Category Archives: Economics

The Social Cost of Greed

May 5, 2021Catholic Social Teaching, Culture of Life, Economics, Freedom, Human Dignity, Marxism, Politics, WorkGreed, Gregory the Great, Oligarchy, Original Sin, Seven Deadly Sins, St. Paul, St. Thomastwowingstogod@gmail.com

It is axiomatic that those who can’t control themselves will always be controlled by someone else. This axiom is on display in our own day as we continue to see democracy be overthrown by oligarchy. A virtuous populace can thrive under a democratic system. Any system of self-government requires a people who are capable of governing their own desires. Once that power is lost individually and vice takes over, mobs are sure to follow. The problem with mobs however is that they really can never organize and so an oligarch must step in to incite and organize the mob. Thus, democracy moves from mob rule to oligarchy very quickly. Our own day bears witness to these principles in action as democracy dies and oligarchy takes over. If we are to arrest this development, then we must examine its causes. Every social ill has as its root cause personal vice and there is one vice that seems to be baked into our society—avarice. We should not be surprised at this fact given that St. Paul matter-of-factly proclaims that “love of money is the root of all evil” (c.f. 1 Timothy 6:10) and the Christian Tradition since Gregory the Great has considered it as one of the Seven Deadly Sins.

Despite tradition’s testimony to the contrary, our own culture insists there is no sin in avarice. That is because it is baked into the American Experiment. Founded on a class-less basis, class became something that was earned and prosperity was the first form of virtue signaling. As Tocqueville said public fortune became synonymous with greed. To condemn greed is to suffer the label of Socialist. For those who are willing to wear that label proudly, they always do so while hiding their 10,000 square-foot houses behind hedges and gates. These modern-day hypocrites make the Pharisees seem tame.

What is Avarice?

What then is greed and why does it cause such social evil? St. Thomas says that, “avarice is taken generally for an inordinate love of having anything whatsoever, and in another way particularly for love of having possessions all of which are comprehended under the name of money because their value is measured by money…avarice signifies a certain defect in regard to the dispensing of wealth and a certain excess in regard to its acquisition and retention because of an excessive love of money” (De Malo, XIII). Mere desire for possessions and money is not evil, but instead an inordinate love of them is. This inordinate love occurs when the desire to possess a thing or thing goes beyond need (this includes the “need” for saving and reasonable luxury). Rather than getting caught up as to where the line between reasonable and inordinate is, we should instead look to the interior of what it is that actually motivates us in our greed.

What makes greed particularly deadly is the fact that it kills our recognition of our creaturely status. All of us crave security. Rightly ordered, we know that this security is limited and so we must trust and hope in God and His promises. This is why the Dollar Bill has the motto In God We Trust on it. But given enough material prosperity, and more importantly, enough money, we begin to think our security is founded upon the ability to monetarily weather any storm. This craving for security leads to an insatiable desire for money because money gives us the appearance of having control. Greed then become all about control and grasping at a God-likeness that is rooted in Original Sin.

Personal greed also spills over to other people because it is opposed to both generosity and justice. It really is more blessed to give than to receive (c.f. Acts 20:35) because it keeps us from falling into the greed trap. The virtue of generosity conditions us to draw pleasure from giving rather than getting. One can hardly imagine God allowing a person to outdo Him in generosity so that they give away too much.

Likewise with justice. The tight-fistedness of greed always keeps us from ensuring that our neighbor receives what is due to him. For the avaricious man, relationships are fundamentally competitive rather than complimentary. Each slice of the pie that you receive is one less that I can have. In this way avarice also becomes deadly for other people. Accustomed to measuring everything in terms of costs, there is an emphasis on having over being. Utilitarianism, rooted in greed is, as Pope St. John Paul II, at the heart of the Culture of Death—”“This culture [the Culture of Death] is actively fostered by powerful cultural, economic and political currents which encourage an idea of society excessively concerned with efficiency…only goal . . . the pursuit of one’s own material well-being” (Evangelium Vitae, 12).

