and collective services from which a great part of the 
people are now excluded. (I) 

For these types of reasons and analysis, the bishops exhorted Christians and 
all men to work, both as individuals, in their work and voluntary activity, 
and in associations for improvement of the social order in each society, 
with regards to rights, economic and social-political participation. Christians 
have been called to participate in political affairs (Call To Action of Pope 
Paul) and to share, not only their superfluous wealth but any surplus of 
goods and wealth which exceeds their reasonable needs for human 
development. 

This social order requires constant improvement. 
It must be founded on truth, built on justice and 
animated by love, in freedom it should grow every day 
toward a more human balance. An improvement in 
attitudes and widespread changes in society will have to 
take place if these objectives are to be gained. 
(Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, No. 
26.) 

11. The Vision of the Kingdom. 
In healing, forgiving and providing needs, the Lord Jesus lived out what 

He also came to announce: "The Kingdom of God is at hand." (Matthew 
4:17) In so far as we, followers of the Lord, do these things, the kingdom is 
proclaimed by us also. The Second Vatican Council described this theme 
and outlined some precautions: 

21 



We do not know the time for the consummation of the 
earth and of humanity. (Constitution on the Church in 
the Modern World, No. 39.) 

The Kingdom won't be finally realized until the end of the ages, when 
Christ will reestablish all things, making a new heaven and a new earth. As 
such, the kingdom vision is "eschatological," it is a vision of the future, and 
it serves as model or standard by which our contemporary society can and 
must be judged. Pope Paul spoke of the value of Utopian visions for society 
in this regard. 

Nevertheless, the Christian faith holds that the kingdom is happening, 
mysteriously, in history, as was pointed out earlier in a quotation from the 
Constitution on the Church. Therefore, the eschatological nature of the 
kingdom should not persuade Christians that affairs of the world are totally 
below and outside of being a Christian: 

...The expectation of a new earth and a new 
heaven must not weaken but rather stimulate our concern 
for cultivating this one. For here grows the body of a new 
human family, a body which even now is able to give 
some foreshadowing of the new age. (Constitution on the 
Church in the Modern World, No. 39.) 

IV. CAUTIONS. 
There are necessary cautions to be taken, however. For one thing, 

earthly progress in itself must be distinguished from the growth of Christ's 
kingdom. (Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, No. 39) It 
cannot be assumed that the "Successful" or powerful or affluent are the 
best Christians, or that the poor do not share in the responsibilities. Material 
good is part of the vision, but the Christian is called first to loyalty and love 
of the Lord, and His will. Thus, it can be a mistake to consider wealth or 
other goods as categorical signs of the Lord's favor - He is just as likely to 
require suffering and poverty of some people in some times. The crux is -
the kingdom is a mystery and defined by the Lord's will, not man's. Thus, it 
can never be said, as was pointed out above, that any one form, system, 
culture or state is commensurate with the Lord's will. This means Christians 
must "avoid...speaking as if the kingdom will come by our effort, ignoring 
the transcendent and eschatological character of God's final act." 
(Komonchok, p. 10) "The kingdom is brought about not by man, but by 
God, and its character and coming often run counter to human 
expectation." (Komonchok, p. 9) The Lord's Kingdom, in its basic 
22 



principles, as seen above, is truly other than of this world. Christ, our King, 
after all, was lifted up to this kingdom by being crucified. Thus, 
Komonchok concludes, "His redemptive acts in the past have often enough 
been the contradictions of human anticipation for us to be able to avoid 
assuming the shape in which the full kingdom will come. Nor is it necessary 
for us to know it; it is enough for us to know our responsibilities for the 
development of genuine human community." (p. 10-11). We would add, in 
addition to those themes outlined above, that the need for prayer, trust in 
the Spirit, group effort, openness and respect for divergent opinions, and 
understanding are paramount. These all point to the essential quality of 
poverty of spirit which must be the central characteristic of the kingdom. 

Secondly, the fact that social freedom and satisfaction of basic human 
needs further human growth and present an environment of freedom does 
not mean that interior spiritual freedom or human growth cannot or does 
not occur among poor or oppressed people. One cannot conclude that to be 
affluent is to be free and happy, to be poor is to be chained and miserable. 
Poor people and cultures where poverty exists in great numbers often 
manifest much deeper human freedom and values of community, sharing, 
and trust than do affluent persons or societies. In fact, the action of the 
Holy Spirit in liberating persons spiritually often occurs within suffering or 
poverty, and cannot be said to be caused by satisfaction of needs or social 
power. What this means is that the action of God must be seen as 
unpredictable and uncontrollable by man, and that spiritual reality can 
overcome social-environmental reality. Nevertheless, this witness of 
increasing the possibilities for human growth is called for by Jesus and His 
Church from all Christians. And respect for more human cultural values and 
differences amidst change is especially necessary for those who would 
extend assistance. Christians are called to help each other be their best 
selves, not to make other people and cultures exactly like they are. Thus 
self-development entails the freedom to pick and choose among resources, 
values and techniques by the poor, so that they can develop themselves 
according to their own needs and priorities. 

Third, many Christians sincerely feel a problem exists in giving goods or 
encouraging the downtrodden to take destiny into their hands (i.e. to take 
power in their own affairs). People may be attracted to a materialistic 
way of life. It is felt that by emphasizing social conditions of more general 
distribution of wealth, and by seeing in goods and self-determination the 
social environment for better human development, that well-meaning 
Christians may actually be de-emphasizing the virtue of poverty, accepting 
an exaggerated "this-world" concept of the Kingdom (which, as seen above, 
can be a mistake) and inviting the poor to imitate the secular example of 

23 



materialism and secular power. Undoubtedly this represents risk when 
Christians share or possess resources with which people can take their 
destiny into their own hands (which implies that they will then decide how 
best to utilize their resources and talents instead of continuing as passive 
dependents and recipients of goods). There always remains the possibility 
that, if successful, newly liberated peoples will imitate the values and 
models of the secular materialistic society in which they have not shared, 
i.e. "making it." While understandable, this result may not be desirable if 
those values and ways of living contain the seeds of avarice or neglect of the 
good of the community. Yet there is no way the Church can impose or 
guarantee that those touched by its service will respond with similar 
activity. The best and most effective way is probably for the Church to be 
a living example of what can be. Christians, spiritually full and alive in the 
Lord, can be communities of concern and voluntary sharing - living the 
virtue of poverty and respect for life. This is, in fact, what the Lord Himself 
did, and to pour out one's love and resources to give life, without requiring 
a return, seems to be an action of hope and faith. We do not suggest that 
foolish irresponsible uses of resources, or actions which are contrary to 
Christian values, should be supported knowingly, but that Christians who 
give of their selves in order to bring Christ have to accept the possibility that 
others may not receive the Christ along with resources and support. It is 
ultimately a choice that those benefitted are free to make, and this freedom 
is part of the gift of God, as Vatican Council II stated: 

Christ is our Master and Lord. He is also meek 
and humble of heart and in attracting and inviting His 
disciples, He acted patiently...His intention was to rouse 
faith in His hearers and to confirm them in faith, not to 
exert coercion upon them...He preferred to call Himself 
the Son of Man, who came 'to serve and to give His life as 
a ransom for many.' (Declaration on Religious Freedom, 
No. 11 Documents of Vatican II). 

V. RESPONSIBILITIES 
1. Personal Lifestyle. Therefore, freedom and resources and personal 

or community power are risky, but so is all human freedom. If affluent or 
middle class Christians live an example of dominance and worldly power 
(which consumes), they invite the downtrodden to imitate it and guarantee 
false development. But if Christians, in divesting themselves, set an example 
of community, sharing, reverence for life, wisdom with humility — then 
they invite the oppressed in their freedom and ability to choose (which is a 
power) to join in building the Kingdom. Liberation then becomes a fruit of 
24 



love and an invitation to Christ. The 1971 Roman Synod addressed this, 
calling for the establishment of justice and an examination of conscience 
among Christians: 

The present situation of the world seen in the 
light of faith, calls us back to the very essence of the 
Christian message, creating in us a deep awareness of its 
true meaning and of its urgent demands. The mission of 
preaching the Gospel dictates at the present time that we 
dedicate ourselves to the liberation of man even in his 
present existence in this world. For unless the Christian 
message of love and justice shows its effectiveness through 
action in the cause of justice in the world, it will only 
with difficulty gain credibility with the men of our 
times. (Justice in the World, II) 

...While the Church is bound to give witness to justice, she 
recognizes that anyone who ventures to speak to people 
about justice must first be just in their eyes. Hence we 
must undertake an examination of the modes of acting 
and of the possessions and life style found within the 
Church herself... (Justice in the World, III) 
...The life style of all: bishops, priests, religious and lay 
people. (Justice in the World, III) 

This subject is taken up in the chapter on Christian Lifestyle in this booklet. 
The Christian is called to work for the alleviation of conditions of 

bondage in the social order. There are many ways, of course, to do this, and 
many types of bondage. With respect to unjust social conditions and 
poverty, Christian responsibility includes the following, in summary: 

2. Work for change as well as to agree with the need for it. (Justice 
in the World, Introduction) 

3. Share goods, not only from superfluous wealth, but to give when 
there is need from goods in excess of moderate, reasonable need. 

4. Private property and decision-making power are not to be hoarded 
or kept for exclusive use. The common good is a prior duty and 
principle..."private property does not constitute for anyone an 
absolute and unconditional right. No one is justified in keeping for 

25 



his exclusive use what he does not need, when others lack 
necessities." (Development of Peoples, No, 23) 
"Economic development must be kept under the control of 
mankind. It must not be left to the sole judgment of a few men or 
groups, possessing excessive economic power, or of the political 
community alone, or of certain, especially powerful nations. It is 
proper, on the contrary, that at every level the largest possible 
number of people have an active share in directing that 
development." (Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, 
No. 65) 
Respect and support the diversity of cultural values, heritages, 
ways. Each part of the human family has its own personality, 
history and wisdom to give to human life. Where cultural values are 
wholesome and add to the humanization of the world, they build 
up the kingdom in their richness. "Rightly therefore, it (a culture) 
demands respect and enjoys a certain inviolability, at least as long 
as the rights of the individual and of the community...are preserved 
within the context of the common good." "Culture has the need of 
exercising its independence according to its own principles." (Both 
from the Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, No. 
59). The duty to facilitate individuals and groups in taking their 
destinies into their own hands also applies here, to allowing 
different groups to select ways and expressions which best suit 
their own culture, according to their own needs and priorities. 
Thus, it is possible that some inappropriate or dehumanizing 
aspects of western materialist industrial culture may be rejected by 
the poor, by minority groups or Third World nations in favor of 
new ways closer to their own heritage. 

Even when sharing resources or funding, Christian people of one 
race or culture or "developed" nation should not impose their 
cultural ways, values or methods upon those being assisted. This is 
"cultural imperialism" as the Third World and many minority 
leaders view it, and assumes that the poor and minority cultures 
have nothing to contribute to their own growth. Such an attitude 
consti tutes an insult, a superior attitude, actually and 
psychologically maintains the poor or minority group in • a 
dependent position, and places conditions upon the giving of life, 
instead of facilitating self-development and self-determination. 
What many well-intentioned middle or upper class whites have not 
understood is the need for minority groups to develop new models 
in their own way, combining "white man's" models with their own 



culture in ways that seem best to the "minority" people 
themselves. The values and underlying assumptions of the white, 
western, industrial culture may neither permit minority peoples to 
develop nor in some cases even be adequate for a true humanistic 
view of life among the "developed." In this sharing process, "white 
society" is learning much from so-called "minority" cultures, and, 
as Paulo Freire has suggested in Pedagogy of the Oppressed, the 
"oppressed" can become saviors of the "oppressor" by sharing a 
more humanized, community-oriented value system. Exchange 
must occur in building the human community. In short, every 
nation and people has a right to be different, and a right to expect 
support in being different from others. Every nation and people 
has a duty to collaborate through dialogue in working for the 
common good. 

6. Respect and support the self-determining choices and ideas of the 
poor and minorities for how to use resources in meeting their own 
needs and developing their own community. They have the 
primary right to and responsibility to make decisions and choose 
the paths for responsible development themselves. Other people are 
responsible for providing resources to be able to make and effect 
these choices if the resources are not available, and to work for a 
humanized social order in which all persons and cultures can 
participate justly in the economic and social systems. 

7. More than an individualistic ethic is required. 
Profound and rapid changes make it particularly 
urgent that no one, ignoring the trend of events or 
drugged by laziness, content himself with a merely 
individualistic morality. It grows increasingly true 
that the obligations of justice and love are fulfilled 
only if each person, contributing to the common 
good, according to his own abilities and the needs of 
others, also promotes and assists the public and 
private institutions dedicated to bettering the 
conditions of human life. (Constitution on the Church 
in the Modern World, No. 30) 
We are aware now that we are "our brother's 
guardian" and that his welfare is our responsibility. A 
"merely individualistic morality," wherein we see sin 
and virtue only in our individual thoughts, words and 
deeds, is no longer sufficient to tackle the problems 

27 



of injustice in our society. It has taken us too long to 
learn the lesson of the Good Samaritan. (Bishop 
Carroll Dozier, Justice: God's Vision, Man's 
Discipleship.) 

Organized programs with large social cooperation and planning are 
necessary. 

We must build social structures that accomplish true 
justice. In these new structures man would be able to 
exercise God-given rights as a sacred person...We are 
to help create a free-flowing society where man can 
grow and act without undue restraint. True justice 
helps preserve the rights of people to live and move 
and have their being in the dignity that is rightfully 
theirs as children of God, members of His household. 
(Bishop Carroll Dozier, Justice: God's Vision, Man's 
Discipleship.) 

In order to approach such tasks, efforts by Christian people will 
have to be pervasive, large in scale and well-organized. Both 
widespread, individual action (examining one's values, lifestyle, 
personal work and economic values) and organized programs will 
be necessary. Neither individual actions nor formal organizational 
activity are sufficient alone, for the changes needed are of such 
complexity and scope as to make necessary both institutional and 
personal efforts which complement each other. 

Individual initiative alone and the mere free play or 
competit ion could never assure successful 
development. One must avoid the risk of increasing 
still more the wealth of the rich and the dominion of 
the strong, whilst leaving the poor in their misery and 
adding to the servitude of the oppressed. Hence 
programs are necessary in order "to encourage, 
stimulate, coordinate, supplement and integrate" the 
activity of individuals and of intermediary bodies . . . 
In order to be fully effective, these efforts ought not 
remain scattered or isolated, much less be in 
competition for reasons of power or prestige: the 
present situation calls for concerted planning. A 
planned program is of course better and more 



effective than occasional aid left to individual 
goodwill. It presupposes, as we said above, careful 
study, the selection of ends and the choice of means, 
as well as a reorganization of efforts to meet the 
needs of the present and the demands of the 
foreseeable future. (Pope Paul VI, Development of 
Peoples, Nos. 33, 50.) 

This principle is hardly a new one in Catholic social thought in the 
United States. Bishop Karl Alter, then Bishop of Toledo and 
subsequently of Cincinnati, and former chairman of the Social 
Action Department, National Catholic Welfare Conference, wrote 
twenty-five years ago: 

It (Catholic Social Action) concerns itself not so 
much with the life of the individual but rather with 
the life of the society. It is interested in the problems 
of social organization and social institutions. It seeks 
to imprint Christian principles on the whole social 
fabric, but it is particularly interested in social 
legislation and social policy and social systems. 
(Introduction to Catholic Social Action, by Rev. 
John F. Cronin, S.S., Bruce Co., Milwaukee, 1948.) 

and Father Cronin himself wrote: 
Social justice imposes the obligation of group action 
to reform the framework and institutions of society 
so that the common good will best be served. 
(Emphasis Father Cronin's) (Catholic Social Action, 
p. 70.) 

Christians are called to give life to all people, not only fellow 
Christians. The Christian people are sent into the whole world, the 
witness to Christ, to love and serve all people, whether they share 
the faith or not. For Christ loves all people, and has brought 
dignity to all. Christians, therefore, cannot restrict their services to 
"taking care of our own." This does not mean that persons or 
programs or nations, who seek programs which are not for the 
common good or which contradict the teachings of the Lord, and 
His Church, have also the right to agreement and support by 
Christians. As was stated above, all people have a duty to seek God, 
fulfill themselves and work for the building of a fully human 
world. 



The joys and hopes, the griefs and the anxieties of the 
men of this age, especially those who are poor or in 
any way afflicted, these too are the joys and hopes, 
the griefs and anxieties of the followers of Christ. 
Indeed, nothing genuinely human fails to raise an 
echo in their hearts. For theirs is a community 
composed of men. United in Christ, they are led by 
the Holy Spirit in their journey to the Kingdom of 
their Father and they have welcomed the news of 
salvation which is meant for every man. (Constitution 
on the Church in the Modern World, No. 1.) 

Jesus expanded the idea of "neighbor" beyond the boundaries of 
one's own people, even including that His followers should love 
one's enemies and do good to those who persecute them. 

Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News 
to all creation. (Mark 16:16) 

\ 

30 



THE SOCIAL MISSION OF THE CHURCH 
IN THE UNITED STATES 

SISTER ELINOR SHEA, OSU FREDERICK J. PERELLA, JR. 
COLLEGE OF NEW ROCHELLE and ASSISTANT EDUCATIONAL COORDINATOR, CHD 

There are two features of the Campaign for Human Development 
which give it a uniqueness in the history of the American Church's 
involvement in social concerns, and also make it in some sense a prediction 
of the future of many programs. 

1. The Campaign for Human Development is set up to work 
for justice by supporting programs of poor peoples' 
organizations which are designed to cause social change. 
In pursuing justice the Campaign acts as a resource for 
presently dependent persons to collectivize their energies 
and thereby become decision-makers in their own affairs. 

2. The success of the program is dependent upon its ability 
to educate those persons with power concerning the social 
injustices which oppress groups of powerless people in 
America. It depends for its support upon the 
contr ibut ions of white, middle-class and affluent 
Catholics, and must, for its ultimate success, strive to 
bring this group into a new relationship with those who 
will receive the funds thus contributed. In other words, 
success cannot be measured solely in terms of how much 
money is collected and distributed, but in what kinds of 
attitudes and relationships are developed between givers 
and receivers. If the program is to effect social change in a 
fundamental way by dealing with causes, an attitudinal 
change becomes essential for a true transformation of 
society. 

Adapted from "World Justice and Peace and 
American Catholics," James R. Jennings, 
Catholic Mind, January 1973. 

In the world of today, so commonly described as "shrinking" or 
evolving into one community of mankind, no effort to deal with domestic 
poverty which has the scope and intent of the Campaign for Human 
Development can be viewed in isolation from the fact of international 
poverty. Nor can any attempt to understand and eliminate poverty in the 
United States act in ignorance of or in competition with the mission of 
Christians in promoting international justice. Precisely the same issues which 
are involved in the Campaign are present on a much greater scale in the 
international quest for development. And the evolution of a theology of 
liberation, arising particularly in Latin America, affords a Christian concept 

31 





for understanding what is being formulated as part of the vocation of the 
Christian Church. The concept of "empowerment," arising particularly in 
the United States, corresponds in many ways on a domestic level to 
"development" on the international level, and the idea of liberation can link 
them both. In this chapter we will attempt to complement the chapter on 
Church social mission with a review of the term "development" as it has 
evolved in the sphere of international relations and relate it to the growing 
theology of liberation. After that, we shall examine the growing theme of 
"empowerment" in domestic social affairs, and end finally with a brief 
review of the heritage of the Catholic Church in the United States in 
working for social justice. 

We do not pretend to be able to summarize all of the relevant 
questions. Rather this summary is built upon the assumption that concern 
for such questions will always be a matter of search and evolution, each 
effort being a contribution to the growing self-understanding which then 
becomes part of our thought and action. All principles expressed in chapter 
one are understood as background for the following review. 

I. Development 
The term development seems to date from 1945, when the United 

Nations was founded. There was an increasing consciousness of the disparity 
between nations in terms of wealth and resources, and a desire in the 
non-governmental agencies of the UN to establish programs to lessen these 
inequities and achieve a more just distribution of the world's goods. The 
Declaration of Human Rights, made at the founding of the UN, affirmed the 
legitimacy of the claims of all men, regardless of differences, to have those 
things judged necessary for human development and a life of dignity. At the 
time, development was seen as a product of man's labors, especially 
economic, in his society, and under-development was judged as the absence 
of efficient labor and production. It is important to note that the term 
"undeveloped" is now considered more apt in describing the state of a 
country which has not yet reached a certain level of economic growth, and 
is a natural condition, whereas "underdevelopment" is better understood as 
a consequence of a country's economy being in a relationship of 
economic-political dependence upon another. For example, a Latin 
American country whose production level is not determined by its domestic 
needs but by U.S. economic market conditions is not independent but 
underdeveloped and the condition is not a natural one but a result of human 
choices. 

33 



In seeking for some understanding of "development" we will examine 
four points: the levels on which it can be understood, the process of 
achieving it, failures in the past, and, finally, a working definition for now. 

1. The Levels of Development: 
(These insights are drawn from Denis Goulet, That Third 
World, and Rene Lauren tin, Liberation, Development and 
Salvation). 

a. The first and most commonly accepted 
definition of development is related to economic 
growth. The level of development is measured in 
terms of gross national product, and a 
comparison of the GNP of one nation with that 
of another gives a scale for measuring 
development. Simply stated, then, development 
means wealth, and increase in wealth means a 
higher level of development. The same idea 
applies to domestic achievement or growth — the 
ability to produce some valued product is 
rewarded with income and buying power. Such a 
criterion arose from nations already highly 
industrialized and was imposed as a model, 
consciously or otherwise, on the nations which 
had not yet achieved this status. The norm is 
clearly quantitative. 

b. When this concept of development began to be 
experienced as inadequate for rich and poor 
nations alike, a broader and more qualitative 
norm was sought which would encompass 
economic, social, political and cultural aspects. 
According to this model, these different aspects 
are interdependent; development of one 
produces development of others, and conversely, 
stagnation of one hinders the development of all. 
This model also recognizes that the four-part 
process of development occurs within an 
international system of interrelatedness, so that 
development in one country must of necessity 
have an effect upon the conditions of others. 
Therefore, means have to be built into the 

34 



international system for preventing the gap 
between the nations from growing worse, as 
indeed it had at the end of the first Decade of 
Development. 

c. Any commitment to development as an over-all 
social process requires consideration of the 
ethical values by which social progress could be 
measured. The so-called developed nations are 
not necessarily in the best position to define 
these ethical values just because they are 
wealthier. On this third level of meaning, 
development presupposes a concept of man by 
which to assess the moral and ethical content of 
programs for development. This idea gives 
priority to "being" over "having," meaning that 
having more is valuable only insofar as it enables 
man to be more fully a mature human person. 
This model also implies a relationship of justice 
among men and a friendship resulting from their 
cooperation and participation in the creation of a 
just and human society. 

d. A fourth and final level of development is 
introduced from the level of consciousness on 
which the Christian can be hoped to be 
operating. It asserts that human development is 
ultimately the fulfillment of love of God in the 
human community. This is the development of 
which Pope Paul spoke in Populorum Progressio, 
and it assumes that the humanism upon which it 
is based is not a closed humanism but one open 
to the absolute. On this level, a dimension of 
transcendence is always a component of true 
human development. 