Extending Control

It is also deadly to others in a less obvious way. Buoyed by unbridled Capitalism and fed by insatiable greed, the avaricious man, accustomed to thinking he has absolute control over his life, now sets his sights on other people. Having many zeroes in their bank accounts, they now decide they will play the hero for others. But this playing of hero is just that, mere play, even if they label it as philanthropic. This philanthropy however is always motivated by a desire to control other people. It is literally a Messiah-complex thinking that they can save the world on their own terms. America seems to breed these “philanthropists” throughout the ages, be it Carnegie and Rockefeller or Gates and Bezos.

Greed creates the oligarchs and greed is what makes the mob malleable to their manipulation. Convinced that the only way to be free from the grasp of the oligarchs is by having their own resources, they remain under their thumbs. Greed generates “class” warfare and Socialism becomes the weapon to pit the greedy plebs against each other. In truth however the only way to be free is the same way it has always been—become men and women of virtue. The virtuous always remain free because they are immune to such manipulation. Armed with generosity and justice, they are not only counter-cultural, but culture changers.

Socialism Hidden in Plain Sight

June 24, 2020Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Economics, MoraliltyCity of God, Democracy, Karl Marx, Paul VI, Pius XI, Socialism, St. Augustine, Totalitarianismtwowingstogod@gmail.com

Albert Einstein once quipped that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. While Einstein may not have been considering the political realm when he said this, modern day Socialists would be wise to heed his proverb. Despite destroying millions of lives, Marx’s disciples single-mindedly insist that the problem is not in the principle, but in the application. The latest attempt is through a more moderate version that is commonly referred to as Democratic Socialism. By wedding it to the widely accepted principle of democracy, the Socialists hope to soften the blow. To this point, even in highly capitalistic countries they have been very successful hiding it in plain sight. It is therefore imperative that we recognize it and work to combat its harmful effects.

In its first go-round, Socialism was wedded to totalitarianism. Whether it be Stalin’s Russia, Mao’s China, Castro’s Cuba, or Kim’s North Korea, Socialists dictators made an offer that their people could not refuse. Millions of deaths later, Socialists knew that they must adopt a gentler and more gradual approach. This approach, still motivated by an exaggerated egalitarianism, would only slowly abolish private property and create economic parody and solidarity among citizens.

A Softer Approach?

Rather than controlling the means of production directly, the new socialists instead control the income from these private means of production, gathering it together through taxes. Men no longer get to keep the fruit of their labor, but instead are allowed to only keep some percentage of it. That percentage is completely at the discretion of the State. In a very real sense, it is the State that owns 100% of the man’s labor but gives him only a certain amount. Skipping the step of controlling the means of production this form of “Democratic Socialism” takes advantage of capitalism as a means of maximizing State income.

Once the taxes are collected, the money is then transferred from the haves to the have-nots, usually filtered through the pockets of some of the have-mores, in the form of various state sponsored welfare programs. So accustomed to this form of wealth redistribution, we do not even recognize it for what it is. The State has a right to collect taxes to cover the costs of operations like military defense, police powers and certain public utilities. What the State does not have a right to do is a form of “legalized” stealing in which it takes from the rich and gives to the poor. Stealing is still stealing whether a plumber or a governor does it. It is this type of regime that Augustine had in mind in City of God when he said:

“Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms? The band itself is made up of men; it is ruled by the authority of a prince, it is knit together by the pact of the confederacy; the booty is divided by the law agreed on. If, by the admittance of abandoned men, this evil increases to such a degree that it holds places, fixes abodes, takes possession of cities, and subdues peoples, it assumes the more plainly the name of a kingdom, because the reality is now manifestly conferred on it, not by the removal of covetousness, but by the addition of impunity.”

Socialism and Well-Meaning Christians

The Church has long opposed Socialism in any form precisely because it is state-sanctioned thievery. In his Encyclical on Socialism, Quod Apostolici Muneris, Pope Pius XI condemned it in these terms. “The Church, with much greater wisdom and good sense, recognizes the inequality among men, who are born with different powers of body and mind, inequality in actual possession, also, and holds that the right of property and of ownership, which springs from nature itself, must not be touched and stands inviolate. For she knows that stealing and robbery were forbidden in so special a manner by God…that He would not allow man even to desire what belonged to another” (QAM, 9). Later in his pontificate he spoke more directly about the evil of Socialism when he condemned it using no uncertain terms:

“We make this pronouncement: Whether considered as a doctrine, or an historical fact, or a movement, Socialism, if it remains truly Socialism, even after it has yielded to truth and justice on the points which we have mentioned, cannot be reconciled with the teachings of the Catholic Church because its concept of society itself is utterly foreign to Christian truth…no one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true Socialist.”
Pope Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno, 117, 120

Despite the repeated condemnations of Pius XI’s successors, many Catholics still support Socialism. Such support usually stems from a soft heart, but it also tends to reveal a soft head. Lifting up the poor while simultaneously keeping them, or even making them less self-reliant is not good for them. A handout should always be a last resort and even then only in a case of emergency. “Man does not live on bread alone” but he will tend to choke on bread, at least spiritually, that is merely given to him. Instead it is good for him to work for the bread he earns because it increases his virtue and thus makes him more free. All things being equal, a man is always better off for having worked for his bread than for having received it for nothing.

This is the why the Church also rejects Socialism as contrary to the dignity of man. Socialism in all its forms always labors under an incentive problem. By forcing income equality the productive men lose their incentive to work which causes shortages and great harm to the common good. Men become equal in misery, rather than moving towards equality in character, one of the only ways in which men can actually be equal.

What the well-meaning Catholic socialist is actually looking for is solidarity with the poor. This cannot be done on a political level but must be implemented on a personal level. The person in material need also is in need, perhaps even more so, of receiving personal love. By removing that personal element and putting everyone under the care (and control) of Big Daddy solidarity can never be achieved. Often this is what calls them to fall in love with the idea of socialism and neglecting to see how it fails in practice. Pope Paul VI cautioned Catholics against being enraptured by the ideological lure of Socialism when he remarked that “[T]oo often Christians attracted by Socialism tend to idealize it in terms which, apart from anything else, are very general: a will for justice, solidarity and equality. They refuse to recognize the limitations of the historical socialist movements, which remain conditioned by the ideologies from which they originated” (Octogesima Adveniens, 31).

If they are truly wanting to help the poor, then as Catholics they already have the Church, the same Church that does “not neglect the care of the poor or omit to provide for their necessities; but, rather, drawing them to her with a mother’s embrace, and knowing that they bear the person of Christ Himself, who regards the smallest gift to the poor as a benefit conferred on Himself, holds them in great honor. She does all she can to help them; she provides homes and hospitals where they may be received, nourished, and cared for all the world over and watches over these. She is constantly pressing on the rich that most grave precept to give what remains to the poor; and she holds over their heads the divine sentence that unless they succor the needy they will be repaid by eternal torments” (Pope Pius XI, Quod Apostolici Muneris, 9). All that is good in Socialism is already in the Church without all the evil side-effects. “Those who work solely toward such ends have, therefore, no reason to become socialists” (Pope Pius XII, Quadragesimo Anno, 115).

What’s Mine is Yours?

June 20, 2020Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Economics, PoliticsCapitalism, Catholic Social Doctrine, John Paul II, Leo XII, Poverty, Socialism, Universal Destination of Goodstwowingstogod@gmail.com

One of the sure signs that the Catholic Church has access to the fullness of truth in her teachings on faith and morals is that she is consistently attacked from both sides. This is especially true when it comes to the basis of her economic teachings, private property. The capitalists call her too socialistic and the socialists too capitalistic. Because of this, snippets of her teachings are either mocked and co-opted, but mostly misunderstood. As a foundation for justice, it is important then that we be able to understand and articulate her teachings.

The Primacy of the Universal Destination of Goods

When God made the earth, He gave mankind dominion over all its goods. Everything in the material order is meant to be used by man. These goods are meant for all men—each and every one—and thus each man has the right to secure for himself and his family what he needs to both survive and to thrive. This principle, dubbed the Universal Destination of Goods, is part of the natural law and is prior to any right to private property. As Pope St. John Paul II put it in an address in 1981 to the 21^st Session of the FAO Conference, “The primary destination of the resources of the earth to the common good demands that the necessities of life be provided for all human beings before individuals or groups appropriate for themselves the riches of nature or the products of human skill.”

Before linking this teaching to private property, it is important to point out that there is a corresponding duty attached to the Universal Destination of Goods. No one can claim any superfluous property, that is more than he needs, until the existential needs of his neighbor are taken care of. This imposes an obligation to provide for the extreme necessity of others because you are truly returning to them what is rightfully theirs.