Thus, rather briefly, we can see some of the dimensions of the 
definition of development and the way the various levels build upon one 
another. 

2. Process to Achieve Development. 
If we assume that no development is complete unless it is based at 
least on an integral humanism, then what kind of process would 

35 



build towards such a goal? According to Denis Goulet, the process 
should include four dimensions, none of which is adequate by 
itself: (a) disciplined capital formation in order to achieve 
self-sustained growth; (b) equitable redistribution of economic and 
political power; (c) the organization of life in order to increase 
rationality; and (d) the reconstruction of the forces that move 
men's lives. 

Reasons for Failure. 
What has happened in the efforts toward development made thus 
far? These programs have been seen to increase rather than narrow 
the gap between rich and poor nations. According to Goulet, there 
are three basic causes for failure: 

1. A patchwork, narrow approach to aid: The 
process was viewed, in the period immediately 
after World War II, as essentially a technical one. 
The pattern of the Marshall Plan where masses of 
capital were injected into the industrial culture of 
Europe to stimulate the economy, was 
transferred, rather simplistically, to Third World 
countries, on the assumption that the western 
model could be set down in dependent countries. 
Later it became apparent that capital could not 
be fruitfully utilized unless the recipient people 
had the skills to use it. But the assumption was 
not questioned, the focus rather being shifted 
from money to technicians and experts who 
would administer the capital effectively. This led 
to an awareness of the unhealthiness of having 
countries dependent upon outside experts, and 
so another shift, still using the same basic theory, 
was undertaken, to that of institution-building 
within the developing countries. But all the 
models for progress in this period were western 
imports, and institution-building came to mean 
in practice that "advisers from rich countries 
came to tell poor countries what to do." 

2. A subordinate receivership role for Third World 
Countries: (The term Third World refers to the 
large number of developing, industrializing 



n a t i o n s w h i c h are n e i t h e r western 
democratic-industrial (U.S., Germany, etc.) nor 
western communistic-industrial (Soviet Union, 
Eastern Europe, etc.) and tend to align 
themselves with neither "side" but select 
independently policies which advance their own 
national growth.) Until recently the countries 
the Third World have not been able, or were not 
permitted, to tell others what they thought 
development was. A few leaders, such as Sukarno 
and Nyerere, began to formulate their own 
programs for development which they judged to 
be more appropriate for their own country's 
history, culture and desires, and at the same 
time, declared an effective independence from 
investor countries. There is a profound instinct in 
all human groups to be themselves, and this 
instinct began to be expressed very strongly in 
the developing nations. The Third World began 
to declare very forcefully that development is 
much more than the purely economic ideal being 
imposed by western industrial nations. Rather it 
is a matter of lifestyles. 

A false belief that western industrial culture 
possesses the only good model and no 
"underdevelopment" exists with them. A high 
level of production and consumption of goods is 
not development. It merely provides a basis or 
possibility for it. Some normative principles still 
have to be found for deciding how to use these 
productive assets for human ends. The developed 
countries are as much or more in need of such 
norms than the so-called underdeveloped 
countries. The people of each country must be 
be free to decide for themselves what goods they 
want to produce, how much and for what 
purposes, but they need to do this with a sense 
of responsibility to one another as well as to 
themselves. 
However, many development programs seemed 
to require for Third World countries a kind of 



cultural suicide and radical loss of self-esteem as 
a basic prerequisite for development, since the 
acceptance of aid from industrial nations 
naturally implied acceptance of the large nations' 
values and cultural norms. The Third World 
nations were not taken seriously in terms of their 
needs, especially the need for self-esteem and 
independence. Summarizing then, development 
programs have been overly narrow in their 
socio-economic emphases, have been insistent 
upon the model and values of the dominant 
nations, have not recognized the need for 
partnership and equal participation of Third 
World countries, so that their freedom, cultural 
autonomy and values could be developed. 

It is to this historical situation and the problems caused by it that Pope 
Paul VI, in his 1967 encyclical "On the Development of Peoples" 
(PopulorumProgressio), addressed himself. And in in 1971, the Synod of 
Bishops gathered in Rome, followed with a landmark document "Justice in 
the World." A few basic principles are listed which were laid down by the 
Pope and bishops, and reflect the recent pastoral teaching position of the 
Church about "Development." These complement those in chapter 1. 

From Development of Peoples. 
(1) It is the Church's duty "...to put herself at the service 

of all, to help them grasp their serious problem in all 
its dimensions, and to convince them that solidarity 
in action at this turning point in human history is a 
matter of urgency." (No. 1) 

(2) Freedom from misery, the greater assurance of 
finding subsistence, health and fixed employment; an 
increased share of responsibility without oppression 
of any kind and in security from situations that do 
violence to their dignity as men; better education - in 
brief to seek to do more, know more and have more 
in order to be more: that is what men aspire to now 
when a greater number of them are condemned to 
live in conditions that make this lawful desire 
illusory." (No. 6) 

38 



(3) The hard reality of modern economics... works 
rather to widen the differences in the world's levels of 
life, not to diminish them: rich peoples enjoy rapid 
growth whereas the poor develop slowly. (No. 8) 

(4) ...local and individual undertakings are no longer 
enough. The present situation of the world demands 
concerted action based on a clear vision of all 
economic, social, cultural and spiritual aspects. (No. 
13.) 

(5) Development cannot be limited to mere economic 
growth. In order to be authentic, it must be 
complete: integral, that is, it has to promote the good 
of every man and of the whole man." (No. 14) 

From Justice in the World : 
(1) The new growth of industry and technology will 

favor the concentration of riches, and powers, 
(including decision-making powers) in the hands of a 
small group of leaders, whether public or private, 
unless something is done to reject this outcome. 
Economic injustice and the lack of a share in society 
prevent men from attaining fundamental human and 
civil rights. (Section I) 

(2) ...suffocating oppressions constantly give rise to 
groups of "marginal people" who are undernourished, 
located in inhuman housing, illiterate, and deprived 
of political power and the disposition to 
responsibility and moral dignity. (I) 

(3) In the face of international power systems, the 
achievement of justice depends more and more on the 
will to promote development. (I) 

(4) . . .it is impossible to have true progress unless it is 
recognized that progress demands - within the chosen 
political system - economic improvement and a 
sharing on the part of the people in society's 
benefits...Social progress for the whole community 
through an overcoming of regional imbalances and 



islands of prosperity. This sharing of the people 
constitutes a right which should be applied in the 
economic, as well as in the social and political 
realms. (I) 

(5) If the Church must give witness to justice, she 
knows that whoever intends to speak to men of 
justice, must first practice justice before them. (Ill) 

(6) The Church, in order to be truly the sign of 
solidarity desired by the family of peoples, must in 
her life manifest greater cooperation among the 
churches of rich regions and poor, by spiritual 
communion and by division of human and material 
things. The help which churches now give each other 
often can be made more efficacious through real 
coordination...by taking the whole into consideration 
in the common administration of the gifts of God, by 
the fraternal solidarity which always favors the 
autonomy and the responsibility of those who benefit 
from these gifts, by being concerned about the setting 
up of criteria, about the choice of concrete proposals 
and the carrying out of these. (Ill) 

The following are summaries in our words, not quotations. 
(7) Support efforts and organizations which promote 

disarmament, discourage weapons trade, and foster 
international arbitration and police action (III) 

(8) Wealthy people and nations should voluntarily give 
away percentages of their annual wealth, offer higher 
prices for raw materials from the Third World and 
allow more imports of foreign made goods, and 
sometimes allowing preferential treatment to goods 
made in foreign countries. (II) 

(9) Wealthier, more powerful nations should allow and 
provide for more power in economic and political 
decisions on the part of the poor and Third World -
that is, they should surrender some of their own, so 
that more equal participation is achieved. (Ill) 

40 



(10)Simplicity of life, cutbacks in consumption of 
material resources, and cutbacks in environmental 
pollution by all nations are necessary. (Ill) 

(11)Just distribution of wealth and more democratic 
participation within Third World countries is a duty 
of their leaders and governments. (III). 

4. A Working Definition 
In the light of all this, what then can we establish as an acceptable and 

useful definition of development? A suggested definition which describes 
that of an individual person but which can be applied to all groups as well: 

Development may be described as the process tending to transform 
each man into the responsible agent of his own unfolding growth by 
participating within a community that is an autonomous agent of its own 
social, economic and cultural becoming. This implies liberation from the 
constraints of: 

the natural order (being subject to natural forces and 
environment with no ability to control or survive them) 
the cultural order (ignorance, magic forms of religiousity, 
incapacity for understanding one's own situation or that 
of others) 
the social, economic and political order, both on the 
national and international planes (different forms of 
domination and alienation, structured social limitation 
such as unequal distribution of wealth or racism, 
incapacity to assume one's own destiny as one's own.) 

This then is the scope of any true program for development, a program for 
the freeing of persons and groups to direct their own lives according to the 
values they believe to be most consonant with true human development. It 
is an inherent part of the mission of the People of God, both to proclaim, 
educate about and work for development, especially for Christians in the 
United States, a nation so powerful and involved in all dimensions of world 
society. It is a challenge worthy of man but calls for a constant liberation 
from the limits of blindness, sin, ignorance, fear and selfishness to which 
man is subject. Wherever human life is oppressed, enslaved or dehumanized, 
"underdevelopment" exists. From this perspective, underdevelopment exists 
within the United States, as can be seen in the Poverty Profile (Published by 
the Campaign for Human Development, 1972). And it exists among the 

41 



affluent as well as the poor, for many are trapped by fear, rigid 
security-needs for wealth and predictable consumption, cultural values and 
economic ways which make them incapable of loving their poorer brothers 
and making their society more human. It is out of this very process of 
attempting to promote development that the call for liberation has arisen. 

II. Liberation. 
How can an understanding of "liberation" assist in freeing the very 

move toward development and empowerment today, and where can we look 
for an understanding of liberation? The current use of the term covers a 
wide range of interests and programs - women, Blacks, Chicanos, prisoners, 
homosexuals, to mention some. And it is a term loaded with different 
emotional connotations, because it is associated with different groups and 
different meanings. To many, "liberation" is threatening, un-American and 
revolutionary. If Christians are to understand and be brothers to various 
groups of people, a mutual effort to listen and perceive the human 
experience and need behind words and symbolic actions must be 
undertaken. In this way, the term "liberation" can be examined by trying to 
find a common thread of meaning in all groups who use the term. The 
common dimension is that all are involved in some kind of struggle to 
escape, from a situation they see as bondage or dependence, into one of 
equality and independence. All seek to change the social ways which 
perpetuate dependence and servitude. The Campaign for Human 
Development also seeks to transform those structures in the USA which 
perpetuate a state of poverty. 

We cannot trace here the whole evolution of "liberation" but for our 
purposes we can acknowledge that the strongest and most consistent calls 
for an explanation of a theology of liberation, as it relates to development, 
have issued from leaders of the Latin American Church. This should not be 
a matter of surprise, since Latin America is the only "developing" continent 
in the world today which has a Christian religious tradition and the 
liberation movement contains a re-awakening to one of the central religious 
events of Judaeo-Christian history, the Exodus. Study of this tradition 
within the Church and a reminder of the themes of the Kingdom discussed 
in chapter one should help our thinking on the meaning of liberation today, 
especially as we see the move toward "liberation" in the growing quest for 
justice and peace in our own country. 

The quest for justice which has been described in revelation as a 
distinctive characteristic of Judaeo-Christian community, has always been, 
42 



first and foremost, a response to the call of God to the people He had 
chosen. This call was given and received, initially, in a concrete historical 
situation, that of the enslavement of Hebrews in Egypt, and the call was to 
follow Yahweh into a new and promised land and thereby, to be freed. The 
chief components of this revelatory event were: 

1. The experience of oppression, slavery, servitude to Egypt. 
2. The call to be liberated through the action of Yahweh. 
3. The establishment of a Covenant between Yahweh and 

the people He had chosen to be the recipients and agents 
of liberation. 

4. The mutual responsibilities of the Covenant-Yahweh's 
promise to lead, protect and be present to His people and 
bring them into a new land of justice and peace, and the 
promise of the Hebrews to obey His law, follow His 
leading, trust in His promise and do the works of mercy, 
justice and love. 

To understand the importance of this event in the life of God's people, it 
must not be viewed as an isolated happening in their history, but as a central 
event. In the Exodus the scattered peoples were called together, invited to 
become a community of brothers under God, given an identity and vocation 
before God, and, in this primary revelatory moment, established within 
history. Hence, the Exodus and Covenant are not simply past history for us, 
the spiritual descendants of Israel, but their meaning continues to be 
revealed through the coming of Jesus' Kingdom and our own historical 
move into the future. 

The immediate meaning for those who participated in the Exodus was 
liberation from bondage, liberation for the future, liberation for life. Its 
practical center was the liberation of man. Understood this way, God is then 
the personal Power who, in order to liberate men, submits the structures of 
the world to the project of freedom and creativity. He acts in this way: God 
loves and frees us first, then asks us to do the same in response. Each era in 
time is submitted to the judgment of the call to liberation. Since each 
historical moment has its own forms of oppression and evil, at each point 
along the journey, Israel's (The People of God) faithfulness can be measured 
by its ability to recall the primary vocation to liberation - their own and all 
men's - their reliance upon God, and their willingness to evaluate their 
society in order to do the works of mercy, justice and truth. In so doing, 

43 



God's People continually experience coming into the Promised Land, over 
and over again. Were we to trace the inter-action of God with His people in 
this light, we would find a pattern repeated over and over again: a tendency 
to settle down, to restrict the limits of God's love and power within 
inadequate human institutions and ways of doing things; a tendency to set 
up boundaries or barriers, structures of separation and security, laws of 
exclusion and privilege. The whole struggle of Jesus, who came to set at 
liberty those who are oppressed, was with His own people who had made 
the law of Israel and the land of Israel too narrow and exclusive. And while 
the Church has continually tried to live in faithfulness to her vocation to 
preach the Gospel to all nations, she has had to undergo purifications when 
her heart became hardened. This means that the call to move into the future 
is a penetrating and purging call, asking for the abandonment of all 
securities and riches other than the security of reliance upon God's 
faithfulness to His promise. Prophets have kept the call alive, but often at 
the risk of their own lives and positions. Jesus renewed the vocation of 
Israel and extended it, but at the cost of His life. But through His faithful 
ones, God's call was eventually understood and re-embraced in truth. Past 
experiences must be seen then not as the unchanging forms for the future, 
in terms of concrete specifics, but as a model for understanding the present 
and choosing concrete new steps for the future. 

For man to fulfill his vocation, to understand and live faithfully before 
God and man, he must therefore be involved in the concrete human 
situations where God is working to achieve the liberation of His people from 
sin, personal and social, and from its effects (evil, injustice, destruction). 
Any movement to separate religious experience and understanding of life's 
meaning from human endeavor in the city of man is to run the risk of 
alienating faith from service, an understanding described as error by Pope 
John XXHI in his Mater et Magistra (no. 255). The criteria for judgment 
given to us by Jesus has a profound and unavoidably practical grounding -
those who will be welcomed into the Kingdom are those who have fed, 
clothed, sheltered and visited the Lord in the person of His oppressed. 
Those who are turned out of the Kingdom are those who have turned away 
from Him through blindness and hardness of heart. 

The task is twofold: 
1. a recognition of the Lord in His suffering people. 
2. a determination to discover the best way, according to the 

times, to answer His needs as expressed in them. 

44 



At one time the second task meant the ransoming of captives, literally. 
At another, the establishment of institutions to care for the oppressed and 
poor. Church programs still perform great and needed services. But social 
services, although ministering to basic needs of people, in many cases leave 
them still in a position of dependency and receivership - they are not 
subjects of their lives but objects - they are acted upon. In terms of our 
contemporary world, then, freeing the oppressed seems more and more to 
mean involvement in changing structural systems which perpetuate their 
dependency, poverty and powerlessness, where this is possible. A 
contemporary rendering of the parable of the Last Judgment such as has 
been done by Laurentin might read: 

"Lord, when did we give you to eat, and to drink, and 
when did we clothe you and visit you? 

His answer to the men of the twentieth century will be: 
When you changed those structures that generate hunger, 
thirst, nakedness, and loneliness, when you created or 
operated structures through which men could finally feed 
themselves, satisfy their thirst and clothe themselves in a 
community of justice and love, it was to me that you did 
it. And when you abstained, it was to me that you did not 
do it." 

(Matt. 25:3246, 
in Laurentin, p. 123) 

III. Empowerment. 
In the United States, integration of poor people and excluded minority 

groups into the mainstream of society became an official goal of the 
government during the early and middle 1960's. This movement was 
stimulated by three basic concepts: 

1. Legal statutes are the guidelines for the way a society operates. If 
civil rights to social, economic and political sharing in the society's 
growth are not being realized, it is partly because the society has 
not brought social activity under just law. 

2. The main reason for lack of civil rights and just laws is "prejudice" 
on the part of white and rich people. 

45 



3. Poor people and minority groups are not inherently inferior or 
incapable of meeting the standards of the strong (white) society. 
Rather, they merely lack the "opportunities" to advance 
themselves because poor protection of rights and prejudice have 
restricted their opportunities. Massive governmental and private 
efforts can, over time, restore these and the poor can move into the 
mainstream, like everyone else. Many types of opportunities must 
be opened up at the same time, because poverty is a complex thing, 
made up of social, familial, economic, political, psychological and 
cultural factors. Life itself is a complex of all these and so is 
deficient-life, e.g. poverty. 

These are oversimplified, of course, and many other concepts were involved. 
But at least three basic underlying assumptions were the basis for these 
ideas, which became the central concepts for the Kennedy-Johnson civil 
rights through law and War on Poverty programs. These assumptions were: 

1. Law defines social activity by setting limits on behavior. Or, 
political activity (laws, the government, etc.) is the main shaper of 
social and economic activity. 

2. Prejudice and discrimination are essentially spiritual-psychological 
realities. They can be controlled by law or changed by appeals to 
conscience. 

3. The model for the best system for betterment of the poor and 
minorities is the historical United States work and free enterprise 
system. Provide jobs, and therefore, education in skills, college, 
housing ~ and people could move after that on their own. 

Civil rights laws changed behavior because certain types of social 
behavior became illegal. In this respect, opportunities were opened up. But 
it became apparent that there were areas outside the realm of law that were 
not changing -- the number of jobs available, distribution of income, the fact 
that the War on Poverty was underfunded, or not complied with, or even 
dismantled by political opposition to legal aid (because it worked) or 
Community Action Programs (because poor people participating either 
failed for lack of proper preparation or in fact set up different priorities for 
their community than did the local political power groups). Moreover, 
minority people felt that even within the poverty program they were 
beholden to the gratuitous support of people who didn't understand their 
culture or who expected that minority persons would accept their values. 
Middle class organizers came in and told the poor what they needed and 
46 





how they should be. Government (local, state and federal) officials told the 
poor what they would be allowed to do. Participation and shared-decision-
making occurred on insignificant levels and questions, over little amounts of 
resources, if it occurred at all. Moreover, union members were opposing 
entrance of minority persons; non-poor, white areas opposed (violently in 
some cases) integration of neighborhoods; later, speculating realtors and 
agents took advantage of federal housing programs and actually tried to 
force chaotic change in a neighborhood, getting government-subsidy-inflated 
prices and mortgage guarantees for poor owners. These speculators profited 
more if the poor couldn't succeed in home ownership, because they would 
be reimbursed and could sell the homes again. 

Minority and poor people essentially found the various programs to be 
distant and not carried out in their self-interest. Even some of their own 
self-appointed "leaders" tried to set up kingdoms based on government and 
other outside monies. The notion that a community has to develop its own 
stable structures and its own leadership, based upon its own priorities, began 
to grow. But this could hardly happen if one were forced to wait like 
petitioners for government and other private money. Moreover, the only 
way to secure a fair share of governmental and societal resources was to 
participate in the decision-making levels where these resources were divided 
up. Finally, the model for growth had to come from the cultural and ethnic 
experience of the community or else they would lose self-respect and 
appreciation for their own heritage. 

Cultural and political self-proclamation began to occur within the 
context of "self-determination," and in the first instance appeared among 
Black Americans, known as "Black Power." Advocates stated that only 
black people would understand black needs and experience, because the 
society, which had long since proved itself racist, still didn't understand how 
it would be to share power and decision-making with black people. 
Eventually, the ideas of cultural autonomy and empowerment became 
popular in other minority group movements - Chicanos, Native Americans 
and now white ethnics and Appalachians. The rhetoric and emotion 
accompanying these, as well as the substance of the goals set by these 
movements, has threatened many people and great backlash has occurred. 
"Power" was associated with riots, violence, revolutionaries, anarchists. 
Emphasis on one's culture was called reverse racism. No doubt in some cases 
both were true, but the essential ideas seem to have been missed because 
many were unable to listen and look behind the acts and games being 
played, to the reality of the message. Looking behind all social acts is 
important. For instance, it is accepted that a boxer should try to "psych 
out" his opponent by looking or acting tough; that a football player will try 
48 



to gain advantage by getting in a good "hit" on the first play; that teenagers 
try to impress by coolness, belligerence or other moods. In each case, this is 
a normal human use of psychology to gain attention or respect. So also is 
anger, militance and table-pounding. 

The realization that many social decisions and arrangements in a 
democratic society are made outside of the reach of the law, based upon the 
various kinds of give and take which go on in society, was also alien to many 
people. In order to participate even minimally in the give and take of 
democratic, competitive society, a person or group has to have a social 
bargaining power - some good or ability (whether it be votes, reputation, an 
economic good - or anything else) by which to influence other groups or 
individuals in their actions. Simply stated, this is power. 

The people of the United States have always believed in essential 
freedom, equality before the law, government by the consent of reasoned 
participation by all citizens. It is a hard pill to swallow to realize that 
probably much of our social decision-making is not done in the 
governmental-legislative process, and that those bodies are really shaped and 
directed by the interests and influences which elect or support them. In 
short, economic and social power elects government. Government is in 
many respects responding to its constituency, not directing it. Power is a 
crucial, inherent element in a democracy, not a vile, evil thing. 
Self-determination is based upon certain abilities, both personal and social, 
to stand on a relatively equal level with others and have one's opinion at 
least heard and sometimes adopted. However, for some reason, the people 
of the United States do not like to talk about or accept "power." 

Empowerment began to gain in popularity as poor people and minority 
people realized that even with the best of intentions, the established 
government and business structure couldn't allow the powerless to have a 
significant participation, in monetary terms or decision-making, in the 
existing system - that would not be in their self-interest. In order to 
understand what experience is described by spokesmen of poor people and 
"minority" peoples, it is necessary to listen to what they say. It is also 
necessary to translate another's language into terms one can understand, and 
therefore to look behind anger and shock, much of it aimed at "psyching" 
white people and thereby gaining some influence (the power of respect, fear 
or surprise) over them. Stokely Carmichael and Charles Hamilton wrote 
Black Power in 1967, subtitled "The Politics of Liberation in America." 
They said: 

49 



To carve out a place for itself in the politico-social order, 
V.O. Key, Jr. wrote in Politics, Parties and Pressure 
Groups, a new group may have to fight for re-orientation 
of many of the values of the old order, (p. 57) This is 
especially true when that group is composed of black 
people in the American society - a society that has for 
centuries deliberately and systematically excluded them 
from political participation—To do this, we must first 
redefine ourselves...we shall have to struggle for the right 
to create our own terms through which to define ourselves 
and our relationship to society, and to have these terms 
recognized. This is the first right of a free people...Only 
when black people fully develop this sense of community, 
of themselves, can they begin to deal effectively with the 
problems of racism in this country. This is what we mean 
by a new consciousness; this is the vital first step. 

The next step is what we shall call the process of political 
modernization - a process which must take place if the 
society is to be rid of racism. "Political modernization' 
includes many things, but we mean by it three major 
concepts: (1) questioning old values and institutions of 
the society; (2) searching for new and different forms of 
political structure to solve political and economic 
problems; and (3) broadening the base of political 
participation to include more people in the 
decision-making process.. 

(Stokely Carmichael and Charles 
Hamilton) Black Power, Vintage, 
1967, pp. 35-39) 

This principle is really not so revolutionary, except that it was based upon 
the principles of the American Revolution. (New institutions and 
representation had been demanded, symbols of British authority and power 
were flaunted.)The real goal is control of one's own affairs, at least on an 
equal level with others so that give and take can occur. The problem with 
more traditional charity programs, and even the War on Poverty, was that 
they maintained political, financial and psychological dependency - which 
denied participation on a shared basis and self-respect. This was true before, 
and in most cases, during and after the "War on Poverty." 

50 



Negroes tended to be the objects rather than the subjects 
of civic action. Things are often done for, or about, or to, 
or because of Negroes, but they are less frequently done 
by Negroes. 

(James Wilson, Negro Politics, Free 
Press, 1960, p. 133) 

The point at hand is the true principle of self-determination - people who 
can take into hand their own affairs have self-respect and can enter the give 
and take of society. But in our society, certain resources are needed before 
people can take this responsibility - as pointed out in the teachings of the 
Church quoted earlier. 

And certain changes in social and economic values and organizations 
will have to occur before resources can be opened up. Thus, "Black Power" 
and the movements which followed that model (Chicano power movements 
(La Raza), Indian movements, and now White-ethnic power movements) are 
based upon appreciation of one's own values and cultural heritage, so that 
one doesn't hate himself and try to be something he is not; and upon the 
organizing and building of power (vote blocs, community organizations, 
jobs, community-oriented business and economic development, control of 
some economic resources) so that other groups in the society can be 
prevailed upon (out of need or out of respect) to bargain and deal equally in 
society with a group which, up to now, has been on the receiver, dependent 
end of things. This process is, in fact, crucial to the American system of 
democracy: 

The essence of democracy lies in the rights and 
potentialities of the individual-Rights, liberty and 
equality are not valuable per se but because they are the 
means to one fundamental end, individual development...a 
free state seeks to 'release individuality' and 'prevent the 
frustration of the creative impulse.' It leaves room for 'our 
personal initiative' and provides opportunities 'shown to 
be essential to the development of personality.' 
Democracy, according to Laski, is the 'affirmation of 
one's essence.' 

(William Withers, Freedom Through 
Power, John Day Co., New York, 
1965, p. 3) 

51 



The ultimate goal of a "free country," then, is human development. In 
modern society, some power (control of self and some resources) is 
necessary for freedom (power over material need -- its opposite is poverty; 
power over social dependency - its opposite is self-esteem, participation, 
shared decision-making): 

Freedom is the capacity of each individual to achieve, and 
the determination of the state to protect him in exercising 
that degree of power essential to permit him, so far as 
possible, to make his own life instead of having someone 
else make it for him. This, as Professor Withers, accurately 
observes, includes freedom within an enterprise as well as 
freedom outside his job; freedom of life within the 
framework of government, as well as freedom to go 
beyond it; freedom of life within large organizations as 
well as freedom to live outside them." 

(Introduction to Freedom Through 
Power, by Adolf A. Berle, p. VIII) 

In order to have a bargaining position, if you will, in such a society, 
social-political-economic power in some degree is necessary, Berle says. In 
modern democracy, you can't be free without it. 

There is one difficult question for a Christian here, which can only be 
answered in time and experience, in reflection and prayer. Does not the 
humanistic idea of power, presented above in the context of democracy and 
social analysis, contradict the Christian vocation of poverty of spirit, and 
meekness? In Christian teachings, it is clear that the Lord Jesus distinguishes 
between the "way of this world" and His "way." Christians will not "lord it 
over them" but be servants to fellow human beings. No store will be put in 
material security or earthly positions of influence. Jesus' Kingdom is "not 
of this world." How can this be reconciled with "empowerment" which 
seems to connote some kind of force, either spiritual, psychological, 
political, economic or social? 

On the face of it, the presentation of the New Testament 
is that when God gets down to work on earth in a 
personal and definitive manner he exhibits his power in 
powerlessness. The forsaken and crucified man is believed 
to be the Christ of God... 

52 



This appears to suggest that the ultimate power which is 
capable of bringing in and establishing the Kingdom of 
God is the love of God (the God who is love) which love 
exhibits its power as powerlessness...Power as we know it 
(powerful power and not powerless power) always 
involves counter-action and counter-effects. 

David Jenkins, "The Power of the 
Powerless" from In Search of a 
Theology of Development, Sodepax, 
1970, p. 5) 

Jenkins stated that "powerful power" achieves its will, or least compromise, 
on the basis of force (physical manipulation or social pressure). He suggests 
that perhaps this type of "power" is unredeemable and always productive of 
resentment, anger, injury of some kind. Christian powerlessness suffers, 
absorbs, loves, and, therefore, reconciles. Only in this way can harmony be 
achieved: 

If (and it is a big "if ' ) we are ever to get to a state of 
equilibrium in which all are fulfilled in each other and 
each can enjoy all (a creative Kingdom of love) then there 
must be a power at work which will absorb powerful 
power rather than counter power with power, (pp. 51-52) 

The power of this world divides, takes away, does injury perforce. The 
power of God unifies (through Christian suffering and reconciliation,) gives, 
does not injure. 

We cannot pretend to be able to answer this. It is extremely deep and at 
the heart of the mystery of Christ. That is why this section must end with a 
dilemma, a question, and why this booklet is offered as a sourcebook for 
thought, not answers. However, there are a few possible approaches which 
we can suggest in brief summary: 

1. Christ did not force Himself on people. Yet His absolute gentleness 
and self-giving did set up a spiritually forceful situation because of 
its challenge, its judgment and its purity. People judge themselves 
in the presence of Christ, either accepting Him (His lack of 
pushiness actually becomes very forceful, driving a person to 
distraction to say yes or no. The Saints have witnessed this), or 
rejecting Him. 

53 



2. Christ's powerlessness does not exist in His not having force or 
power or the ability to debate or the personal presence which 
commands a decision. Nor does He not have food, clothing or 
money. His powerlessness lies in how He uses them, for He refuses 
to do injury or destroy. He only builds up, heals. Instead of 
countering worldly power with His own, He simply refuses to have 
any part in it - He withholds His support. He will not take or 
hoard goods or power. The key lies in the usage: 

The Son of Man came eating and drinking ... 
(Matthew 11:19) 
Give all you own to the poor ...Matthew 

19:21) 
.. 'to prove to you that the Son of Man has 

authority on earth to forgive sins' «- he said to 
the paralytic - 'get up, pick up your bed and go 
home' . (Matthew 9:6-7) 

insofar as you did this to the least of my 
brothers, you did it to me. (Matthew 26-40) 
it is the pagans of this world who set their 

hearts on all these things. (Luke 12:30) 
- 'He has gone to stay at a sinner's house, they said. 

But Zacchaeus stood his ground and said to the 
Lord, 'Look, sir, I am going to give half my 
property to the poor, and if I have cheated 
anybody, I will pay him back four times the 
amount.' And Jesus said to him Today salvation 
has come to this house.'... 

Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace 
to the earth... (Matthew 10:34) 

Jesus' ways, pouring out, detachment from goods, respect for other's 
freedom - these are powerful, and create a situation which judges people by 
the way they respond. The situation created is not without turmoil, because 
it questions the values of all around Him. This witness and action is 
life-giving and makes people who wish to take life angry. It forces a decision 
and changes the basic assumptions upon which things normally are done. 
54 



Jesus' refusal to participate in self-interested activity is a freedom and 
detachment which, as in the story of Zacchaeus, both gives life to Zacchaeus 
and challenges him to imitate the Lord. That is the point. Christ does not 
give life by taking away - Christ does not kill off the Romans. He gives by 
divesting Himself in order to build up others, and Christian freedom lies in 
giving freedom to others. Then, by invitation, Christian power calls the 
liberated one to a higher freedom and power - that of service. This higher 
freedom is not, cannot be imposed - it is left to the choice of the one who 
is now set free to choose. That is why the Church can only empower people 
if it is powerless itself, if it divests itself in order to build up fellow human 
beings. The Christian, therefore, cannot simply intend to pass on secular 
power or affluence to the oppressed. The Christian work for human 
freedom is different in this: that it refuses to take life or freedom; that it 
works, not for its own freedom or power, but for the freedom and power of 
others; and that it seeks these not as ends in themselves but as a sign of 
God's love, a witness to the dignity of people given by God, and a means 
wherein people have a better environment for freely pursuing their own 
human development. 

...Modern forms of democracy must be devised, not only 
making it possible for each man to become informed and 
to express himself, but also by involving him in a shared 
responsibility. Thus human groups will gradually begin to 
share and to live as communities. Thus freedom, which 
too often asserts itself as a claim for autonomy by 
opposing the freedom of others, will develop in its deepest 
human reality: to involve itself and to spend itself in 
building up active and lived solidarity. But, for the 
Christian, it is by losing himself in God, who sets him free, 
that man finds true freedom, renewed in the death and 
resurrection of the Lord. 

(Call to Action, Pope Paul VI, p. 27) 
These considerations do not answer the basic question. Prayer and 

reflection and living with risk in trying will be necessary. Mistakes will be 
made. But the important thing is to not be afraid of the call, but be trusting 
in the Power of the Holy Spirit: 

Today more than ever the Word of God will be unable to 
be proclaimed and heard unless it is accompanied by the 
witness of the power of the Holy Spirit, working within 

55 



the action of Christians in the service of their brothers, at 
the points in which their existence and their future are at 
stake. 

(Pope Paul VI, Call to Action, p. 30) 

IV. The Church's Heritage of Service in the United States. 
With this background in mind, we can then look very briefly, at the 

ways in which the Church in the Untied States has responded to the 
vocation of service. 

In the United States, after 1850, parish life had as one of its 
primary concerns a service dimension, since the life of the congregations, 
chiefly immigrants, was one of great poverty, as well as powerlessness, or a 
sense of exclusion from the established system of social services provided by 
the government. This condition resulted from increasing harshness of the 
industrial revolution in the United States, from ethnic and religious 
prejudice, and from the ever present resistance by the native-born to 
"foreigners" who would take their jobs and homes. In this respect, many 
Catholics, starting with the Irish, then the Germans and finally Eastern and 
Southern Europeans suffered discrimination and exploitation similar to that 
experienced by Blacks, Spanish speaking, native Americans and white ethnic 
groups to this day. Abraham Lincoln, speaking of the "American" party and 
their Know-No thing roots, stated that "when the Know-No things get 
control, it (the Declaration of Independence) will read ! all men are created 
equal except Negroes, the foreigners and Catholics!" Conditions in the mills 
and mines were horrible, child labor exploited, wages and benefits very 
limited. In fact, on occasion Catholic immigrant people reacted to 
discrimination by violence, notably in the confused case of the riots and 
murders attributed to Irish "Molly Maguires" in Pennsylvania. Catholics 
were stereotyped and considered to be drunken brawlers, of low 
intelligence, and secret agents for a foreign power (Rome). It is curious to 
see how much our Catholic immigrant forefathers had in common with 
current minority groups. Prejudice, low wages, poor housing, stereotypes, 
occasional violence which is blamed on the entire minority group rather 
than the few individuals involved. But the case of the Catholic population 
was notably different from that of contemporary groups, for three reasons: 

1. The industrial revolution provided growing numbers of jobs, poor as 
they were, which subsequently were upgraded; and cities were 
exploding because of industrial growth, not declining. 

56 



2. The Catholics did not bring a heritage of slavery or racism, and 
came from Europe where they had a strong western culture and 
unifying religion. 

3. The institution of the Catholic Church, with professional leaders 
and educators, assisted greatly in serving their needs and fighting 
for humanitarian values. So also did labor unions. 

The Catholic parish became one of the most important centers of social 
life for immigrant minorities in the United States. Cultural heritage was 
maintained, at least initially, even while immigrants were assisted in adapting 
to "American " life. Churches, schools, hospitals, orphanages and other 
institutions provided alternatives to the public, secular institutions, in order 
to respect and preserve cultural self-identity and religious belief in the face 
of suspicion and discrimination. Thus, the Catholic Church worked to 
integrate its people through its own alternative structures. The Church's 
concern for social questions grew from the poverty and exclusion of its own 
people in a new land, and was based upon supporting the individual or 
family in e f for t s to adapt. Immigrants gradually accepted being 
"Americanized" and let their cultural heritage slip, in order to prove to 
themselves and others that they were loyal, good "American" citizens. This 
was only natural, but in many ways the model was Anglo-Saxon Protestant 
with a strong work ethic and intense patriotism. This process was later 
called "The Melting Pot." 

Catholic organizations and more collective efforts to work for social 
justice began to appear at the time of the Civil War. To name a few with 
heritage of work for and concern for the poor: 

1. St. Vincent de Paul Society, chiefly promoted by Levi Silliman 
Ives. Vincentians assisted in charitable relief work, but also 
supported industrial schools and boarding homes. 

2. Brothers of the Holy Cross - labor schools for poor boys and men. 
3. Sisters of Mercy - the same as above for young women. 
4. German Catholic Central Union - fought for justice for the poor 

and disseminated Catholic social thought to educate for justice. 
Catholic efforts were predominantly aimed at their own people's needs, 

however, and largely ignored those who shared in their plight as Lincoln had 
described, most notably the freed Blacks. American Indians and Catholic 

57 



Mexicans were really untouched and unkown by the immigrant Church, and 
were being pushed back and out by American expansion in the West. 

In terms of social change and structure, the Church began to involve 
itself over the labor question, especially since the industrial revolution had 
created a working class of wage earners and most Catholics belonged to it. 
Cardinal Gibbons of Baltimore grew in reputation because he intervened in 
Rome against condemning labor unions, especially the Knights of Labor. 
Shortly thereafter, Church leaders in the hierarchy recognized the validity 
of such social groupings to work freely for the betterment of workers. They 
realized the contribution of these unions to freedom and democracy and 
justice by developing bargaining power for the disenfranchised. Cardinal 
Gibbons stated that "to lose the heart of the people would be a misfortune 
for which the friendship of the few rich and powerful would be no 
compensation." Bishop John Lancaster Spaulding, a co-founder of Catholic 
University and a great leader, spoke on the occasion of Pope Leo's Rerum 
Novarum that "the mission of the Church is not only to save souls but to 
save society." And Pope Leo himself established the precedent of the 
Church's defending the working man's right to organize, condemning an 
exclusively profit-oriented, self-seeking capitalism which does not adhere to 
the concerns of justice, and asserting the right of every person to a wage 
decent enough to provide an adequate living standard. Work for social 
legislation on the part of Church leaders was also found in the principles of 
this encyclical. 

It is important to note that such a heritage of justice, which has been 
forgotten by most Catholics in the wake of new needs and new 
socio-economic positions, was not created by our forefathers with peaceful 
acceptance. These changes did not come easily, for many Catholics felt that 
these were areas forbidden to Catholic endeavor, and greatly opposed them. 
Archbishop James Bayley of Baltimore had described labor unions as 
"miserable associations" and stated that "their idea is communistic and no 
Catholic with any idea of the spirit of his religion will encourage them." 
Another example is the debate over child labor laws. Father Peter Dietz was 
a community organizer, founder of trade unionist Militia for Christ, first 
Catholic fraternal delegate to the American Federation of Labor, and 
founder of social work schools, and Monsignor John A. Ryan was a 
distinguished Catholic writer on social justice and first Director of the 
Department of Social Action, National Catholic Welfare Conference. Both 
had urged legislation outlawing child labor laws. Commenting on this, the 
Catholic Standard and Times of Philadelphia stated that pensions for 
mothers and child labor laws violated social liberty, and later blasted 
advocates of this social legislation "posturing busy-bodies." Intensity of 
58 



sincere opinion on various sides of social questions has characterized the 
Church in the United States. Reflection on current affairs and new activities 
never occurs without honest difference of opinion. But, constantly, the 
Church grew in its efforts to defend the poor and powerless. Along with its 
emphasis on charity, it stressed the changing of society so the poor 
could help themselves,so that workers could bargain for themselves, so that 
law would protect the defenseless. The following characteristics summarize 
those efforts on the part of the Catholic Church: 

1. The workingman and poor who were being supported by the 
organization, though not exclusively Catholic, were mostly 
members of the Church. The Church then was protecting its own 
by seeking a just social order. 

2. For the most part, advocacy for justice did not issue from the daily 
life or concerns of ordinary parishioners. Special organizations, the 
clergy, and institutions did the work. The parish member 
supported these actions by giving to the parish, and benefitted 
from the service of the full-time professionals. In short, organized 
work for social justice did not often reach into the Catholic "grass 
roots." 

3. Much social service work was done through alternative, private 
Church institutions. 

Since the first World War, much outstanding work for social justice has 
occurred, strengthening the real gift Catholics have made to justice, order 
and democracy in the United States. To name a few: 

- The Bishops' Program for Social Reconstruction, chiefly designed by 
Monsignor Ryan at the end of World War I, advocated a high minimum wage 
(at wartime level or above); legislation for a minimum wage; unemployment, 
sickness and disability insurance; old age pensions; child labor laws; 
protection of right of labor to organize; national employment service; public 
housing; progressive taxation so that all citizens and corporations would 
bear their just share of the support of the common good. (Many of these 
were enacted in "New Deal" legislation. Many of them are still to be done, 
especially achieving a decent minimum wage, sufficient public housing, 
adequate work for all). Also, there has been the foundation of the National 
Catholic Welfare Conference, from the National Catholic War Council; the 
work of the National Catholic Rural Life Conference and the National 
Conference of Catholic Charities. Outside the institutional programs of the 
Church, many significant social movements for justice have given leadership 

59 



to Church work for justice, among them: the Catholic Worker Movement of 
Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin; Friendship House of Catherine de Hueck; 
National Catholic Conference on Interracial Justice, especially inspired by 
Father John La Farge, S.J.; the Adult Education programs of the 
Association of Catholic Trade Unionists (ACTU) to help Catholic union 
members develop skills in public speaking, the social encyclicals, 
parliamentary law, — bent on insuring democratic procedures within unions 
and preventing the infiltration of Soviet style Communism; the involvement 
of Catholic priests, parishes, laity and of diocesan Catholic Charities in the 
work for racial equality and against poverty during the War on Poverty. 

Thus, the contribution of the Church in the United States to the 
pursuit of social justice and freedom has been extremely significant. The 
present times present a challenge because, in many ways, many Catholic 
people seem to have lost their roots and forgotten this heritage. Moreover, 
the fact of institutionalized programs without the involvement and 
initiation of local groups of laity has alienated this work from the body of 
Catholics - they agree with it but do not participate generally. Finally, the 
challenge of social justice now is different because most Catholics no longer 
belong to the poor and excluded, but to a middle-class which shares the 
benefits of an affluent, production centered economy. Changes needed now 
appear as threats to them. It is true that many urban working Catholics still 
reside in changing cities where their once proud neighborhoods are aging 
and city services crumbling, where automation and slowdown in industrial 
cycles are making more workers obsolete or financially marginal, where 
governmental programs by and large have ignored their needs. The Church's 
work and service must be given to these, our own people, who are still 
marginal citizens in many ways. But the challenge is more one of awareness. 
The Church's work to insure freedom for all was often motivated by the 
needs of its own people. An atmosphere of disassociation and "care for 
one's own" developed, and is still prevalent among many Catholics. 
Moreover, real marginality and need is experienced by urban working class 
Catholics many of whom pay strenuous taxes (with no investment 
write-offs), make low wages and suffer many of the same problems as the 
poor. The tendency is to care for one's own and see the needs of the poor as 
a threat. But the Church mission to liberate all people even as we are 
liberated by Christ, and a study of the social-economic factors in urban 
American seem to suggest that Catholics should ally themselves with the 
poor. In so doing, both groups could liberate each other, creating a just 
social order for all instead of fighting for limited benefits for oneself. For 
the more affluent, the call to justice seems to ask the People of the Church 
to complement the work of their institutions by action in their own lives 
and by changes in their own values. New realities call all the People of God 

60 



to go out to people outside of the Church. Calls to promote justice and love, 
expressed now as "development" and "liberation" and "empowerment" 
arise from the changes which have taken place in the American Church: 

1. the poor in need of service towards liberation are not as 
identified as church members as well as the poor of the 
past, i.e., in the 19th and early 20th centuries. 

2. governmental and professional agencies have developed 
and assumed at least some competence for social service in 
the place of the beneficent societies of voluntary 
organizations. The Church's work here is still important, 
but must go beyond this. 

3. poverty and related ills are increasingly seen, not as the 
simple problems of individual persons (who according to 
the work ethic should and could better themselves),but 
also and more importantly as a condition that has its 
origins in the structure of society and the place of the 
people in that society. 

4. in place of service to people there has arisen, as of old 
within the labor movement, the awareness of the need to 
empower people to help themselves to become 
self-determining and to develop processes that will throw 
off the structural condition of powerlessness and poverty. 

These new conditions have serious implications for the Church: 
1. works related to the alleviation of poverty cannot be 

restricted only to church-connected programs. People 
have to be assisted by minimum, needed resources, to do 
for themselves. 

2. the constituency of a ministry to the poor is not only the 
Catholic congregation, but the community of need, 
regardless of religious identification. 

3. effective service to the poor more directly involves 
political action and values change by more affluent people 
since it involves changing the place of people in the 
socio-political-economic structure. 