The socialist might be tempted to agree and applaud the Church’s teaching until he reads the fine print. The obligation rests in giving (or even offering no resistance if they take) those things that constitute an existential need. In short, the obligation is to give to those who are in a condition of absolute poverty. Poverty, in the Christian worldview is a virtue. But when the Church speaks of it in her social teaching, she usually attaches a modifier, such as absolute to it. Absolute poverty is “a condition in which life is so limited by lack of food, malnutrition, illiteracy, high infant mortality, and low life expectancy as to be beneath any rational definition of human decency. The persistence of such degrading poverty, and especially the lack of the absolutely basic minimum of food, is a scandal of the modern world, in which one finds enormous contrasts of income and standards of living between rich countries and countries that are materially poor” (Pope St. John Paul II, Address to the 21^st Session of the FAO Conference, 1981).

The ”scandal of the modern world” is not so much that we have rich and poor or even that there is an inequality, but that the wealth of the world is concentrated in the hands of so few when there are so many who do not have what they need. The poor have a prior claim on those goods they need for their survival and thus the rich have an obligation to give those goods to the materially poor.

Private Property in Context

Only after the most basic needs are met can we begin to discuss property, but the Right to Private Property, even if it is subordinate to the Universal Destination of Goods, is no less important. Private property is integral to protecting the freedom of men. When a man owns his own property, he does not depend upon others (usually in power) for his own well-being. Not only that, but it also is a means of personal development. When he is responsible for his own well-being and is free to exercise that responsibility on his own property, he also grows in virtue. In short the man who owns his own property develops not just materially but also spiritually. Summarizing the Church’s teaching, John Paul II said:

“in Rerum Novarum, Leo XIII strongly affirmed the natural character of the right to private property, using various arguments against the socialism of his time. This right, which is fundamental for the autonomy and development of the person, has always been defended by the Church up to our own day. At the same time, the Church teaches that the possession of material goods is not an absolute right, and that its limits are inscribed in its very nature as a human right. While the Pope proclaimed the right to private ownership, he affirmed with equal clarity that the “use” of goods, while marked by freedom, is subordinated to their original common destination as created goods, as well as to the will of Jesus Christ as expressed in the Gospel.”
Pope St. John Paul II, Centesimus Annus, 30

In affirming the right to private property then, the Church teaches that this right is not absolute. Property also has a social function that is not only governed by the Universal Destination of Goods, but also the moral law. This means that a man is not free to use his property however he sees fit. Not only can he not infringe on another’s right to private property but also must not impede another’s moral freedom.

Connection with the Just Wage

All that being said, increasing wealth is a good thing provided that it be done “in a just and lawful manner” (Pius XII, Quadragesimo Anno). Those who through their wealth, provide wealth for others provide a service to the common good. And thus “it is only fair that he who renders service to the community and makes it richer should also, through the increased wealth of the community, be made richer himself according to his position, provided that all these things be sought with due respect for the laws of God and without impairing the rights of others and that they be employed in accordance with faith and right reason” (ibid).

But the Universal Destination of Goods also applies here as to how one governs their business. Provided that an owner’s necessities are being taken care of, before taking more of the wealth created for himself, he must make sure that all of his workers too have enough to provide for themselves and their families. A just wage then is not determined solely by supply and demand, but on the demands of the Universal Destination of Goods.

The point is that, while the law of supply and demand might apply to material goods, it cannot be a means of determining wages. The just wage is a recognition of the moral primacy of labor over capital. Labor is indispensable to production and because it is done by human beings, must always respect the Universal Destination of Goods. It is also not an argument for a minimum wage, but instead an argument for what is called a living wage. This wage is individualized and thus employees doing the same job could actually get paid different amounts based upon their needs. So antithetical to the modern mindset is this principle that Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum went to great lengths to explain it:

“Let the working man and the employer make free agreements, and in particular let them agree freely as to the wages; nevertheless, there underlies a dictate of natural justice more imperious and ancient than any bargain between man and man, namely, that wages ought not to be insufficient to support a frugal and well-behaved wage-earner. If through necessity or fear of a worse evil the workman accept harder conditions because an employer or contractor will afford him no better, he is made the victim of force and injustice…If a workman’s wages be sufficient to enable him comfortably to support himself, his wife, and his children, he will find it easy, if he be a sensible man, to practice thrift, and he will not fail, by cutting down expenses, to put by some little savings and thus secure a modest source of income. Nature itself would urge him to this.”
Pope Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum, 45-46

It becomes clear then why socialists and unbridled captialists both claim the Church’s teaching as their own and yet at the same time loathe it. But the Church is always both/and and not either/or and this is no less true than in the field of economics.