61 



In the light of these observations, the guidelines for applications for funding 
from the Campaign for Human Development have a particular significance: 

" . . . The project must benefit the poor. 50% of those 
benefitting the project must be from low income groups. 
The poor must have the dominant voice in any self-help 
project... 
Priority: 
Projects which generate cooperation among and within 
diverse groups in the interest of a more integrated and 
mutually understanding society-
Promising, innovative projects which demonstrate a 
change from traditional approaches to poverty by 
attacking the basic causes of poverty and by effecting 
institutional change..." 

Criteria and Guidelines, 1972, 
Campaign for Human Development. 

Significantly funds are allocated to deserving groups without 
consideration of their religious affiliation, provided the programs do not go 
against the moral and ethical teachings of the Church. 

And so, Catholics find a situation of historical challenge. Do we 
remember the* roots from which we sprang, the suffering we endured, the 
heritage of goodness and justice and freedom to which our people have 
contributed and from which we have benefitted? Was so much effort 
motivated only by the fact of our own needs, thus fitting into the pattern of 
self-interest? Now that most Catholics have been loved first, can we turn 
and extend that love and service and dedication to justice to others in need? 
Will we, whose grandparents and parents suffered a hard road not desirable 
for anyone, now work to eliminate it for our successors in discrimination 
and poverty, or for our own people who have never really escaped it? Or 
will we, comfortable with needs now met, harden so as to be to others what 
the "nativists" were to our grandparents? Timely institutional programs are 
needed, as Pope Paul had said, but new communities of faith and mutual 
support are needed also to liberate us from fear and enable us all to live the 
Gospel. This is the question to be examined in "Christianity as a Lifestyle." 

62 



THE CONCEPT OF SOCIAL SIN 
PETER J. HENRIOT, S,J. 
STAFF ASSOCIATE, CENTER OF CONCERN 

INTRODUCTION 
In establishing the Campaign for Human Development in 1969, the U.S. 

Bishops emphasized the need for education in the effort to mobilize the 
good will of the Christian community in the United States against poverty 
and injustice: 

We also believe that this new effort can lead the People of 
God to a new knowledge of today's problems, a deeper 
understanding of the intricate forces that lead to group 
conflict, and a perception of some new and promising 
approaches that we might take in promoting a greater 
spirit of solidarity among those who are successful, those 
who have acquired some share of the nation's goods, and 
those still trapped in poverty. (From Preamble to 
November 1969 CHD Resolution of U.S. Bishops) 

This paper examines the connection between economic system, life-style 
and the perpetuation of poverty; it raises the question of our responsibility 
to all our brothers. 

Social Sin in Light of an Event 
On May 4, 1969, James Foreman, former head of the Student 

Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, interrupted regular worship services 
of the fashionable Riverside Church, New York City. He dramatically read 
to the congregation and brought to the wider attention of the religious 
community in the U.S. the "Black Manifesto," a demand for $500 million 
in "reparations" to be paid to blacks in this country for damages from past 
exploitations by American whites. The drama of this incident raised 
numerous questions across the nation: 

-emotionally: what were our feelings in the face of such 
rhetoric and unusual circumstances? 

-sociologically: where was "brotherhood" in the light of such 
a black/white confrontation? 

••politically: what were the power implications of this 
demand? 63 





-economically: was a demand for so much money realistic, 
and how would the money be used? 

-•ethically: was it really just to speak of an obligation to pay 
reparations? 

-theologically: what were the implications of directing this 
demand to the American religious community? 

Many churches and synagogues were not prepared to deal in any 
substantive theological fashion with this demand. Leaders of various 
religious groups appeared to fall back on either out-right rejection or 
confused acceptance. (See Robert S. Lecky, ed., Black Manifesto: Religion, 
Racism, and Reparations, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1969) Yet at its 
deepest level, the "Black Manifesto" raised important issues of conscience 
on the meaning of community, of social sin, and of repentance. 

The development of Catholic social thought. Traditional Catholic social 
thought has seen a fairly consistent line of development in the teaching of 
the Church since the days of Leo XIII. Leo's Rerum Novarum set the 
general tone and style for the body of social doctrine, with its emphasis on 
basic human rights and its explanation of the traditional scholastic teachings 
on social justice. Scripture was used by Leo in the form of quotations to 
bolster lines of argument-an approach common to most expositions of 
Church teachings at that time. Pius XI's Quadragesimo Anno, the many 
writings and addresses of Pius XII, and two major encyclicals of John XXIII, 
Mater et Magistra and Pacem in Terris, followed this same general pattern. 
These teachings contain a growing receptivity to secular, social science 
sources. 

A new departure in this development came with the Second Vatican 
Council's document Gaudium et Spes, "The Church in the Modern World," 
and subsequently with Paul VI's Populorum Progressio. Both of these 
documents reveal an emphasis upon Biblical theology rather than a reliance 
simply on Biblical quotations. That is, an effort is made genuinely to 
theologize upon the scriptural teachings on social justice and on the social 
mission of man in this world. This emphasis upon Biblical theology, in the 
view of many, adds a new dimension to the social teaching of the Church. 

This new dimension reached a still clearer expression in the document 
of the Second Roman Synod entitled "Justice in the World," of November, 
1971. Biblical theology clearly provided a central thrust in the preparations 

65 



for, the debates over, and the final wording of this major document. Thus 
the Bishops of the Synod were able to say: 

Scrutinizing the "signs of the times" and seeking to detect 
th« meaning of emerging history, while at the same time 
sharing the aspirations and questioning of all those who 
want to build a more human world, we have listened to 
the Word of God that we might be converted to the 
fulfilling of the divine plan for the salvation of the world. 
(Introduction; emphasis added) 

Listening to the Word of God, the Bishops said that "the hopes and forces 
which are moving the world in its very foundations are not foreign to the 
dynamism of the Gospel, which through the power of the Holy Spirit frees 
men from personal sin and from its consequences in social life." 
(Introduction) This emphasis by the Synod on the congruence of secular 
and religious (Gospel) forces is highly significant. But even more significant 
is the stress placed upon the social implications of a scriptural understanding 
of sin. 

The "new" category of social sin. A major theme in Biblical theology is, 
of course, the theme of sin and redemption. It is this theme which the 
Synod document on world justice explicitly picks up and develops in a 
social context, thereby explicating a new dimension in Church social 
teaching-the dimensions of "social sin." While this category of social sin can 
be found in earlier teachings, it is not found with the explicitness and detail 
with which the Synod debated the topic and wrote of it in its final 
document. 

In general, social sin refers to: 
1. Structures that oppress human beings, violate human 

dignity, stifle freedom, impose gross inequality. 
2. Situations that promote and facilitate individual acts of 

selfishness. 
3. The complicity of persons who do not take responsibility 

for the evil being done. 
The discussion of social sin is something for which many of us were not 

prepared. This fact was acknowledged by the Bishops at the Synod in their 
general debate, and summed up as follows: 
66 



How is it, after 80 years of modern social teaching and 
two thousand years of the Gospel of love, that the Church 
has to admit her inability to make more impact upon the 
conscience of Her people?...It was stressed again and again 
[in the debate] that the faithful, particularly the more 
wealthy and comfortable among them, simply do not see 
structural social injustice as a sin, simply feel no personal 
responsibility for it and simply feel no obligation to do 
anything about it. Sunday observance, the Church's rules 
on sex and marriage tend to enter the Catholic 
consciousness profoundly as sin. To live like Dives with 
Lazarus at the gate is not even perceived as sinful. (No. 7) 

What the Bishops were reflecting has been underscored with startling clarity 
by a survey on the focus of moral advice published in a leading American 
Catholic theological journal: 

In recent issues (within the past decade) of The American 
Ecclesiastical Review, a distinguished moral theologian 
answered the following questions, among others: May an 
Episcopalian clergyman be called a "priest"? May 
Catholics patronize a drugstore in which contraceptives 
are sold? May a used-car dealer repair a car so as to give 
the impression that it is in better condition than it 
actually is? If two Catholics are eating in a restaurant and 
one inadvertently orders meat, must the other remind him 
of the day? (Paul Hanley Furfey, The Respectable 
Murderers, New York: Herder and Herder, 1966, p. 147) 

As further evidence of underdevelopment in defining the idea of social 
sin, we can cite the articles under "sin" in the New Catholic Encyclopedia. 
This monumental work, published in the United States in 1967 (after 
Vatican II) attempted to bring up-to-date the best Catholic thought in a 
wide range of areas. There is no discussion at all of the meaning or 
implications of social sin. 

At this point, then, we certainly must ask: why hasn't there been a 
theological development of this category of social sin and a pastoral 
explanation to the people? It surely seems clear that the "religious" person 
in our society is often equated with the "morally upright" person. But 
individual morality is what we focus on, not social morality. An 

67 



individualistic spirit appears to prevail in both the theoretical framework of 
Catholic moral theology and the practice of moral virtue. We can suggest 
several reasons for this. 

First , traditional moral theology was act-oriented, rather than 
actor-oriented. Arising especially out of the practice of the Sacrament of 
Penance, this has meant a concentration upon concrete actions, specific 
instances, individual events. As a consequence, the general quality of the 
person who performs the acts~his or her orientation, habits, and 
attitudes-has not been emphasized. Traditional moral theology tended to be 
concerned with the deed performed rather than with the sort of person who 
performed the deed. 

The act-oriented approach does not help to delineate a broad range of 
responsibility for me as a Christian, because with so much emphasis on what 
I "should do" there is not enough emphasis on what I "must be." Take the 
example of an ethic of measuring personal success and deriving great 
personal satisfaction from the acquisition of material goods (closely related 
to the traditional concept of the personal sin, "avarice"). A serious evil in 
affluent circles in the United States today, this attitude is translated into 
action as frequently through omissions as through acts. There arises a 
serious social manifestation of excessive attachment to one's personal 
possessions, (shown, for instance, by refusal to support tax reform 
measures). This seems to be a case of social sin, large scale hardness of heart, 
which results from an aggregate of individual self-concern. But the 
act-orientation of traditional moral theology does not provide such 
assistance in guiding individual Christian consciences here. 

A second and related reason for the theological underdevelopment of 
the category of social sin has been the traditional doctrine of "inculpable 
ignorance." Traditional moral theology has always taught that a person does 
not sin if he or she is ignorant of the seriousness of the deed that he or she 
performs. He would be culpable, or guilty, if he were in fact ignorant 
through his own fault-for example, if he did not make a reasonable effort 
to enlighten himself. But if he were ignorant through no fault of his 
own-truly inculpable-then there would certainly be no sin involved, even if 
he did something very seriously wrong in the "objective order." Since it is 
presumed that individuals can be knowledgeable of individual actions and 
their consequences, "inculpable ignorance" would not be considered very 
common among individual actions. But the intricate complexities of the 
modern social scene would make "inculpable ignorance" much more 
common and hence social sin much less frequent. 

68 



Third, much recent theology in both Protestant and Catholic circles has 
been influenced by existentialist and personalist philosophies. This has 
resulted in what Johannes Metz has called the "privatization" of theology, a 
serious loss of the social dimension of the Christian message. (Theology of 
the World, New York: Herder and Herder, 1971, p. 111) As a consequence, 
there is a significant "a-political" thrust in theology in general, and in moral 
theology in particular. 

A fourth reason why social sin has not been emphasized seems to be the 
distinction drawn between "legal" and "moral." Although the two are often 
confused, they are definitely not identical, either conceptually or in the 
practical order. Indeed, it is possible to have something that is completely 
legal according to all proper laws, but is definitely not moral in the sense 
that it does not render justice. An example would be a system whereby 
highly exhorbitant interest is charged on loans according to the law, even 
though it does great injustice to those lower-income persons obliged to pay 
the interest. An individual who "follows the law" might consider himself to 
be highly moral, yet he may fail in justice. This legalistic mentality has 
frequently prevailed in religious discussions of social justice, hindering the 
development of a social morality that shows appreciation of social sin. 

The evolution of our understanding of social sin. -Because of this 
apparent theological underdevelopment of sooial sin, let's examine some 
recent patterns and influences that helped to facilitate the more thorough 
discussion of this topic by the Second Roman Synod. 

This is important for at least two reasons: (1) to show how this 
theological concept came to be accepted; and (2) to learn how it can be 
effectively communicated to others. 

Certainly the experience of the Second World War heavily influenced 
European and American theologians to consider the social dimension of 
theological thought and Church action. Something much more profound 
than Reischenbauch's "Social Gospel" was needed in the face of the war's 
horrendous moral evil and the complicity of so many "good" Christians. 
Bonhoeffer's search for a "religionless Christianity" and his willingness to 
face "the cost of discipleship" gave rise in the post-War years to searching 
analyses of the relationship between the Gospel and the modem social 
order. Key to that search was an emphasis upon structures. 

69 



Recognition of the power of structures was given in Pope John XXIII's 
Mater et Magistra, in his discussion of "socialization." (Nos. 59-67) The 
relation of structures to sin was subsequently developed in a remarkable 
passage contained in the 1965 document of Vatican II, Gaudium etSpes: 

To be sure the disturbances which so frequently occur in 
the social order result in part from the natural tensions of 
economic, political, and social forms. But at a deeper level 
they flow from man's pride and selfishness, which 
contaminate even the social sphere. When the structure of 
affairs is flawed by the consequences of sin, man, already 
born with a bent toward evil, finds there new inducements 
to sin, which cannot be overcome without strenuous 
efforts and the assistance of grace. (No. 25) 

What is particularly remarkable about this passage is that (1) it cogently 
links structures and sin; (2) it stands out in isolation in the total document; 
and (3) it was not immediately followed by further development of the 
same theme in other Catholic social writings. 

A major advance in the development of social theology came from 
Protestant thinkers. In July, 1966 at Geneva, the World Council of Churches 
Conference on Church and Society began grappling with the theology of 
revolution, with the fact of violence in the modern world, and with the 
Christian's relation to violence. The problem of violence necessarily raises 
the structural issue, which has to do with the ways of life. When aggregated 
and considered society's normal ways of doing things, modes of living are 
called the system or the structures. If the system is oppressing human 
dignity, then it is itself doing violence to the oppressed. This violence by 
political, economic, and social structures-despite its seeming legality, its 
subtle, non-violent appearances, its projection by the ruling powers as part 
of the unchangeable status quo-is the situation which provokes a violent 
defense, the action of revolutionaries who seek to remove the unjust 
structures. 

The World Council of Churches meeting recognized that for many in 
the world, especially in the developing countries, the question was one of 
meeting violence with violence. The real authors of disturbance are 
identified not as those who hunger and thirst after justice, but those who, to 
protect their privileges, prevent justice by maintaining the structures of 
oppression. 

70 



Two years later in April, 1968, the Beirut Conference on "World 
Cooperation for Development" again returned to the problem of unjust 
structures. Sponsored by SODEPAX, this conference emphasized: 

And our responsibility is not merely as persons for other 
people, but also for the political and economic structures 
that bring about poverty, injustice and violence. Today 
our responsibility has a new dimension because men now 
have the power to remove the causes of the evil, whose 
symptoms alone they could treat before. (World 
Development: The Challenge to the Church, Geneva: 
SODEPAX, 1968, p. 15) 

The relationship between these structures of oppression and sin was made 
explicit at Beirut: "We know the reality of sin and the depth of its hold on 
human beings, and on our political and economic structures..." (pp. 16-17) 
Injustice was seen sometimes to be "so embedded in the status quo" that 
violent revolution might be justified to bring about change, (p. 20) 

This "opening to violence" was, understandably, a trend which 
disturbed many church leaders and theologians. In his 1966 encyclical, 
Populorum Progressio, Paul VI had spoken of the fact that "men are easily 
induced to use force to fight against the wrong done to human dignity," 
especially when "it is a question of manifest and lasting tyranny that 
damages the primary rights of the human person and inflicts serious harm 
on the common good of the country." (No. 31) When the Pope went to 
Latin America in 1968, however, he clarified his position so as to avoid 
endorsement of violent revolution. 

Latin America: Medettin and Gutierrez. In late August and early 
September, 1968, the Second General Conference of Latin American 
Bishops met at Medellin, Columbia. The Medellin Conference opened with 
an address by Paul VI, who warned that Christians "can not be linked with 
systems and structures which cover up and favor grave and oppressive 
inequalities among the classes and citizens of one and the same country..." 
(The Church in the Present-Day Transformation of Latin America in the 
Light of the Council, Washington, D.C.: Latin America Bureau, USCC, 
1970, II, 31) The discussions referred to these systems and structures as 
being forms of "internal colonialism" (the domination of the poor classes 
by the rich classes) and "external neo-colonialism" (the domination of the 
poor countries by the rich countries). Again and again, the power of 
structures was emphasized, and the need to transform them was stressed. 
Not surprisingly this very theme has been emphasized in Latin America. For 

71 



years, the Argentine economist Raul Prebisch had been insisting that the 
basic problems facing development in the poor nations were structural and 
needed to be met by changes of structures. 

The concluding statement of Medellin was very explicit about injustice 
embedded in structures: ["The Christian"] recognizes that in many 
instances Latin America finds itself faced with a situation of injustice that 
can be called institutionalized violence..:violating fundamental rights." (II, 
78; emphasis added) The realities of this injustice were clearly said to 
constitute "a sinful situation." (II, 71) The General Secretary of the 
Conference, Bishop Eduardo Pironio, emphasized: "It is evident that in the 
Latin American reality there exists a 'condition of sin' that ought to be 
transformed into a reality of justice and sanctity." (I: 112) 

The direction of thought on structures and sin, which was being set 
forth at Medellin, was finding its underpinning in the works of several Latin 
American theologians who were discussing a "theology of liberation." 
Foremost among these theologians was Gustavo Gutierrez, of Lima, Peru. 
According to Gutierrez, "liberation" is a far more expressive 
word-theologically as well as sociologically--than "development." 
Development tends to be heard primarily in an economic sense, and 
connotes dependence of some people on the assistance of others. 
Liberation, however, emphasizes more of the integral human aspects of the 
process, and immediately connotes the struggle against the asymmetrical 
power relationships between rich and poor. The content and implications of 
the "theology of liberation" is summarized by Gutierrez in a passage worth 
quoting at length: 

In the past two years we have seen a flurry of public 
statements: from lay movements, groups of priests and 
bishops, and entire episcopates. A constant refrain in 
these statements is the admission of the Church's 
solidarity with Latin America's plight. The Church refuses 
to disregard that plight, seeking instead to accept its 
responsibility to correct the injustices. The poverty, 
injustice, and exploitation of man by fellow man in Latin 
America is often called "institutionalized violence." 
Theologically, that phenomenon is called a "situation of 
sin." The reality so described is more and more obviously 
the result of a situation of dependence, i.e., the centers 
where decisions are made are located outside our 
continent-a fact that keeps our countries in a condition 

72 



of neocolonialism. In all these statements, from a variety 
of sources inside the Latin American Church, the term 
"development" is gradually being displaced by the term 
"liberation." The word and the idea behind it express the 
desire to get rid of the condition of dependence, but even 
more than that they underline the desire of the oppressed 
peoples to seize the reins of their own destiny and shake 
free from the present servitude, as a symbol of the 
freedom from sin provided by Christ. This liberation will 
only be achieved by a thorough change of structures. 
("Theology of Liberation," Theological Studies, 1970, pp. 
251-252) 

The theological importance of Gutierrez' emphasis is clear. In biblical 
language, liberation is primarily liberation from sin, and it is a liberation 
possible only through the power of God, and, in the New Testament, the 
power of Jesus Christ. To speak of liberation in a social sense, then, is to 
speak of social sin-and to emphasize the social struggle against that sin. 
Gutierrez writes: 

Christ thus appears as the Savior who, by liberating us 
from sin, liberates us from the very roots of social 
injustice. The entire dynamism of human history, the 
struggle against all that depersonalizes man-social 
inequalities, misery, exploitation-have their origin, are 
sublimated, and reach their plentitude in the salvific work 
of Christ, (p. 257) 

The implications for the life of the Christian-and for the Christian 
Church-are readily evident. 

The Synod's exposition.-A. special working paper on justice in the 
world, was distributed in April, 1971, to the Catholic Bishops prior to the 
Roman Synod of 1971. The paper discussed the theme of justice in very 
concrete terms and spoke of the challenge to the Church to respond with 
specific actions. In the opening paragraph of this document, we find a clear 
hint of the approach the Bishops would eventually take on structures and 
social sin: "[Men of our times] demand profound changes in the very 
structures of society, structures which often constitute in themselves an 
embodiment of the sin of injustice." (No. 2) 

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In its response to this working paper, prepared prior to the meeting of 
the Synod, the Peruvian Episcopal Conference spoke of the need for a 
"faith which interprets the present situation [of social injustice] as sinful 
and a negation of God's plan," and called for "a denunciation of sin in the 
oppressive consumer society which creates artificial needs and superfluous 
expenses." (IDOC, December 11, 1971, pp. 4-5) Similarly, these Bishops 
spoke of "a world and a humanity marked by sin and characterized by its 
consequences, which are injustice, deprivation, exploitation, and 
oppression..." (p. 12) In the responses made by other National Conferences 
of Bishops, there was considerable discussion of the need to struggle against 
unjust social structures, but not much explicit reference to social sin. 

In the Synod debate itself, the theme of social sin and sinful structures 
appeared frequently in a variety of forms from several different sources. 
Cardinal Tarancon of Spain was very clear: 

It is true that the Church's mission begins with liberating 
man from sin. But it does not end there. Moreover, 
colonialism, cultural and economic domination, 
oppression of the weak-all these are really and truly social 
sins. 

Cardinal Flahiff of Winnipeg states: 
Christianity liberates. It liberates from sin-not only 
personal sin, but also and perhaps chiefly from social sin, 
since social sin, like original sin, creates a situation 
wherein individual sin becomes easy and acceptable. 

One other strong voice in the Synod debate which emphasized this 
theme was that of Cardinal Alfrink of Utrecht. According to him: 

The number of injustices deriving from man's behavior 
and from the institutions created by man are growing. 
Unjust economic and political structures constitute a 
"close at hand" occasion to commit sins of individual and 
particularly collective injustice. An unjust situation 
becomes a grave sin at the moment in which one becomes 
aware of it and refuses to exert oneself to change it. 
Conversion of heart is indispensible but this should arrive 
at the point of strongly wishing to bring about the change 
of situations which are objectively unjust. 

74 



The result of such input into the Synod debate is evident in the final 
text of "Justice in the World." The Bishops are moved by "the cry of those 
who suffer violence and are oppressed by unjust systems and structures," 
and remind the Church that her mission for the redemption of the human 
race includes "its liberation from every oppressive situation." (Introduction) 
In promoting an integral development to meet the expectations of our time, 
we must not ignore "the objective obstacles which social structures place in 
the way of conversion of hearts"-structures, for example, which would 
make the poor nations "the victims of the interplay of international 
economic forces." (Part I) 

After sketching the outlines of our modern world, the Bishops 
conclude, "In the face of the present-day situation of the world, marked as 
it is by the grave sin of injustice, we recognize both our responsibility and 
our inability to overcome it by our own strength." (Part II; emphasis added) 
Such a situation calls Christians to be aware of the true meaning and urgent 
demands of the Christian message: "The mission of preaching the Gospel 
dictates at the present time that we should dedicate ourselves to the 
liberation of man even in his present existence in this world." (Part II) 

In reaching specifics, the Synod document refers strongly to "education 
to justice." It states: "But education demands a renewal of heart, a renewal 
based on the recognition of sin in its individual and social manifestations." 
(Part III; emphasis added) Furthermore, the liturgy is to be used to educate 
for justice, and thus "the practice of penance should emphasize the social 
dimension of sin and of the sacrament." (Part III; emphasis added) 

Thus it is possible to see from this review how the category of social sin 
evolved from a rather lean theological status to a significant factor in the 
Synod debates, eventually to receive authoritative acceptance in the Synod 
document. 

1. What is Social Sin? A structure that violates and oppresses human 
dignity is surely a sinful structure. For example, a welfare system, which 
operates as though its premise were that the poor are somehow bad and 
therefore not to be trusted or given any say in what happens to them, is a 
structure that violates the dignity of the poor. It is an oppressive structure 
that makes victims out of those who are obliged to follow its patterns and 
customs. Minimal payments, excessive surveillance, demeaning interviews, a 
punitive philosophy, the ever-present fear of cut-off of funds: all of these 
elements of the structure of a welfare system offend human dignity. We 

75 



would refer to personal action of such a character as sinful. But the action 
of the structure is even more effective in violating the poor and powerless 
than the action of an individual person. Hence, we must similarly refer to 
the action of this structure as sinful. 

2. A situation that promotes individual selfishness can be called a 
sinful situation. For example, zoning and tax systems that allow individual 
citizens to preserve their privileges at the expense of the poor and the 
powerless provide situations that support individual selfishness. Such 
restrictive legislation makes it impossible for the less economically 
advantaged to seek more desirable surroundings outside of the central city. 
A tax system, which places a disproportionate burden for the public goods 
upon lower-and-middle income people, (e.g. through numerous loop-holes 
for higher income brackets) is clearly a system that promotes the individual 
selfishness of some citizens in our society. 

Another example is the financial-income policies widely practiced in 
this country. Investments are made either to obtain quick gains (profits) or 
long-range gains in investment value (growth). Both reward persons with 
capital for steering clear of monetary involvement involving risk, or growth 
of other persons' interests. Such would be an investment in the poor, in 
minority banks, in development of cooperative businesses that have slower, 
but more consistent growth cycles, when managed properly. Therefore, the 
poor cannot obtain loans from banks or the government as easily as big 
interests. Similarly, mortgage payments and insurance are harder for 
low-income persons to obtain than for richer persons...making it next to 
impossible for the poor or lower middle classes to enjoy a decent life 
according to normal standards. Unionized, blue-collar working people are 
paid low wages in many areas, which does not enable them to maintain any 
real security. They are constantly afraid of price increases, layoffs, or new 
minority members entering their unions, of changing neighborhoods, which 
the financial establishments will see as signs of declining property values, 
(often a self-fulfilling prophecy caused by the financial institutions 
themselves). Hence, they bitterly resist integrated neighborhoods, 
low-income housing programs, welfare expenses (which crimp their already 
limited incomes), union minority training and membership programs. 
Meanwhile, the more affluent, who have invested capital with appropriate 
tax write-offs and protection privileges, (for the good of the economy, 
investment must be encouraged) pay proportionately less taxes to social 
improvement programs when they have much more wealth. These are all 
interlocking structures that define an environment for social sin. 

76 



The complicity or silent acquiescence in social injustice is a third 
instance of social sin. This occurs when one is aware of sinful structures or 
situations but refuses the responsibility of trying to change them when 
capable of doing so. There is no way to ascertain how often this may occur 
in a society as complicated as ours. Probably, people are ignorant 
(inculpably) or participating indirectly in arrangements that cause evil to 
other human beings. An example would be the problem of purchasing farm 
products produced by large agribusinesses or farmers who utilize farm 
laborers at below-living wages; who do not provide decent housing or 
provisions for the migrant farm workers, who lobby in state or federal 
legislatures against allowing such people to unionize, (a right guaranteed by 
church teachings as early as the encyclical Rerum Novarum of Pope Leo 
XIII). 

Continued patronage of such producers by buying their products 
rewards their system of doing things and supports the oppression of farm 
workers. The problem is that many well-meaning moral persons contribute 
to such interlocked large-scale problems without realizing it...and have 
trouble accepting personal responsibility for such situations because on their 
own personal level, the decision to purchase a certain product is good for 
their family, or good for some other reason. This results in many good 
people being outraged when they are told that they have contributed to 
"oppression"...they feel they have not chosen to do evil to anyone 
personally, and that criticisms of the system by which they live and derive 
their security is an attack on their person. The idea of social evil or social sin 
is extremely difficult to explain. 

Some sociological and theological insights — It is important for us to 
understand the theoretical framework that adds support to a position 
labeling the preaching examples as instances of social sin. This framework 
consists of a sociological emphasis on the reality of social structures, and a 
theological interpretation of the meaning of sin. 

A. Sociologists speak of the reality of social structures and emphasize 
that in modern society these structures-systems and institutions, 
socio-economic-political arrangements-are highly influential. For example, 
in studying the sociology of knowledge, Peter Berger has stressed the 
objective and historical fact of the institutions and structures of society. 
(Peter L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of 
Reality, Garden City, New York: Doubleday Anchor, 1967, pp. 53-67). 
These institutions and structures are external to the person and persistent in 

77 



their reality and influence-whether or not he or she likes it. In order to 
understand social institutions and structures, it is necessary to understand 
the process involved in both their genesis and their maintenance. Berger 
summarizes this process in three moments of a dialectic. 

1. Extemalization-ihs process by which man superimposes 
order on his environment in order to make it more 
meaningful and more useful. 

2. Obfectivation-the process by which the product of man's 
externalization is experienced as an autonomous reality 
confronting the individual as an external and coercive 
fact. ("That's the way things are," "the way 'they' want 
it," etc.) 

3. Internalization--the process of which structured reality is 
passed from generation to generation in the course of 
socialization. (Newcomers and children are taught how to 
live by existing ways so they can survive.) "Society is a 
human product. Society is an objective reality. Man is a 
social product." (p. 61) 

According to Berger and other sociologists, the structures and 
institutions of our society are not neutral either in constitution or in 
operation. This is extremely important. Structures and institutions 
essentially embody value-relationships, reflecting the values of those who 
construct them. Once created, these structures and institutions in turn 
influence these values. A political structure such as a representative 
assembly, an economic structure such as a tariff on certain imported goods, 
an educational structure such as compulsory schooling to the age of 
eighteen, a legal structure such as the bail and bond system, a techonological 
structure such as the modern communications media, familial structure such 
as a matriarchy: all of these embody meaning and value and reinforce and 
promote the same. As such, these social structures have tremendous human 
potential for good and for evil. Properly functioning social structures 
provide greater and better opportunities for human growth available to all 
groups in society. Unjust and unresponsive social structures hinder this 
human growth and freedom, thereby oppressing human dignity. 

The existence and the influence of social structures was clearly 
recognized in a celebrated passage in the 1961 encyclical Mater et Magistra 
of JohnXXni: 

78 



A leading characteristic of our day is the increase in social 
relations and social organizations by which is meant that 
constant growth of those bonds between men that have 
brought into their lives and activities a wide variety of 
social groupings which generally have been accorded 
private and public status in law. This increase springs from 
many modern factors including scientific and 
technological progress, superior productive efficiency and 
a higher standard of living among the citizens...This 
development of social organization brings many 
advantages and benefits...But with the daily multiplication 
in these various forms of organizations there comes a 
widespread increase in the laws...Thus the individual's 
freedom to act is confined to narrower limits. For means 
are often used, methods adapted and conditions created 
that make it difficult for an individual to make up his own 
mind independently of outside pressures, to act on his 
own initiative, to exercise his rights and duties properly 
and especially to avail himself of and perfect his abilities 
as a man. (Nos. 59-62) 

B. In recent years there has been considerable theological reflection on 
the meaning of sin, reflection which helps to throw light on the issue we are 
treating here of social sin. Biblical scholarship has shown that in its more 
refined scriptural treatment in John and in Paul, "sin" is used in the singular 
and implies a state or condition. This "sin" belongs more to the inner man, 
the actor, than "sins" or acts of "transgressions." It is a description of what 
flows from the character or quality of a person. The theologian Louis 
Monden has discussed this by describing sin in terms of "option." (Sin, 
Liberty and Law, New York: Sheed and Ward, 1965) Sin is thus seen 
primarily as a stance, an orientation, a direction that man gives to his life, 
rather than a single act or deed or incident. This stance is manifested and 
forced in the day-to-day actions-or failures to act-that go together to 
define our lives. 

Another theologian, Piet Schoonenberg, offers a helpful insight into the 
power of sin when he explains how man is "situated" in sin, how sin can 
pervade our whole being. According to Schoonenberg, this "situation" is 
integrally related to our capacity to freely choose: 

The freedom of the will does not mean that the will acts 
without any connection with what the whole person is, 
does, and feels...Modern individual and social psychology 

79 



makes us realize to what extent the decision of our will is 
influenced by our way of seeing concrete reality, by the 
spontaneous reaction of our drives, and, hence, also by 
the knowledge and motivation which we may receive from 
others-in one word, by our whole former education and 
present environment. All of this constitutes the ground on 
which, and the raw materials with which our free decision 
takes shape. (Man and Sin: A Theological View, Notre 
Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1965, p. 
I l l ) 

In this context, Schoonenberg speaks of the power of bad example, 
especially its power to obscure values and norms. Each individual, previous 
to any responsible decision-making, has need for moral formation; without 
this moral formation, individual virtue is very difficult, if not impossible. A 
simple and clear example is that of a child born into a family that lives from 
theft or prostitution, a family in which the norms of honesty and chastity 
are not observed and where these values are not alive or operative. We are 
reluctant to say that such a child seriously sins, because he or she has no 
possibility of making the choice of value. Yet, there still is harm which is 
done to others by the child, the harm which is done since the child has no 
chance for growing as a human person in this area of virtue. This situation 
of sin is perceived by Schoonenberg as analogous to the situation of 
"original sin." For the wider sin, the "historical sin" of mankind, is seen as a 
complex fabric of unjust social structures and many individual sins 
reinforcing each other. In this way a social milieu or general situation of sin 
for the whole human family builds upon itself. The social situation of 
original sin is basically a situation in which individual sinfulness is 
facilitated. 

The theological emphasis upon sin as situation-which at once relates 
more adequately to the findings of modern biblical scholarship and modern 
psychology-challenges traditional moral theology to move away from its 
act-orientation (described earlier in this paper) to an approach of 
actor-orientation. With this understanding, the social implications-indeed 
the social incarnations-of sin are more readily placed in perspective. 

The possibility for social incarnations of sin has been explained well by 
the Canadian theologian Gregory Baum, who suggests that we take seriously 
the category of the demonic. The demonic means that the evil at work 
among us cannot be reduced simply to individual human malice. Rather, 
there are processes and structures among us that multiply evil and spread 
destruction vastly exceeding the harm that can be done by individual 
80 



choices. Evil establishes itself profoundly in human history and is 
perpetuated by forces which, in part at least, seem to escape immediate 
personal control. Baum points to the political order and notes that the 
behavior of certain institutions is not wholly determined by the will of 
those who belong to these institutions nor even by those who exercise 
authority over them. Institutions seem to have a life of their own: (1) they 
can multiply good, with their beneficial effects comparatively independent 
of personal generosity or the lack thereof; or (2) they can multiply evil, 
with tendencies adversely affecting the lives of many people with a malice 
far surpassing the malice of the individuals involved. According to Baum, 
"the system, the apparatus, the machine does harm and inflicts suffering 
even against the goodwill of the men who serve it." He gives a striking 
description of an example of this process: 

In a company, for instance, a decision has to be made by 
the board of directors that will affect the lives of 
thousands of people. It is only after lunch that the 
meeting is able to discuss the proposed plan. Tired from 
the morning's work and the martinis before lunch, the 
directors sit around the table listening to the proposal 
made by the committee. The proposed plan seems 
advantageous to the organization, and even though it will 
disrupt the lives of many and unsettle the conditions of 
life for men in a vast area, the directors give it their 
approval, without facing these issues and assuming full 
responsibility for the results. They vaguely rely on the 
committee that proposed the plan: they may not have 
been delighted with it but neither were they alert enough 
to resist it. A halfhearted approval from each of the board 
members sufficed, the vote was cast, the decision was 
adopted, and from then on the machinery executes it with 
precision. After the vote, a member of the board may 
discover that the new policy has more destructive 
consequences than he thought, but now there is nothing 
he can do. The institution moves ahead with automatic 
and unrelenting regularity. Repentance, goodwill, holiness 
will not help him. Only a highly complex social 
process-calling an emergency meeting, convincing the 
other directors, finding an alternative plan, etc.-a process 
which is not always within reach, could possibly put a 
stop to the execution of the orders. While the malice 
involved in the decision-making was minimal, the 
institution moves ahead like a monster more powerful 

81 



than man, repetitive, compulsive, inhumanly precise, 
devouring people in obedience to its inner programming. 
(Man Becoming: God in Secular Experience, New York: 
Herder and Herder, 1971, pp. 120-121) 

Baum is not directing his remarks against institutions as such but is simply 
pointing to the social consequences of institutional life, and the possibilities 
of the demonic to transcend individual personal fault. This description of 
social sin is extremely important in our complex technological society with 
its highly interdependent domestic and global responsibilities. Poverty, 
hatred, discrimination, prevention of political and social participation on 
the part of some in the decisions that make the society men live in-(it is to 
these realities) that the notion of social sin must now be applied by 
Christians who would be apostles of the Kingdom in their own time. 

The conclusions reached cannot be programmed or made completely 
uniform, but must result from the prayer of individuals and groups of 
Christians together, reflecting on the signs of the times and their own values 
and lives, and listening to the Word of God in Scripture and the teachings of 
the Church. We have tried here to present a summary of the background of 
recent development of "social sin" in the context of church social teachings, 
in order to stimulate thought and contribute to the discussion, rather than 
present a final synthesis or position paper. 

Beyond this, a discussion of social sin, as in any discussion of sin, must 
be met with a discussion of conversion. Aware of our social sin, convinced 
of the reality of sinful structures and institutions, impressed by the impact 
of sinful situations, we can look now for the meaning of social metanoia, 
the content and context of an act of social conversion. 

The 1968 Medellin documents made this point lucidly: "The 
uniqueness of the Christian message does not so much consist in the 
affirmation of the necessity for structural change, as it does in the insistence 
on the conversion of men which will in turn bring about this change." (II, 
58) First personal conversion, then conversion of structures; but no 
authentic personal conversion without genuine commitment to changing 
structures. Clearly, the "first...then" is not temporal. For the test of the 
validity and viability of the one is action on behalf of the other. It is to the 
question of conversion and Christian ways of living that the next paper will 
address itself. 

82 



CHRISTIANITY: A LIFESTYLE 
FREDERICK J. PERELLA, JR. ASSISTANT EDUCATIONAL COORDINATOR, CHD 

Living according to the Gospel is not, and never has been, an easy 
matter. The way of Christ was meant to be a lifestyle - a relevant 
world-view based upon faith and the actual power of the Holy Spirit. This is 
what Jesus meant when He said: 

I tell you most solemnly, unless a man is born through 
water and the Spirit he cannot enter the Kingdom of 
God. What is born of the flesh is flesh; What is born of 
the Spirit is spirit (John 3:5) 

St. Paul described the redeemed person as a "new creation," a really new 
type of human being. Jesus continually stated that we, of our own human 
power, cannot manage this new life without His Spirit. 

I am the vine, you are the branches....cut off from me 
you can do nothing. (John 15:5) 

Following Jesus is not meant to be a mental acceptance of historical 
concepts or metaphysical explanations. Unless the experience of Christ's 
power changes our basic assumptions and the behavior which flows from 
them, we have not become new persons. New wine will not stay contained 
in old wineskins because the old are simply not adequate and new basic 
values are needed: 

A conversion which is only a matter of ideas, an 
intellectual change, would not be what the Gospel 
means by conversion...the entire process of metanoia -
conversion - takes place at the level of the heart. 

P. A. Liege, O.P. 
What Is Christian Life? 
Hawthorne Books, New York, 
1951,p. 11. 

Thus, becoming a Christian, another Christ, entails first a radical acceptance 
of the Spirit of Christ as a guiding power in one's life. Living the Gospel first 
depends upon personal conversion and faith. 

What does it mean to accept the assumptions of Christ? St. Paul often 
contrasted the lifestyle "of the world" to the lifestyle of the Spirit which is 
'Vrt the world" - A Christian does not withdraw from, reject or ignore the 
world, but immerses himself in recreating it and totally loving it with 
assumptions and values which do not proceed from the mind "of the 

83 





world." "Submitting to baptism" means accepting Jesus as Lord, revising 
one's entire attitude towards life, and giving up worldly self-sufficiency to 
put a total trust in God. Also this new way of life, as the General 
Catechetical Directory states, is totally gratuitous- God gives it. 
Consequently living as Jesus lived comes not so much from taking on new 
deeds or new laws, but in opening ourselves to the Spirit's guidance and 
being willing to risk what seems to many to be foolishness, absurdity, total 
naivete. As St. Paul states, we become fools for Christ. 

Jesus counselled to love enemies; to serve others rather 
than lording it over them; to give cloak and tunic, extra 
time to those who ask; to turn the other cheek when 
slapped; to place total confidence in God's providence 
and not to depend on the security of accumulated 
goods, stylish clothing, stockpiled food supplies; to 
free the oppressed; to visit the imprisoned; to love 
other persons as much and in the same way as one 
loves him or her self; to give life, not by taking or 
hoarding it but by surrendering ourselves in love and 
even in death; not to fear death; and to realize that to 
live each person must die to self-centered needs and 
actions. 

Realistically, who among us lives this way? Or even thinks that Christianity 
means to live this way? At gut level, it seems to be unwise, unrealistic, 
idealistic, ridiculous. 

The language of the cross may be illogical to those who 
are not on the way to salvation, but those of us who 
are on the way see it as God's power to save. As 
scripture says: I shall destroy the wisdom of the wise 
and bring to nothing all the learning of the learned. 
Where are the philosophers now? Where are the 
scribes? Where are any of our thinkers today? Do you 
see now how God has shown up the foolishness of 
human wisdom? If it was God's wisdom that human 
wisdom should not know God, it was because God 
wanted to save those who have faith through the 
foolishness of the message that we preach. And so, 
while the Jews demand miracles and the Greeks look 
for wisdom, here are we preaching a crucified Christ; to 
the Jews an obstacle that they cannot get over, to the 
pagans madness, but to those who have been called, 



whether they are Jews or Greeks, a Christ who is the 
power and the wisdom of God. For God's foolishness is 
wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is 
stronger than human strength. 
Take yourselves for instance, brothers, at the same 
time you were called: how many of you were wise in 
the ordinary sense of the word, how many were 
influential people, or came from noble families? No, it 
was to shame the wise that God chose what is foolish 
by human reckoning, and to shame what is strong that 
he chose what is weak by human reckoning; those 
whom the world thinks common and contemptible are 
the ones that God has chosen - those who are nothing 
at all to show up those who are everything. The human 
race has nothing to boast about to God, but God has 
made you members of Christ Jesus and by God's doing 
he has become our wisdom, and our virtue, and our 
holiness, and our freedom. As scripture says: If anyone 
wants to boast, let him boast about the Lord. (1 Cor. 
1:18-31) 

The "foolishness" which Paul describes is the radical attitude of sharing, 
willingness to be uncertain, refusing to take life for one's own security, or to 
hoard material goods, rejecting worldly power which dominates and 
embracing powerlessness which seeks the development and creative free 
participation of other people in society. Only liberation from certain human 
fears can make us free, and that liberation in Christ's Church is found in 
Spirit and in community. 

The Spirit and the Virtue of Poverty. 
Total openness is the door through which Christ's Spirit can enter - if 

people try to predict or force the Spirit into categories of human minds, the 
Spirit cannot work there because the person wants to control the future. A 
basic human need is to control things, to be secure, to be able to predict 
reasonably what will happen - in a job, in case of illness, in a personal 
relationship. Jesus asks us each to relinquish such security and this "letting 
go" is very difficult. Living this openness, and pouring oneself out to give 
life to the world, appears absurd to the worldly wise. Faith, an act of trust 
in the person of Christ, is the bridge over the uncertainty and does not 
provide intellectual certitude. Hence, Christians are "poor" - without 
86 



fortifications before God. They must trust His love. The central virtue of 
Christianity might be called poverty of spirit, and, as was observed in 
chapter one, the "poor" are those unpretentious ones for whom Christ's 
Kingdom is especially intended, Johannes Metz has expanded this theme: 

A man with grace is a man who has been emptied, 
who stands impoverished before God, who has nothing 
of which he can boast. "For God is at work in you, 
both to will and to work for his good pleasure" (Phil. 
2, 13). He works out his salvation in the poverty of 
"fear and trembling" (Phil. 2, 12). Grace does not erase 
our poverty; it transforms it totally, allowing it to 
share in the poverty of Jesus' own immolated heart (cf. 
Rom. 8, 17). 
This poverty, then, is not just another virtue - one 
among many. It is a necessary ingredient in any 
authentic Christian attitude toward life. Without it 
there can be no Christianity and no imitation of Christ. 
It is no accident that "poverty of spirit" is the first of 
the beatitudes. What is the sorrow of those who 
mourn, the suffering of the persecuted, the 
well-forgetfulness of the merciful, or the humility of 
the peacemakers - what are these if not variations of 
spiritual poverty? This spirit is also the mother of the 
three-fold mystery of faith, hope and charity. It is the 
doorway through which men must pass to become 
authentic human beings. 
Only through poverty of spirit do men draw near to 
God; only through it does God draw near to man. 
Poverty of spirit is the meeting point of heaven and 
earth, the mysterious place where God and man 
encounter each other, the point where infinite mystery 
meets concrete existence. (Poverty of Spirit, Johannes 
B. Metz, pp. 25 and 26) 

Thus, the community of Christians has as its first requirement embracing 
poverty of spirit ~ to become poor so that God might enrich us with true 
life; to become poor so that, as Christ did, we can be free to enrich others 
through community, the Word, and service of their needs. This implies the 
divesting of illusory, "of the world" goods: self-sufficiency, personal 
strength, storing up "worldly" powers against deaths of all kind 

87 



(maintaining youth or beauty against age; maintaining influence against 
feeling useless or unimportant; maintaining goods and clothes against 
loneliness or insecurity about tomorrow; maintaining one's style of strength 
and "cool" against looking weak or useless.) Christ teaches first the need to 
accept death to self and physical death as the entrance to true life. Then, 
through the Cross, we will be raised to new life. 

Much anxiety, time, resources and entire lives are spent seeking 
fortification against these many kinds of death. (Death, if seen as 
surrendering life or some part of yourself, occurs every day, each time one 
suffers, is embarrassed, is hurt by a loved one, fails in some enterprise. It is 
limitation, finitude.) Moreover, the time and resources expended in 
attempts at self-fortification are those often anxiously hoarded from 
others — they create division or jealousy — and block sharing among people. 
Jesus, and the Church, as reviewed in chapter one, have revealed that true 
life resides in giving life, not in taking it. Life "of the world" assumes a basic 
"scarcity principle" --1 must be careful to protect and provide for myself — 
in all things. True life does not hoard things, time or self, but, respecting 
basic human needs for provisions and freedom, shares goods, personal time, 
concern and abilities, friendship and faith in order to build up full human 
life. Living this way is not easy. The virtue of poverty of spirit, and open 
belief in the Holy Spirit as more than a mental figment, must pervade active 
Christian life. As it is, the way "of the world" lives out basic assumptions — 
that I am essentially alone and defenseless in life, that I will die once 
forever, that I must store up defenses of all kinds against various insecurities 
in life. Christ did not live by these assumptions, and offers us His Spirit as 
Power to overcome them. 

Community and Simplicity of Lifestyle. 
Catholics have for centuries repeated the words "the Communion of 

Saints" when reciting the Apostles' or Nicene Creed. Do we normally realize 
the consequences that flow from this dogma? In his book What Is Christian 
Life, Fr. P. A. Liege examines this point further: 

Christian conduct involves personal sanctification and 
responsibility. But it is also and necessarily acted out 
within the Church, is holiness within a mystical body. 
And this opens out a new dimension for Christian 
responsibility; the consequences of what a Christian 
man does affects in every way far more than his 
individual life. By "in every way" we mean first the 

88 



community of Christians and then the community of 
all men. For all mankind and the whole of human 
history acquire their full meaning in the mystical body 
of Christ. 
Do Christians normally realize the consequences that 
flow from the dogma of the communion of saints? For 
these would make them conscious that they are truly 
responsible for the Christian life of their brethren and 
that they are ontologically involved in it...Each single 
member of a Christian community must integrate the 
communal dimension into his behavior...when a man 
falls, who is to say that they (members of the 
community) are not responsible for his fall, if they had 
done nothing to hold him up before his fall? It is 
untrue to say that such a matter is no concern of ours, 
even though the assumption of responsibility for it 
may sometimes require much tact. 

This demands reflection on what the collective effect 
of personal conduct and the political dimension of 
human activity should make a Christian do. 

(P.A. Liege, What is Christian 
Life, Hawthorn Books, New 
York, 1961, p. 113-14) 

The implications for living the social teachings of the Church in community 
are great. For just as it is clear that individual conversion, prayer, and 
poverty of spirit are necessary for any person to accept the Lordship of 
Jesus Christ, it is also clear that the Lord did not call His followers to an 
individualistic religion. Salvation is worked out in community, in life with 
other persons. Christ's assumptions and example direct followers toward 
loving involvement in the hopes and fears, joys and sorrows of all other 
human beings. We are called to be "all one," as Jesus prayed at the Last 
Supper in John's Gospel. 

You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a 
consecrated nation, a people God means to have for 
himself; it is yours to proclaim the exploits of the God 
who has called you out of darkness into this marvelous 
light. (1 Peter 2.9) 

89 



Peter addressed this vocation to all Christians, not only priests or 
professional religious. 

What does this mean in contemporary, pastoral terms? For one thing, 
it means that the mission both of each individual and all the members in a 
Christian community concerns not only each other's needs, but those of all 
people. A parish or other Christian community is not therefore established 
only to sustain its own needs, but to enable its members to proclaim and 
witness the Gospel. The internal life of community - the service, witness, 
education, worship and fellowship - are signs of our love for each other and 
resources to enable us to turn these same activities outwards to other 
people. Effective dealing with causes of bondage and impediments to human 
freedom and development requires new levels of involvement. Political and 
economic programs and strategies, both on the domestic and international 
levels, are valid and necessary levels of involvement for Christian 
communities which minister to the needs of people in modern human 
situations. Individual charity alone is not sufficient today. 

The Gospel as a living organism has no difficulty in 
adopting this political development of the life and 
events of contemporary man. Already, beforehand, it is 
open to every call for more unity and universality. 
Always beforehand, it breathes the spirit of 
disinterestedness and of service on a collective plane, of 
love for the poorest and for the victims of the great 
powers of egoism. Christians should have less difficulty 
than others in accepting the promotion of 
under-developed peoples, the disinterestedness of the 
developed nations and the condemnation of 
nationalism, the fight against the rule of money and of 
private interests. They ought to be the first to raise 
their charity to the sphere of the general causes of 
social injustice. Charity makes wider demands than in 
the past and can no longer be satisfied with personal 
relations. Less than ever can the Christian realist 
content himself with strictly but narrowly fulfilling the 
duties of his position in life. 

On all hands the personal responsibility of every 
Christian is being urged to widen out to the dimensions 
of the mystical Body. As each day passes the universal 
solidarity of all men becomes less and less an 
abstraction. All the facts-- economic, political, 

90 



military - make this abundantly plain. Whether we 
realize it or not, no one of our actions, however 
personal it may be, can keep clear of this new network 
of human communion, for their responsibility is 
extending every more widely. If we realize that the 
half-dead man helped by the Good Samaritan is today 
r e p r e s e n t e d by a thousand million men, 
under-nourished, ill-housed, under-educated-
four-fifths of mankind -- does this not at least dictate a 
deepening of the Christian outlook on material goods 
and the fight for social justice? All things press me with 
the question of the coming of others upon the scene, 
whether these are near or far, and I cannot shirk the 
answer. 

(Liege, pp. 116-117) 
Christian communities, then, are called to deal also with structural questions 
of larger scale than one-to-one relationships - for structural and collective 
systems of politics and economy affect life in the world. 

It is no longer possible for every person or family to do "his own 
thing" - every action we take has its effect on another person - the world is 
an interwoven whole network of economic, biophysical, political and social 
interactions. When I breathe or drive my car, I affect the air someone else 
breathes. When I pay taxes over which I have no control, I enable others to 
do things which affect people for good or ill. When I buy slacks, lettuce, or 
when I ask that land be zoned for one purpose only, I am affecting others. 
These realities pose very hard and hugely unmanageable problems for an 
individual — how can one person deal with such awesome interconnections? 
Personal lifestyle and faith are the root of response, but alone will not be 
enough. 

A second consideration therefore is the need for community as a 
personal support system. If the attitude of Christ is difficult to live out 
(because it risks martyrdom and uncertainty and self-immolation), not only 
is faith in the Spirit and poverty of Spirit necessary to seek among 
Christians, but dynamic small communities which share resources (even 
money) which encourage, build up, console individual members and families 
who are trying to live the Gospel - are needed to liberate members from 
basic fears of isolation and to enable them to meet their human and spiritual 
needs even while living faithfully a life of simplicity and openness. To live 
Gospel values in our culture is difficult because our own cultural values 

91 



stress independence, individual strength, self-sufficiency and success, the 
nuclear family and mobility. These values place emphasis on a market-place 
situation in which everyone, while trying to be a "nice guy," is still forced 
out of necessity to look out for himself. "You got to take care of your 
own," and, "if I don't watch out for myself, no one else will" - are very 
common feelings, if not statements. They are based upon the assumption 
that each person is responsible for himself - and has no one to blame but 
himself if he fails to provide. This cultural value of course is outdated by 
reality because individuals are affected by large economic political and 
social systems today — alone one can do nothing. In short, the atmosphere, 
which is quite a natural one, encourages fear and isolation and self-centered 
survival-oriented behavior. Every man for himself. 

In this context, any Christian finds it hard to live the social values of 
the Lord ~ they simply imply too much risk and insecurity. The Church can 
preach social responsibility ad infinitum but without some kind of security, 
people will be able to live it only with great difficulty. This is a situation of 
being caught in social sin. Current examples abound in the daily newspaper: 
a good example is the frequent reaction in urban areas among middle 
income people who generally are considered Christian and many of whom 
are Catholic, to react vehemently against a proposal to locate low income 
housing in their residential neighborhood. Reasons given for this reaction 
are many: some liberals accuse the middle income or lower middle income 
communities of being racist. Others, using a more economic analysis, state 
that these people generally have barely survived a highly mortgaged 
acquisition of a house, take great pride in that home and depend upon its 
maintaining or appreciating value, and are motivated by the almost certain 
event of property value decline (when low income housing enters the 
neighborhood). Naturally, economic analysts state, these people are worried 
and opposed to the idea of such an event because their entire life's assets 
and savings are at stake. There is no societal support to help them if 
property values begin to decline. Often high density public housing causes 
overcrowded schools, overcrowded recreation facilities, overburdening 
sanitation problems. These conditions are often caused by poor city 
planning of people who do not live in the area. Is the threat of economic 
loss a legitimate reason for a Christian to refuse location of poor and 
oftentimes minority people in their neighborhood? Are the needs of the 
residents for economic and other kinds of security reasonable and is their 
reaction therefore to be blamed on the city planners who insist upon 
packing poor people into high density housing? Are the residents racist? Is 
the pattern of declining property values the fault of real estate agents who 
speculate on the possible change of neighborhood and try to make fast 

92 



sales? In such a situation, it is very difficult and presumptuous to lay blame 
on any one person or persons. It is probable that different elements are 
involved in the decision of middle income residents. 

What happens to the sincere Christian in such a situation? In most 
cases, the desire to provide for one's family and the need to look out for 
one's own economic security, in a society where that responsibility is laid 
upon the individual, motivates the well-meaning Christian to resist a more 
socially oriented decision. He or she does not have the resources or security 
to place the needs of poor people equal to his or her own. It would be 
virtually asking that individual to be an economic or social martyr. And yet, 
it seems clear that only if the people involved in delicate social situations 
such as the one described, take into their hands the common good and 
develop methods to secure the reasonable needs of all the community, will 
racial and economic harmony and human development occur in our 
changing urban areas. 

How does being a Christian help a steelworker who makes 8 or 
$10,000 with a family of 5, a 20-year-old house containing a 30-year 
mortgage? How does being a Christian help this man when a black family 
moves next door and when real estate agents offer him a reduced price for 
his house, whispering the imminent decline of property values and the state 
of the neighborhood? Turn the question around: How does being a 
Christian help the poor minority head of household understand the fear and 
sense of desperation in the white tradesman who, afraid of losing his own 
job in an industry which has seasonal work, resists the entry of minority 
apprentices into his union? Can the Black or Spanish speaking or Indian 
worker love that other, who comes on as a racist? Most certainly the ability 
of a Christian to love his neighbor and put himself in the other man's shoes, 
the ability to consider the needs of one's brother as equal or greater than 
one's own, if supported by a strong faith and prayer and the strength of the 
Holy Spirit, will see a Christian through the difficulties of a changing 
neighborhood and of economic insecurity and social tensions. But in many 
cases the real problems encountered in such situations of social change are 
very brutal. There are real fears which, if acted upon, can create the very 
conditions which are feared. In such a situation what is the Christian thing 
to do. Does one suffer or sacrifice? And in social change situations, someone 
always loses something. How does all this affect the affluent parishes in the 
suburbia where social change is "zoned out." 

Here is a situation for a new pastoral approach within the Christian 
community. Most social problems result from the conflict situations of 
different groups or individuals who are trying to meet what they deem to be 

93 



their own legitimate needs. The fact that the Lord Jesus asks us all to set 
aside our own needs and self-love or at least to consider it equal to the needs 
and love of our brothers does not make it any easier for us as individuals to 
live by this Gospel. For life in the spirit of Christianity requires the two 
dimensions (1) individual faith and trust in the Lord and (2) the community 
of belief, support and love. Whether or not Christians who are motivated by 
society to perform less than Christian deeds are lacking in faith and love is 
something only God can decide. Undeniably in the past, the bearing of 
social burdens has often been laid on the individual. Questions asked have 
been "How can I get a job?" "How can I keep my property value?" Or, how 
can we resist the changes? "How can we provide for our own needs?" Where 
is the Christian community which asks "How can we all help each other 
satisfy our basic needs and still be just and help the poor and minority 
peoples share the good things?" The Christian community, if it were a true 
interacting community giving support and encouragement and brotherly 
correction, would share goods and help individuals in time of their weakness 
and trouble. This type of community life would certainly assist Christians to 
have the strength and the courage and understanding they need to live up to 
the standards of Jesus Christ. The lack of such support communities has 
been part of the problem with the individual-centered morality which many 
Christians lived during the past centuries. Sin and weakness was looked 
upon as an individual affair. Whether or not social, family or economic 
conditions helped or hindered the individual in finding the Lord was often 
not considered because salvation was a question of one's own strength and 
ability to live up to the commandments of God, no matter what the 
conditions. Because we are to varying degrees restricted and motivated and 
strained by our social environment, Christian community life must be a 
reality and must become a liberating force, before the people of God can 
expect their presence in this world to be a sign of contradiction and 
salvation and joy to all men. In short, human life is a social as well as 
individual reality. Human faith in God is a social and individual reality, and 
the living out of the social dimension of Christianity will depend upon both 
the individual courage and faith of Christians and the social support, 
encouragement, and assistance which fellow Christians give each other. This 
new pastoral approach would not place blame or condemn individuals for 
their weakness or failure to live up to the demands of the Gospel. Rather it 
would look at people's needs and problems and attempt, by combining 
resources, sharing ideas and praying together, to meet those needs on a 
reasonable basis so that all might have an opportunity to develop themselves 
as human beings and share in the resources of the land. The Christian in an 
affluent suburb, not faced by the tensions of changing center cities or the 
dissolution of rural life, will prove his or her Christianity by supporting with 
various personal resources and time: 1) the concrete efforts of threatened 

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Christians to meet their own legitimate needs; and 2) efforts on the part of 
poor people to create opportunities for a better life for themselves. If 
Catholic members of labor unions resist minority apprenticeship programs 
because they fear their own jobs will be eliminated in order to hire the poor, 
the Christian community would support programs of expanded jobs and 
placement and meet the family expenses of those who might be dislocated 
so that they too could be provided for in a decent way and not made to 
bear full brunt of social change. If a priest preaches justice from the pulpit, 
he will also of necessity learn the needs and desires and values of the 
community in which he lives. Thereafter, he can attempt to understand 
fears of the community and to find ways to bringing the people together in 
a community, helping them to find security in faith and in sharing their 
resources with those who do not have. When these kinds of sharing and 
group support develop within and between parishes, group prayer and 
discernment over crucial issues will become very apparent as a necessary and 
relevant part of Christian life, and the community of witness will build up 
each member at the same time as it speaks to all men of the joy of faith and 
trust in the Lord. 

The implications of our dogma of communion demand of us that we 
equate our own survival - success - security to that of our fellow Christians 
and other people. Sharing in our own community will enable individual 
members and the community as a whole to respond to social injustice. 
Leaving everyone to his or her own devices will not accomplish this. 

Social justice will also require a simplification of life style. If part of 
the rationale for sharing and new communities of faith and witness is to 
help each other meet reasonable human needs and be supported enough to 
share with the poor or oppressed, a consideration of legitimate needs and 
luxuries must be raised. The goal of Christian sharing is not meant to be 
superfluous leisure and security. Community can be a means of providing 
reasonable security as an alternative to individual or family stockpiling of 
goods and securities. Once freed from fears, Christians could effectively put 
their excess goods and resources at the disposal of groups of poor people or 
organizations set up to facilitate their development. This action will require 
a radical examination of conscience on the part of Christians as to 
unnecessary goods or artificial needs. Such an examination of lifestyles was 
called for by the bishops of the world in 1971 at the Roman Synod. 

...anyone who ventures to speak to people about 
justice must first be just in their eyes. Hence we must 
undertake an examination of the modes of acting and 
of the possessions and lifestyle found within the 

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Church herself...rights must be preserved...Our 
examination of conscience now comes to the lifestyle 
of all: bishops, priests, religious and lay people. In the 
case of needy peoples it must be asked whether 
belonging to the Church places people on a rich island 
within an ambient of poverty. In societies enjoying a 
higher level of consumer spending, it must be asked 
whether our lifestyle exemplifies the sparingness with 
regard to consumption which we preach to others as 
necessary in order that so many millions of hungry 
people throughout the world may be fed. 

(Justice in the World, III) 
The Lord Himself called people who hoard and overconsume fools, and 
counselled us not to be anxious over things. But the problem of simplicity is 
not so easy. Honest thought and discussion is needed about what are 
legitimate needs, for in affluent societies people often feel needs for goods 
which are luxuries to others. Moreover, large economic systems providing 
jobs and income for many are based upon the predictable consumption and 
production of consumables which may not be necessary for a decent life. 
Consider the massive multiplication of clothes, trinkets, toiletries, to name a 
few. Yet, employment and production are, at this time, necessary. 

Other aspects are to be considered in divesting oneself for others. 
What of political power, control over economic goods and assets H- systems 
by which resources are distributed and by which groups are enabled to 
bargain in society. Those on the receiving end of the stick are always 
essentially dependent, no matter how many goods they "get." It is argued 
that to solve poverty economic growth and production must be increased. 
But the Poverty Profile reveals that the percentage of that growth over the 
last three decades which is distributed to the lower fifth of our population 
has remained the same — 4%. And the control and disproportionate return 
received by the upper fifth has remained the same — 44%. The reason is 
control over the means of production and investment — people earning 
money off of money, not off of labor. The poor do not even earn just 
returns from their labor, and their labor produces capital which multiplies 
itself for others. The poor have no share in this outgrowth. Therefore, the 
Church has also counselled an examination of the ways in which people and 
nations participate in political and economic structures - for some control 
or share of control is required in order that resources be somewhat 
equitably shared. 

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On the other hand, it is impossible to conceive true 
progress without recognizing the necessity-within the 
political system chosen of a development composed 
both of economic growth and participation; and the 
necessity too of an increase in wealth implying as well 
social progress by the entire community as it 
overcomes regional imbalance and islands of 
prosperity. Participation constitutes a right which is to 
be applied both in the economic and in the social and 
political field. (Justice in the World, I) 

But even were economic growth and greater sharing of control by poor 
people and nations achievable (and that requires much dissolving of sinful 
social and economic values and structures), some acceptance of 
simplification by the wealthy will be necessary. The world cannot expand 
its resources and production constantly (even if that new production were 
shared equitably): 

Furthermore, such is the demand for resources and 
energy by the richer nations, whether capitalist or 
socialist, and such are the effects of dumping by them 
in the atmosphere and the sea that irreparable damage 
would be done to the essential elements of life on 
earth, such as air and water, if their high rates of 
consumption and pollution, which are constantly on 
the increase, were extended to the whole of mankind. 

(Justice in the World, I) 

Thus, new ways of sharing the goods and systems which exist must be 
found, and this will include the need of Christian individuals and nations to 
divest themselves of superfluous goods and power. 

Only a new vision and vastly different values will be able to 
accomplish this. The way of life of Christians will have to find new shapes 
and values, or be doomed to failure to follow the demands of the Gospel. 
New pastoral approaches to community will be needed. New social and 
economic systems are needed — as Pope Paul stated in Populorum 
Progressio, justice will require "innovations that go deep." Is it possible? 

98 



Christianity as a New Way of Thinking. 
Serious barriers now stand in the way of Christian communities which 

live lifestyles of justice, greater sharing, simplification, poverty of spirit 
and prayer. Such a new pastoral approach would run into "The way things 
are" now. In fact, social values and expectations, contemporary experience 
and fear of either failing or being judged "different," the system of rewards 
and concepts of meaning which exist in our society - all discourage change. 
Any social-cultural way of life has strong built-in resistance to change 
because the security and survival of human lives are involved. People will 
not accept the risk of change unless good alternatives are offered. 
Alternatives can exist on two levels: different ways to achieve the same 
goals; or, different ways in order to achieve different goals. To approach the 
search for ways of further humanizing society and caring for integral human 
development of all people, Christians will first have to decide what their 
goals are - what kind of fulfillment is desired in life and how people can 
achieve it - as individuals and in community. Christians will evaluate their 
own lives and the culture in which they live by reflecting on the values and 
themes taught by the Lord Jesus and developed by His Church. As 
explained in the first chapter, the history of God's dealings with humanity 
makes clear that no one culture or society can ever be assumed to embody 
perfectly the ways of God - no human institution is sacred. And the 
promise of truth given by the Lord rests in the presence of the Holy Spirit 
and in community ~ not in particular cultures or organizational methods. 
Therefore, Christians are called to continual evaluation of their culture and 
society. 

Any culture has implicit goals, facilitating certain types of human 
activity (primary goals) and impeding others (secondary goals). Meaning and 
success are attached to the primary values, which become cultural themes -
basic patterns of thought. We must seek to become aware of our operative 
social and personal themes and compare them to the teachings of Christ. If 
there are certain impediments to living as Christians (whether individual 
sinfulness or sinful social realities), we are responsible for seeking 
alternatives. 

This essay cannot authoritatively or exhaustively examine the culture 
and society of the United States, and does not presume to do so. Other 
authors have written on the subject and hopefully their ideas will be 
considered. What is clear is that serious reflections and prayer are needed 
since, as the bishops in Rome stated in "Justice in the World," "we 
have...been able to perceive the serious injustices which are building around 
the world of men a network of domination, oppression and abuses which 

99 



stifle freedom and which keep the greater part of humanity from sharing in 
the building up and enjoyment of a more just and more fraternal world." 
(Introduction). "Economic injustice and lack of social participation keep a 
man from attaining his basic human and civil rights." (Section I) 

Can our culture provide an environment in which to build 
communities which liberate? The notion of human individual development, 
so strong in our society, is a direct heritage of Judaeo-Christian tradition, 
and from that have developed modern law, the recognition of human rights, 
the condemnation of slavery, emphasis upon freedom and human 
development. Modern western society has brought much to history. 
However, two problems have arisen: the loss of the communal aspect of 
human life; and the assumption that meaning, fulfillment and causation are 
individual-centered realities. In short, personalization of economy, 
education and law - have also led to uni-dimensional concepts of the human 
person - modern man is very lonely, and isolation is considered a symptom 
of existential freedom. Freedom is believed to come from mobility, 
self-sufficiency and separation from social or physical bonds. One's end goal 
in life is to be free, self-starting, self-sustaining, and, self-centered. 

Modern western civilization therefore succeeded in changing what has 
been called the "sacred society" ~ the society where tribal or communal 
customs and beliefs were assumed to be inviolably supreme. Earlier in 
history, individual rights and freedom had been subordinate to the whole. 
The forms and structures were believed sacred. Judaism and Christianity 
changed this view with an emphasis on spirit and person. Mankind was still 
facing age old problems, however, of survival against starvation, disease, 
violence and other physical exterminants. The western system has 
emphasized individual fortification against these kinds of want. But in doing 
so our culture sometimes assumed that freedom is equal to being fortified 
against want on the individual or family level. Hence, the problem of 
"scarcity" became a prime motivator in western society. Property in 
agricultural society meant the chance to be self-sustaining (to grow your 
own food and raise your own stock) and so became a primary value; 
productive skills enabled one to participate in exchange and be valued 
enough to insure the gaining of provisions; having surplus of goods, clothes, 
things — insured against want. Efficiency and dependability assured others 
of one's market value and increased ability to earn, to compile and to 
protect. Power was associated with control over nature, goods, production. 
He who had the largest surplus could invest in others and help them develop 
too, but in so doing, he collected debts and had power. In short, property 

100 



rights, productivity, control, self-sufficiency, cleverness, possessions - all 
become primary social goals. Freedom from want also meant being bound 
to these other requirements. 

Western culture overcame the repressive aspects of traditional culture 
and the modern era has been called the age of the person. In the process, 
however, as recent developments reveal (emphasis upon "love," 
development of sensitivity, of support groups, of psychological therapy, 
etc.) certain human development needs became secondary in importance 
and the communal aspect of life (a definite part of human experience) was 
neglected. Having become a system, this overbalance causes the modern 
problem of lack of community and loneliness and self-hatred. It also leads 
to neurotic materialism. New types of community are relegated to being 
"subcultures" or are considered odd because they simply do not fit into 
"things as they are." The challenge: how to maintain the resources and 
technology of modern men, but harness them for the development of all? 
Western society has developed islands of wealth and power, for it was 
assumed that each person should be out for his self-development and was 
alone primarily responsible for himself. Things obtained by work are seen as 
"rights" and "mine"- others have no claim. Giving away wealth or 
resources is valued only on the neighborly level, as sort of a nostalgic 
holdover or sub-set of neighborly values. But resources needed by powerless 
people cannot be had at that level. 

In such a society justice seems doomed, because the very habits, 
instincts and perceptions of people, as well as the fears of not succeeding 
and being caught in the crunch - all militate against risk, openness and basic 
sharing. The drive for self-sufficiency isolates people, makes them feel 
lonely or inadequate, declares older or younger people to be of low value 
(to the market place -- except for the fact that they buy things), declares 
"non-productive" people of low value. Nevertheless, the burden of 
responsibility for becoming more efficient and more productive lies with the 
person who is not these things, since we are each responsible for our own 
fate. Therefore, the resources of society are steered to those who already 
have resources - where efficiency is greatest and risk of losing the lowest. 
The powerless are left in a vacuum and blamed for it. As seen in the Poverty 
Profile, this means that money and resources multiply themselves, and 
poverty supports the process. 

There comes a point when qualities, if overstressed, become new types 
of chains: Freedom from want through the chain of fear, materialism, and 
self-centeredness. But Church teaching and the teachings of the Lord clearly 
hold that such abilities as we have harnessed for 80% of American citizens 

101 



and 20% of the world are only basic human stepping stones to higher, more 
meaningful levels of human development. If they become ends in themselves 
and block effective love, sharing, and giving life to the world, then we have 
made a new idol, are trying to build the kingdom of man "of this world," 
and have missed the call to Oneness and holiness which Christ presented. 

The present era calls for reexamination of Christ's call to 
community - not the old, repressive of the person, but new communities of 
spirit and voluntary sharing and respect for the dignity of the individual. 

Is not the rise of an urban civilization which 
accompanies the advance of industrial civilization a 
true challenge to the wisdom of man, to his capacity 
for organization and to his farseeing imagination? 
Within industrial society urbanization upsets both the 
ways of life and the habitual structures of existence: 
the family, the neighborhood, and the very framework 
of the Christian community. Man is experiencing a new 
loneliness; it is not in the face of a hostile nature which 
it has taken him centuries to subdue, but in an 
anonymous crowd which surrounds him and in which 
he feels himself a stranger. Urbanization, undoubtedly 
an irreversible stage in the development of human 
societies, confronts man with difficult problems. How 
is he to master its growth, regulate its organizations, 
and successfully accomplish its animation for the good 
of all? 
In this disordered growth, new proletariats are born. 
They install themselves in the heart of the cities 
sometimes abandoned by the rich; they dwell on the 
outskirts - which become a belt of misery besieging in 
a still silent protest the luxury which blatantly cries 
out from centers of consumption and waste. Instead of 
favoring fraternal encounter and mutual aid, the city 
fosters discrimination and also indifference. It lends 
itself to new forms of exploitation and of domination 
whereby some people in speculating on the needs of 
others derive inadmissible profits. Behind the facades, 
much misery is hidden, unsuspected even by the closest 
neighbors; other forms of misery spread where human 
dignity founders; delinquency, criminality, abuse of 
drugs and eroticism. 

102 



To build up the city, the place where men and their 
expanded communities exist, to create new modes of 
neighborliness and relationships, to perceive an original 
application of social justice and to undertake 
responsibility for this collective future, which is 
foreseen as difficult, is a task in which Christians must 
share. To those who are heaped up in an urban 
promiscuity which becomes intolerable it is necessary 
to bring a message of hope. This can be done by 
brotherhood which is lived and by concrete justice. 

(Pope Paul VI, A Call To 
Action, [The Coming Eighteenth] 
Nos. 10 and 12) 

This search will require prayer and wisdom, radical trust in the presence of 
the Holy Spirit and courage to risk new ideas and unpredictable futures. The 
Lord said He would provide -- but not by human "of the world" concepts. 
Christians are just as likely to suffer "failure" and "want" as to be 
successful, powerful, admired and secure. The categories of man are not 
always God's. But if Christ lost His life to give life to others, and was poor 
to enrich others (materially and spiritually), so also must we be. 

How can we maintain the benefits of our present culture while 
changing what oppresses human development? Not to hide form asking 
these questions, is our great need. We offer a schema, for reflection and 
possible action. Below is a comparison of what seem to be current American 
secular values and Christian values. In seeking to be just, life-giving and holy, 
Christians must imitate the Lord. Discerning what of His life are central 
themes and what are cultural forms is difficult - we have tried to stress 
themes here. Where modem forms of life stifle the living of Christian 
themes, or where "of the world" themes have asserted themselves, 
conversion and new ways of living must be sought. Certainly the comparison 
should be down to earth - because in reality much goodness and human 
wisdom exists in our culture. The question is: In our way of life where have 
we turned away from justice, life-giving and holiness, and what changes are 
needed to reverse that? 

The following chart represents a typology - it is intentionally 
absolute - presenting extremes. Most people undoubtedly live by values 
somewhere in between the two poles. But for the sake of study and 
thought, two "polar types" have been developed. Also, the values are 

103 



expressed as "gut-level" or operative values. They are not meant to describe 
what people think they believe in or what they say; Rather, behavior, 
operative choice, is the level sought for. Many people for example, would 
say they believe in the Resurrection, but not as many feel secure about it in 
their heart and thus, fewer people live freed from the fear of death. 

THEMES 
American Secular Christian 
Private; This World; Relationship. Community 

Self Transcendance of Spirit. 
Other 

FEELINGS 
Self-Maintaining - Having 
(1) Fear of death or loss of power 
as Life-Losing. No after-life. 

(2) Give to get. Transaction is 
basic to human relations. My 
worth is in having something 
valuable to give others. 
(3) My security and happiness. 

(4) Power, Popularity, Respect 
equal self-worth. 
People come to me. 

(5) Desire measures and signs. 
The law. Consumption as sign of 
success and self-expression. 

( 6 ) T o u g h n e s s . C o o l . 
Self-sufficient. 

Self-Giving - Being 
(1) Acceptance of death and 
self-surrender as Life-giving. 
Resurrection. Absorb conflict and 
injury to reconcile. 
(2) Relationship is mutual and 
therefore is exchange. Emphasis is 
on pouring out and giving to build 
up the full life of the other. 
(3) The other peoples' sense of 
worth and freedom. 
(4) Service and facilitating others 
offers true meaning. I go to 
others. My worth comes freely 
from God's love for me and 
Christ 's death. Influence, or 
"being valuable" is irrelevant. 
(5) Spirit. Trust in Love of God 
and community. Sensitivity, 
creativity and ability to give life. 
Simplicity of life so as to give 
others. 
(6) Meekness. Vulnerability. 
Dependent in some things and 
therefore humble. 

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Social Systems 
Hoarding-Taking 
(1) Material security through 
possessions and power = freedom. 
Concentration. 

(2) I can have what I can get, and 
deserve it. 
(3) Efficency and technology. 
People receive insofar as they 
produce. 

(4) Power. Be No. 1. Coercion for 
self-protection. 
(5) Self-defense to point of 
killing. 
( 6 ) O w n e r s h i p . Property 
expresses the self. Property rights 
modified in society's interest. 

(7) Profit-motive. Growth. Gain 
as goal of an investment of goods 
or self. Self-interest. 
(8) Competition. The best gets 
the proceeds. 

(9) Predictability. Control. 

Sharing-Pouring Out 
(1) Poverty of Spirit. Community 
support and Faith in providence. 
Reasonable needs met— then 
distribution to needy. 

(2) My purpose is to give life to 
others. 
(3) Human needs, and rights of 
all people to basic needs, 
regardless of their productivity or 
efficiency. 
( 4 ) Powerlessness. Service. 
Vulnerability. Refusal to coerce. 
(5) Refusal to take life, even at 
cost of own. 
( 6 ) Sharing. Possession is 
stewardship for God and others. 
C o m m o n good primary; *r 
property secondary. 
(7) Exchange. Equity. Willingness 
to lose for sake of other. Other's 
interest equal to or greater than 
my own. 
(8) Cooperation— sharing to 
make sure all have minimum 
needs because all are of God. 
(9) Risk. Trust in God and fellow 
humans. 

We all live in darkness - the experience that we are, of ourselves, 
nothing. Except that we exist and others exist, and we image God. "Those 
who seek security could not, to assuage their need, amass to themselves 
enough objects, or persons treated like objects, even if they had all of 
history at their disposal...The self is not at the.center of the universe...A 

105 



man is too insignificant to be preoccupied with his own failures. Whatever 
energy he has is required for attending to the loneliness, the pain, the needs 
of others. No contrition is more truthful than other-centeredness." (Michael 
Novak, The Experience of Nothingness, Harper and Row, 1970, pp. 
116-117) 

Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard 
it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of 
God!" The disciples were astounded by these words, but 
Jesus insisted, "My children," he said to them, "how hard 
it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel 
to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to 
enter the kingdom of God." They were more astonished 
than ever. "In that case," they said to one another, "who 
can be saved?" Jesus gazed at them. "For men," he said, 
"it is impossible, but not for God: because everything is 
possible for God." (Mark 10:23-27.) 

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EDUCATION TO JUSTICE 
SISTER JOSEPHINE DUNNE, S.H.C.J. 
EDUCATION COORDINATOR, CHD 

I. Catholic Education as Counter-Cultural 
The November 4, 1971 issue of Newsweek magazine featured as its 

major article the question "Has the Church lost its soul?" In that article, the 
following observation was made: 

The Newsweek poll also confirms what many concerned 
Catholic leaders have long suspected: that U.S. Catholics 
today, as Father James T. Bustchall, provost of the 
University of Notre Dame, puts it, "are no different, 
really, from other Americans." 

The article went on to suggest that the "soul" of the U.S. Church - an 
integral Catholic subculture with its own distinctive blend of rituals and 
rules, mystery and manners - has vanished from the American scene. Can 
this phenomenon be looked upon as a favorable development? Father 
Michael O'Neill (America, April, 1972) has pointed out that the first 
Catholic schools in our country were counter-cultural; they provided 
cultural and religious unity in the midst of, and in opposition to, the process 
of total Americanization (Protestantism and Anglo-Saxonism). Father 
O'Neill suggests that, like most cultural groups, the Catholic American 
counter culture, including its schools, eventually became established and 
recognized as an entity capable of forming loyal, hard working American 
citizens. In terms of culture and socio-economic status, a large percentage of 
the church's membership today is Americanized, accepting basic American 
values, defending and living the American "way of life." Integrated into the 
middle and upper middle classes, these Catholics experience the 
prerogratives of such a position. Consequently a counter-cultural spirit is 
generally not found among these Catholics; it is found, however, in the 
reviving consciousness of other Catholic communities, notably, white ethnic 
groups, Spanish-speaking Catholics, liberal/radical Catholics and very 
conservative Catholics. It is precisely in the diversity of the demands of 
these Catholic groups, no longer immigrant, that they run counter to the 
prevailing American, and even American Catholic, cultural norms. 
According to Fr. O'Neill, it is in responding to these diversified needs that 
Catholic education should be counter-cultural because the church itself 
should be rejecting poverty, injustice, destruction of and irreverence for life 
- all contemporary facts in American society. 

What is the relationship of Catholic education to the mission of the 
Church? To society? More specifically, with regard to the church's call to 
witness Christ's justice and respect for freedom and dignity among all men, 

107 





what is the educational mission of the church? The ideas presented here are 
intended to serve as suggestions for discussion and not as final solutions to 
the questions raised. The paper has been developed after dialogue, reading 
and collaboration with educators on all levels, with administrators, with 
students and parents. 

In current times, the proclamation of Gospel values is an urgent need 
and duty of the church. Christ's gospel sees human life as a promise from 
God the Father, who purposed in creation that human life should realize 
fully its potential-physically, psychologically, socially, spiritually. One role 
of Christian education is to help people understand their lives in the light of 
this promise, to realize themselves fully and to live lives of faith, hope and 
love. The U.S. Bishops in their 1972 pastoral letter stated: 

Thus one crucial measure of the success or failure of the 
educational ministry is how well it enables men to hear 
the message of hope contained in the gospel, to base their 
love and service of God upon this message, to achieve a 
vital personal relationship with Christ, and to share the 
gospel's realistic view of human condition which 
recognizes the fact of evil and personal sin while affirming 
hope... 

The success of the Church's educational mission will also 
be judged by how well it helps the Catholic community to 
see the dignity of human life with the vision of Jesus and 
involve itself in the search for solutions to the pressing 
problems of society. Christians are obliged to seek justice 
and peace in the world. Catholics individually and 
collectively should join wherever possible with all persons 
of good will in the effort to solve social problems in ways 
which consistently reflect gospel values. 

Educational Pastoral, N.C.C.B. 
To Teach as Jesus Did, Preface, 1972 

The educational mission of the Catholic community in our country, 
should be involved in searching for solutions to the pressing problems of 
contemporary society, helping to satisfy the legitimate needs of all men. 
Christianity, as the Roman Synod's statement "Justice in the World" has 

109 



stated boldly, implies an absolute or radical demand for justice; working for 
justice is no longer a "specialty" for some but is a constitutive inherent 
element in preaching the Gospel and in being a Christian. In short, no one 
can call himself or herself Christian if he or she is not concerned for and 
working for justice among men and women. 

Therefore, it is fully evident to us that work done in 
behalf of justice and the transformation of the world is 
also a constitutive dimension of the preaching of the 
gospel, as well as of the Church's mission in the 
redemption and the liberation of the human race through 
the manifestation and realization of God's plan. (1971 
Synod document "Justice in the World," Introduction) 

Included in the area of Christian education for justice, therefore must 
be 1) learning the process of reflection and discernment, measuring one's 
concrete experience and times by the teachings of Christ and the Church in 
a spirit of prayer; and, 2) developing some special competence to analyze 
and act upon concrete living situations, historical causation, social realities. 

Meeting at Medellin, Columbia in 1968, the bishops of Latin America 
defined a liberating education as: 

...that which converts the student into the subject of his 
own development. Education is actually the key 
instrument for liberating the masses from all servitude and 
for causing them to ascend "from less human to more 
human conditions...therefore, education on all levels must 
become creative, since it is necessary to anticipate the new 
society that we are looking for. It ought to base its efforts 
on the personalization of the new generations, deepening 
their consciousness of their human dignity, favoring their 
community spirit." 
(The Church in the Present Day Transformation, Second 
General Conference of Latin American Bishops, Part II.) 

The Christian call expressed here is a serious one, given to every Christian, 
to transform self and the world. Christian education must therefore address 
itself to the two-fold task of proclaiming the good news (and preparing 

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Christians to do the same) and embodying that proclamation in action. 
Does this task mean that Christian education is necessarily a 

counter-cultural force? Assuredly the responsibility of Christian education 
to society is to benefit the nation by educating its graduates well to live in 
this nation responsibly and responsively as integrated, fully-developed 
human persons, rooted in the person and power of Jesus Christ. To the 
degree that these graduates are equipped to bring to bear the power of who 
they are, redeemed Christians, upon systemic moral weaknesses of a society, 
will Catholic education be an asset. If a contemporary society does not 
manifest Christian values in its life-style, effective Catholic education will 
necessarily come on as counter-cultural in teaching Christian values. This 
stance would seem to require of Catholic education a strong grounding in 
the concrete daily life of its learners and the nurturing of independent, 
courageous persons. Discernment, evaluation and serious reflection upon the 
values of society to determine their relationship to Christian values seem to 
be necessary educational experiences for such an education. Conversely, to 
the degree that Catholic Christian education merely follows the secular 
models provided by society, it becomes a duplication and an unjustifiable 
expenditure of the Church. Individual Christians may well have the civil 
right to be concerned about quality, style and other considerations which 
affect choice of schools or programs for themselves or their children; but if 
the Church as a community of faith must provide an education which is 
different, it must therefore provide more than the accepted secular model. 
The counter-cultural quality of Catholic education, then, lies precisely in 
the content and method of its teaching of values, beliefs, and the 
interpretation of history. Herein lies the desirability of being different, not 
necessarily in rites, rituals, language or other aspects of culture, as 
Newsweek misguidedly interpreted the current situation, but in the message 
and the media. 

II. The Call to Justice as part of the Message. 
What, in modern days, is the message to be? The Church is searching for 

answers; here it would be profitable to summarize briefly some of the latest 
statements of Pope Paul VI and the Bishops which shed light on the questions 
of education and justice in the world. Pope Paul, in his Call to Action, urged 
Christian communities to analyze objectively the situation in their own so-
ciety, to shed on it the light of the Gospel, and to draw principles for anal-
ysis, evaluation and action therefrom. Solidarity in this action is a matter of 
greatest urgency. (Call to Action, Nos. 4 and 5.) 

I l l 



The Call to Action clearly identifies certain questions of social justice 
which "must take first place among Christians in the years to come." These 
include human conditions of production, fairness in the exchange of goods, 
and in division of wealth, sharing of responsibility to shaping society. (No. 
7) Emphasis must be on the common good and the necessity to subordinate 
the economic processes of society to a political process where all men are 
included in decision making. (46-47). In his earlier encyclical, Development 
of Peoples Pope Paul stated unequivocally that ownership of property and 
wealth, and freedom to use it for one's own interest are not absolute rights, 
in the Christian world view; responsibility to the poor and to fellow man are 
absolute duties. (Nos. 22-23) Because this teaching is contradicted in 
practice by society, especially in western society, it is indeed 
"counter-cultural." 

More recentiy the Bishops meeting in Rome made strong suggestions 
about Christian education, questioning the impact of modern education on 
a world torn by poverty, injustice, racism, discrimination, hatred and war. 
In the document Justice in the World the Bishops called for an examination 
of conscience to see if the Church is falling short in forming the "just man". 
Many Christians may not be living a life of justice. Why is this so? The 
search for answers calls for an examination of the pressures of life which 
Christians experience with the rest of mankind - pressures which make 
conformity to secular life-styles a facile, almost unconscious process; and 
for an examination of Catholic values-education to look for the causes of 
failure to communicate Christ. The Bishops described contemporary 
western secular culture as a life-style which exalts possessions, individual 
security and power, profit and guaranteed growth; one which creates a 
marketplace, competitive, "make-it" mentality among individuals. Such a 
culture promotes an established order which, of necessity, creates divisions 
and selfishness. Those educated by and for this culture are not "new men 
and women" but those made in the image of the established order. 

Educational methods should therefore be such, that men 
are taught to live life in its encompassing reality and 
according to the evangelical principles of personal and 
social morality, which find expression in vital Christian 
witness. In fact, it is clear what impediments to progress 
concern us for our own sakes and for the sake of all men. 
The system of education which often still exists in our 
day, favors a narrow-minded individualism. Part of the 
human family lives, as it were, immersed in a mentality 

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which exalts possessions. Schools and the communications 
media, often hindered by the established order, only allow 
for the formation of a man desired by the same 
established order, that is a man formed in its own image; 
not a new man but a reproduction of man as such. (Synod 
Document, Justice in the World. Ill, Education for 
Justice). 

The Synod, furthermore, called for the nurturing (education) of people 
thirsting for justice and working for: ordered relationships (by Love); 
self-dignity; self-determination; meaningful participation by all members in 
the making of society; community-consciousness: sharing the goods of earth 
and methods to secure them; basic rights to development. 

Therefore, according to the Christian message, the 
attitude of man towards men is at one with his attitude 
toward God; his response to the love of God which saves 
us through Christ becomes efficacious only in the love and 
service of men. So, Christian love of neighbor and justice 
cannot be separated. In fact, love implies a radical demand 
for justice, and that involves a recognition of the dignity 
and rights of one's neighbor. And, in its turn, justice 
arrives at its interior fullness only in love. For thus, each 
man is the visible image of the invisible God and a brother 
of Christ, from which it follows that the Christian sees 
God himself and his absolute demand of justice in each 
man. 
The actual situation of the world, in the light of faith, 
appears as a new event in the history of salvation. It calls 
us to return to the essential core of the Christian message, 
creating in us a profound realization of its true sense and 
its urgent demands. The mission to preach the gospel 
requires that each of us dedicate himself today to the 
total liberation of man, beginning with his actual 
existence in this world. If in fact the Christian message of 
love and justice does not manifest itself in the world 
through action for justice, it will have difficulty gaining 
credibility among the men of our times. 
(Synod Document, Justice in the World, II, The Message 
of the Gospel and the Mission of the Church.) 

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In short, the People of God in this time are called to a life of justice lived in 
the evangelical virtue of poverty of spirit — not a life of self-sufficiency but 
one of radical actual dependence upon God and the community of the 
faithful. 

The Christian lives under the law of interior freedom, a 
law lived in the perennial vocation of conversion of heart, 
by passing from self-sufficiency to trust in God, and from 
egoism to the sincere love of neighbor. In this is one's 
liberation and his gift for the liberation of men. (Section 
II) 

This statement may be expanded upon by the first lines of section 45 of the 
Call to Action: 

Today men yearn to free themselves from need and 
dependence. But this liberation starts with the interior 
freedom that men must find again with regard to their 
goods and their powers; they will never reach it except 
through a transcendent love for man, and, in 
consequence, to serve through a genuine readiness. 

Catholic education, since it shares the basic missions of the Church, must 
reflect both a teaching function (didache) and a community service function 
(diakonia) in order to nurture such a People. 

In the social sphere, the Church has always wished to 
assume a double function: first to enlighten minds in 
order to assist them to discover the truth and to find the 
right path to follow amid the different teachings that call 
for their attention; and secondly to take part in action 
and to spread with a real care for service and effectiveness, 
the energies of the Gospel. (A Call to Action no. 48.) 

Integral to this task is the reality and power of Christian community. 
Community is at the heart of Christian education not 
simply as a concept to be taught but as a reality to be 
lived. Through education men must be moved to build 
community in all areas of life; they can do this best if 
they have learned the meaning of community by 
experiencing it. Formed by this experience, they are 

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better able to build community in their families, their 
places of work, their neighborhoods, their nation, their 
world. 

Educational Pastoral. NCCB. 
To Teach as Jesus Did. Community, 
1972 

III. Education as Process 
How does education call forth an authentic Christian response to life? 

And what is the process of educating for justice so that values and skills are 
formed to deal with real situations? Obviously, religious and values-education 
requires a delicate respect for the action of the Holy Spirit and the learner's 
self. This personal independence factor cannot be overestimated...people 
cannot be indoctrinated. The Gospel is good news but it is demanding, 
composed of "hard sayings," and the freedom it assures issues from painful 
truth. Motivation to accept the Word is not the only problem, however. 
Discernment and application of the Word to contemporary situations, 
combined with thorough knowledge and understanding of the personal and 
social factors involved, is also necessary and very difficult to achieve. To 
teach literally the words of Christ, expressed in a different time, a different 
culture and different technology, as a methodological solution to the 
problems of poverty, injustice, racism and war — could be a very real pitfall. 
Knowing about the value-statements of a historical person, even the 
God-man, cannot alone empower and sustain a person in the 20th century 
who "thirsts for justice," i.e. who is trying to live justly. Only a living 
experience of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, personal, redemptive and 
contemporary, can call forth a contemporary response that is radical and 
humble — one that produces: 

(1) a longing to know more of the person of Christ, (scripture, church 
teaching, prayer, the Eucharist) 

(2) a need and a desire to search for and share this Person and this 
Power, (sense of community). 

(3) a service relationship toward all men (the Christian vocation). 
(4) an ability to discern how to understand the Word of God in these 

times, drawing principles for action from it. 

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In order to relate these concepts to Catholic education, it is necessary to 
return to an earlier statement: Catholic education must be unique in its 
message and its media (method.) To manipulate the time or identify the 
precise moment of a person's conscious experience of Christ and hence of 
his baptismal ratification is nearly impossible. Can, therefore, formal 
education help either to prepare for this experience, or to sustain it? When a 
school or other formal educational structure insures that learning occurs 
within the context of meaningful problem-solving, applying codified 
knowledge to real questions faced by the learner, so that the experience of 
others is made one's own, a relevant catechesis can occur. A school should 
assist the learner to trust and value his/her own responses and judgments; 
and by this process assist him/her to become a mature Christian of 
discernment and commitment. 

Educational research has shown that in terms of behavioral growth, 
persons retain 20% of what they learn by hearing, 30% of what they learn 
by seeing, 50% of what they learn through hearing and seeing combined, 
70% of what they learn by a verbal articulation of the knowledge, and 90% 
of what learners discover by doing. Only some kind of action-reflection 
dialectic can approach the 80-90% retention rate, by virtue of its concrete 
dynamics. This is where the learner must engage the total self in a process of 
growth and questioning. True knowledge and education results from 
reflection upon personal experience, so that understanding of that 
experience and application of others' experience (codified information/test 
book knowledge) can occur. Once reflection has assimilated previous 
experience, the learner can proceed to act on the new understandings. 

In the transfer of values and attitudes American and western education 
in general seems not to have applied this very old and very tried pedagogical 
ground rule. Instead highly verbalized, formalized and abstract knowledge 
has been presented, creating a dry value-dictation process. Educators are 
discovering this abstraction method has not worked. Catholic education in 
its imitation of secular scientific educational methods has also fallen prey to 
this method. 

What is needed perhaps is a harder look at the definition of education. 
Primarily, education is a process, one in which a person comes to know 
himself -W his limitations and his capabilities - in relation to the world 
around him. However, education is more than a process. Realistically, 
education in the United States is also both a system of accreditation 
(curriculum) in which basic skills are set as the norm of achievement, 
adulthood and advancement; and an institution - an amalgam of resources, 
systems, personnel, facilities, and services. All three of these components -
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process, accreditation, effective sensitive institutions, require a balances in 
terms of goals. Herein lies the problem. Where any one outbalances the 
others, a distortion occurs and western education fails to offer the full 
benefits of its unique potential. 

If education is a process of growth which involves integration of 
experience and development of human sensitivities and coping skills 
(process) it must involve the world outside the classroom, address itself to 
concrete experience, and answer the needs of learners at their particular 
developmental state. Such a process is education as a creative act of 
knowing where persons learn skills by using them in a living context, 
because they need them now. The process is both experiential and cerebral, 
not merely cerebral, and learning is made relevant and exciting in a 
problem-solving, experimental context. For young people this learning 
process, the most natural aspect of education, occurs constantly and 
probably more in the family and home than in schools. Among adults, it 
occurs more in the peer group and at work rather than in college classrooms, 
or any formal "adult education" program. 

The American approach to education, indeed western education, has 
been criticized for being institutional, self-serving and divorced from 
developmental needs, forcing the learned to look elsewhere for meaning and 
causing institutional education to be in many cases an experience of 
irrelevance. Catholic education in the U.S. seems to have shared in this 
deficiency. 

Although the sciences and increasingly the humanities, are discovering 
new methodologies to facilitate learning, the teaching of values is among the 
last educational arenas to be examined. It is precisely here that Catholic 
education is mostly seriously involved, since its raison d'etre is the 
communication of the Christian understanding of history, doctrine, and 
operative Christian values. Christianity as a lifestyle of justice falls into this 
realm of questioning. The 1971 Synodal document on World Justice indicts 
modern western education for not producing people who thirst for justice, 
but rather persons whose values are determined by their own self-interest, 
by the "make it" myth. This survival-skill and profit/investment syndrome 
which belies the Christian idea of a community of service and love, accounts 
largely for the deplorably unjust distribution of world goods: "the rich get 
richer and the poor get poorer." The Bishops' statement urges systems of 
education geared to such goals to move from the narrow-minded 
individualism which is basically un-Christian because "hindered by the 
established order, the systems allow for the formation of a man desired by 

117 



the same established order, that is a man formed in its own image: not a 
new man but a reproduction of man as such." 

Synod Statement, Justice in the World 
III Education for Justice 

IV. Education as Curriculum and Institution. 
The "reproduced man" is not educated to be open to pluralism or 

sensitive to injustice. He is caught; he too is powerless, poor in the spiritual 
and sociological sense because he is motivated by fear and isolation. The 
spiritual poverty of such persons cut from the established mold becomes the 
causal barrier which locks other men into socio-economic poverty. 
Education which aims at graduating reproductions of current society 
actually educates "away from" rather than toward the community of the 
world. 

The Synod statement further identifies the need for deepening an 
awareness of sin in its individual and social manifestations. This type of 
awareness demands of education the development of: 

That critical ability which leads to reflection on the 
society in which we live and on its values, preparing men 
to abandon those values which serve to lessen justice for 
all men. Because such education makes men more human, 
it will help free men in the future from manipulation, 
either by means of communication or by political forces. 
It will make them able to take their own destinies into 
hand and build truly human communities...it is also a 
pratical education, because it comes through action and 
participation (emphasis ours) as well as through vital 
contact with situations of injustice: 

Synod Document, Justice in the World 
III Education for Justice 

Perhaps the most important stress here is the forming of critical 
responders to life, who value and trust their own ability to be critical of 
what is. Such a person must be aware of who he is - culturally, spiritually, 
socially. He must welcome diversity as an enrichment and pluralism as a 
constituent of the American dream. 

The formation of a "reproduced" man is the result in part of 
over-emphasis on the second function of education - accreditation. Basic 
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elementary and secondary education to some extent teach a general 
education to prepare students to live in this society. The society must teach 
its ways, the skills needed to enable new adults to perform well and 
continue the society, to be good citizens and not a burden or detriment. 
Hence, socialization in the basic skills and values is also conducted in 
secondary and collegiate education. The content and method of the matter 
to be taught bespeaks the nature of the society doing the teaching. 

How does this analysis apply to Christian values - education, 
specifically the value of justice? It cannot be denied that formal 
organization is necessary in our society to harbor the resources and 
manpower, and promote the research to improve education. The challenge 
therefore is to design a formal educational system which does not emphasize 
rigid accreditation and structure over personal growth, one which somehow 
incorporates personal, neighborhood or community experiences into the 
curriculum so that education as process is assured. Education should address 
itself to skills needed at developmental stages. It should stress attitudinal 
growth, development of identity, development of an ability to confront, 
creatively, new situations. In the case of Christian education, the institution 
should teach in the context of Christian community and operative values, 
not merely in the narrow framework of parish and morality code. Such an 
approach calls for an analysis of content and method in curriculum. 

There remains the unique problem for any religious educational system: 
How can education respect developmental stages of growth and still present 
the deposit of values and teachings handed down by the Christian 
community, without either artificially and rigidly imposing Christian 
values where they are not interiorized, or simply encouraging a directionless 
process of reflection and self knowledge? Let us consider a schematic 
breakdown of different aspects of teaching Christian values. 

1. Transference - The presentation and handing on of the Christian 
heritage, tradition and teaching must be explained, related historically, in 
other words-transferred. This transfer is formalized and it should be 
accurately and thoroughly taught. The social teachings of the Church, among 
other content areas, are not taught with accuracy or thoroughness in many 
educational settings, even in many seminaries. 

2. Reflection on personal/group experience. This process is necessary 
to produce awareness of self, needs, personal experiences and values. 
Relating oneself, discovered in reflection, to the deposit of Christian 
thought must occur in a comparative context. The measurement of one's 
own experience against Christian teaching hopefully will suggest Christianity 

119 



as the best way to live. Then the entire question of values can rise to the 
surface. 

3. Action-living of Christian precepts to realize Christian values in 
personal or group lifestyle. Christian values issue from a community 
heritage, and describe a lifestyle. This is the point St. Paul makes in his 
letters-Christ calls us to a lifestyle of faith and trust in the Lord and in the 
community of love. Christian values are included if they are truly being 
lived by the community. In other words, justice as a value cannot be 
"taught"...it must be lived. No school, teacher, family or community can 
teach justice or any other value if that values is not a living, motivating force 
in that school, teacher, family or community. No community can teach 
justice or any other value if the learners experience injustice within the 
classroom, at home, at work, in society. In such a situation justice becomes 
a verbal, cerebral value - a myth which students, who have acute insight, 
see as a sham. 

Moreover, experience suggests that Christ's demands are meant to be 
lived with the supportive sustenance of Christian community, that is, a 
situation of group commitment and group action. What is said about 
schools, teachers and communities having to thirst for justice before they 
can offer true values-education suggests that possibly institutional settings 
are not the place to initiate attitudinal change. Perhaps the teachers are the 
starting point. More importantly, the family and entire faith community 
must thirst for justice. Teachers, the family, parents and community 
situation must be taken more into account if values-education is to occur in 
this context. Furthermore, the three aspects of teaching Christian precepts, 
Transference, Reflection, and Action, are not separable nor are they capable 
of planned timing into separate stages of life. They must be in a continual 
dialectical interrelationship - beginning with the learner's needs and life 
situation. The entire life experience of the learner must be an experience of 
justice and faith - his whole life must be his classroom. 

This is what can be called the theory of the new catechesis, as explained 
by Father Albert Shamon, in the May/June 1972 issue of Religion Teacher's 
Journal: Here he analyses the new catechesis, using the historical fact of the 
Exodus as his example: 

In this event, (the Exodus) we see the catechetical 
process. The "new" catechetics begins with a life 
experience. In this particular instance, it was degrading 
slavery and the escape from it. They saw that God is 
involved in life - in their lives in particular. They learned 

120 



that God wanted them to be free. That God is a God of 
Love, One who cares. They learned this from experience, 
from something that happened to them. Their response, 
was to accept the pact that God wished to make with 
them to become His people. To reinforce this 
commitment, they talked about what God had done in 
the Exodus, sang about it, celebrated it, until gradually 
their lives were changed. This is the basic process of 
religious education. So the catechetical process for the 
Chosen People began with a human experience: slavery 
and liberation from it. Next, Moses proclaimed the 
message revealed to him that God was the one who had 
freed them: "I am the Lord, your God, who brought you 
out of the land of Egypt." The people themselves 
discovered the relationship between the human experience 
and the message: it told them volumes about this God of 
their fathers. So they responded with song and a covenant 
with God. All catechesis nowadays employs these four 
steps: Human experience, revealed message, discovery, 
response. That is why the new catechetics is called a 
process. It is more than giving the revealed message as in 
the old catechisms. It is more complex. 

The new catechetics is experiential because it takes a human experience 
and probes it. However, confusion often arises about this method when 
people conclude that probing a human experience is the entire teaching 
process. Doctrine must also be brought to bear on the contemporary 
experience of God. This phase of the catechetical process requires that 
teachers be men and women of faith and prayer, and that the community of 
learners worship together. 

Overemphasis on any one of the three aspects of transference, 
reflection or action leads to errors. Overemphasis on transference leads to 
rigid catechesis, indoctrination, formularizing or abstract memorization...all 
of which may or may not affect behavior. An overemphasis on reflection 
can lead to self-centered, introspective and perhaps existentially 
directionless behavior. Some people criticize expressive, sensitivity-type or 
unstructured free discussion educational dynamics for fear that they may 
lead to abstract humanitarianism or hedonism. 

Overemphasis on action can lead to mindless, compulsive activism, 
experiential ethics, to misdirected or misunderstood expenditures of energy, 
and possibly to frustration and bitterness. Compulsive action misses the 

121 



need for prayer, reflection, community, and priority determination. Only a 
constant interrelated dialectic of these three elements can produce Christian 
values development, capable of influencing attitudes and behavior. 

In the past, Catholic education was accused of falling into the first 
error, overemphasis on transference, rigid catechesis. Currently many people 
.find fault with innovations on the basis of the second error, a too 
unstructured and "undisciplined program." Still others have been accused of 
the third error, hyper-activism, which looks for a cause and immediate 
solutions. Most critics, seizing upon one element, miss the need for a 
dialectical relationship among all three. To incorporate the three aspects will 
require curriculum innovation and a re-thinking of many educational 
methods. Teacher training in the significant social teachings of the Church 
and in methods of teaching the process of valuing will be a primary 
consideration. Innovation in formal programs, more outside-the-school 
education, free time, and more involvement of the parents and the total 
community need to be incorporated into educational planning. 

V. Adult Education and the Community of Faith. 
Adult education and continuing catechesis should develop mature and 

committed Christians capable of effective education of their children and of 
action in their own community. This is necessary because Catholic 
education has often presented morality too abstractly on the level of an 
individualistic morality code rather than as a community life-style. 
Consequently response has been difficult for most adult Christians because 
they have not been living justice in a supportive faith community, but rather 
living an abstract morality code in isolated situations within a fragmented 
society. 

How can one ask a white steelworker to love the poor black or Puerto 
Rican down the street when his only assets are his job and overly-mortaged 
house, when he is trying to save money to send his children to college, when 
his schools are full of drugs and apathy; his neighborhood full of crime; his 
home deteriorating, and he is unable to get insurance or renovation loans 
because he is in a high risk district? He sees the poor as the source of his 
problems, and, in our society, rarely is there a base which takes defensive 
pressure off, liberating him to become a Christian. 

The problem is even more difficult, although less emotional, in 
attempting to develop identification on the part of the affluent towards the 
poor. The Church of the affluent person often fails to challenge him or her 
to relate directly to the poor and the oppressed. Secondary, distant 
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relationships, such as collections, are encouraged instead. His world view, his 
needs and self-interests, his problems are completely different from the poor 
man's. He rarely sees a poor person or neighborhood. Unlike the laboring 
class, blue-collar man, he does not share the same socio-economic problems 
as the poor. Therefore, instead of seeing the poor as a threat, competitor for 
jobs and housing and neighborhood in a limited environment, the affluent 
person does not see the poor at all. And yet, his cities, his safety, his social 
order are being corroded by the poverty he does not see. 

The process of education, then, must reach beyond formal schooling, 
into the community it socializes, and to the adults who also have problems 
to solve. A process of reflection and action upon the needs, values, resources 
and priorities of the community must occur - the dialectic of experience, 
faith and reflection must be alive in a faith community of adults -
otherwise the values taught in schools will be hollow, formal, official 
morality and not operative values in a dynamic community. Such a process 
gives priority to adult education, issue-education, and the incorporation of 
the family in discussion of operative Christian values. Catholic schools 
alone, it would seem, cannot effect attitudinal change ; however, fortified by 
concurrent, supportive efforts in other areas of society, they can be a 
powerful agent for change. The family, the parish, the local community 
must enter into the process of change in order to reinforce the changes 
taking place within formal educational settings. In short, significant change 
cannot begin and take hold in any one of these areas first (in order of time). 
All areas are interrelated and therefore, depend on mutual reinforcement. 

Education for social justice then should take place on all levels. 

VI. Practical Steps and Examples. 
Some practical suggestions, relative to the three aspects of 

contemporary education follow: 
1. Education as a Process. The process of learning skills for coping with 

life in a problem-solving context, could be included in the curriculum of 
educational programs. If a parish or Christian community or school faculty 
is not trying to deal with situations of injustice within their respective 
communities, then injustice is not a priority problem. Consequently learning 
about the Christian value of justice in the nation or in the world will be an 
irrelevant exercise for the learners. On the other hand, coming to grips with 
real situations of injustice will bring students and teachers into a 
learning-team situation. This experiential process opens the classroom up to 

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the life of the family, the block, the town. For lack of this very element of 
the experiential, westernized Catholic education has relegated the learner's 
real life to "after hours." Values, too have been "official-ized" in this 
process, among them the Christian value of justice and concern for one's 
brother. 

Successful experimentation in this experiential method has been made, 
for example, by the Religious Leadership Development Program of the 
Community Service Corps in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia under the 
Catholic Youth Organization. High school students participate in a 
three-semester training (equal and substitute accreditation with regular high 
school religion course) program of values clarification by reflection on 
significant service activities with poor people. Through small group field 
experience and discussion under the direction of qualified personnel, 
students are assisted in the experiential process of defining values through 
group investigation and application. Not only are religious doctrine and 
prayer brought to bear on personal experiences, but practical community 
skills training is also a coordinated aspect of the youth leadership program. 

2. Education as Accreditation.Curriculum Innovation. Involved in this 
element of achievement/advancement levels is the curriculum, or a series of 
learning experiences selected for their formative impact on the learners. An 
inter-disciplinary curriculum on justice must then relate to two aspects of 
curriculum: content and methodology. The content of such a curriculum, 
laced into social studies, religious education and humanities programs, 
should focus on: 

a. the social teachings of the Church 
b. statistics on poverty, racism, social conflict and divisions among 

groups 
c. analyses of the causes of these realities 
d. a study of the cultural values and life-styles which affect the 

every-day life of the learner 
Since faith cannot be taught as an individual morality code but as a 
life-style in a community context, the method of communicating 
this content should be experientially grounded in real issues. 
New techniques and theories of learning values, as stated above 
must be implemented, lest Christian social values be just as widely 
missed and ignored as the Synod feels happened in the past. Values 
clarification, action-reflection methods, classroom of the 



community must be developed as significant learning methods. 
Teacher training to assist teachers understand new methods is 
necessary. No less necessary is explanation to parents of new ideas 
and methods, so that the future environment in which the child 
learns will be supportive. Two significant Diocesan efforts can be 
cited here as examples of large-scale planning and involvement of 
the total community: 
1) The Value Clarifying Process: 

A method of Unifying Curriculum for Human Development. 
Sioux Falls, South Dakota (K-12). By focusing on 
values-ladened humanities curricula this pilot program will 
assist students to develop personal values. Three current 
methodological approaches are utilized: 
a) problem-solving through the use of multi-media tutorial 

units for small groups and individuals. 
b) inquiry through mini-course offerings 
c) value probing and clarification techniques and theory, 

developed especially by Dr. Sidney Simon, are central to 
this pilot program. 

2) The Commission on Catholic Community Action, Diocese of 
Cleveland — a massive adult education "social awareness" 
process involving over 7000 adults in over 40 parishes. 
Through problem-solving engagement and training experience 
with local agencies, adults become resources to the total 
community. By linkage with organizations of powerless 
people, the participants can identify their role as developer 
within their communities and promoter of human dignity for 
all men and women. This study of community problems and 
alternating action is done in the framework of Jesus' teachings 
and social doctrine of the Church. 

3. Education as Institution...As a rich amalgam of persons, resources 
and facilities, education can respond by serving the local community with 
its resources. If there are poor people living near the school, the facilities of 
the school can be put at the service for recreational activities, cultural 
enrichment programs especially in the summer, pre-school programs, adult 
education, remedial education and high school equivalency, among others. 

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The school, faculty and parent associations can become channels for 
communication about Church social teachings, current issues and programs 
such as the Campaign for Human Development. 

Summary. The Church has served as a protective integration 
mechanism; it is called now to become a people who live a group lifestyle of 
evangelical poverty of spirit, trust in the Lord, and prayer; community and 
social mission must be high priorities. The institutions should be at work for 
justice, within and outside of the communities in which they are situated; 
otherwise, the values are false and the learning becomes unreal — a banking 
of the "official" teaching or values. The challenge and urgency of the times 
are powerful. What is the vision for Catholic education? Surely a response 
to life in which teachers as well as students are learners, and 
viceversa.-.where family and community converge on life and are mutually 
empowered by action/reflection on realities around them. To the degree 
that Christian education re-thinks its goals in these terms, selects priorities 
or a priority (be it peace, cultural pluralism, justice, racial equality), and 
works out its program accordingly, will education for justice take place, will 
it become not only an asset to our nation, but more important, a 
manifestation of Christ's Kingdom on earth. 
Where to write for more information about the above-mentioned programs: 
Rev. Francis X. Schmidt 
Director 
Archdiocesan Department of Youth 
1620 Summer Street 
Philadelphia, Pa. 19103 
Mr. Francis N. Scholtz 
Coordinator of Education 
Diocese of Sioux Falls 
3000 West 41st St. 
Sioux Falls, South Dakota 57104 
Mr. Harry Fagan 
Commission on Catholic Community Action 
Chancery Building 
Room 200 
1028 Superior 
Cleveland, Ohio 44114 

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