Catholic Environmentalism?

May 13, 2020Catholic Social Teaching, Creation, Culture, Culture of Life, Economics, Magisterium, MoraliltyEcology, Environment, John Paul II, Moral Ecology, Pollution, Pope Benedict XVItwowingstogod@gmail.com

In an address given during his return to Germany in 2011, Pope Benedict XVI called upon the legislators who had gathered not to neglect what he called the “ecology of man.” The ecology of man, that is, the realization that “man too has a nature that he must respect and that he cannot manipulate at will” is at the heart of environmental ecology. Although this was a recurring theme of the Pope, but his repeated call fell mainly on deaf ears because the care of the environment, like nearly all social issues, has been politicized. There is little interest in solving the problem, only using it to exert political control over other people. But for those who are interested in solving the problem, the Church has offered a true path forward with her emphasis on human ecology.

Although this used to go without saying, any discussion of the environment must first point out that man is different from all of the other visible creatures in the environment. He is not just one creature among many, but he is nature’s steward. Both sides of the debate recognize this fact, even if they loathe to admit it. Any discussion of environmental policy is predicated on the fact that only man is responsible for the environment. It would be absurd to speak of curbing man’s actions if he did not have the freedom to do so. In laying the responsibility for the environment at the feet of men, you are, at least implicitly, saying that he is different than the other animals and that he alone can offer a solution. This admission matters because it implies that man, as governor of creation, also transcends it.

Avoiding the Extremes

As awesome as it is then, we cannot worship nature as something divine. We reverence creation because it reveals the Creator, but it is not divine. It is, like all material things, passing away. We, made of matter and spirit, are above it, pilgrims as it were, just passing through. But just because it isn’t divine doesn’t mean that we can use it as we see fit. Nature is made up of natures, all of which must be respected, if they are going to actually serve mankind.

Like all issues that become political footballs, the environment is prey to the either/or fallacy. Either it must be divinized or it must be raped. Politics has no room for qualifications and the blame must always rest squarely on the other side. The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church summarizes what might be called a “Catholic Environmentalism” when it says:

“A correct understanding of the environment prevents the utilitarian reduction of nature to a mere object to be manipulated and exploited. At the same time, it must not absolutize nature and place it above the dignity of the human person himself. In this latter case, one can go so far as to divinize nature or the earth, as can readily be seen in certain ecological movements that seek to gain an internationally guaranteed institutional status for their beliefs.”
CSD, 463

Fixing the Problem

But even with a correct understanding of the environment, we cannot fix the environmental problems without first practicing the “human ecology” proposed by Pope Benedict. Until we acknowledge that certain types of activities fulfill our nature and others don’t, the problem of the ecology of the environment will never be solved. These activities are known as virtues and it begins with the virtue of prudence. Prudence is the habit of governing our actions such that we only use things in a manner in which we truly thrive. Justice is the habit of taking responsibility for the effects our actions have on other people and not just being motivated by self-interest. Temperance is the habit of living with sufficiency and not hoarding resources because we can. Fortitude is the habit of remaining committed to the right use of the environment in the face of wide scale abuse where each person is trying to hoard as much as possible.

The environmental movement lacks any real teeth because they systematically ignore, what Pope Benedict called, “the inner pollution” of which the environmental pollution is just a consequence. They speak of what we ought to do, but still exalt license as if it was true freedom. You cannot promote license, especially in the sexual realm, while simultaneously demanding that people act temperately in their use of the environment. If you will (ab)use other people then you will most certainly abuse the environment. It will never gain any moral authority until it acknowledges a moral law. Without a true respect for human freedom and the conditions in which it thrives, it will have to resort to the hammer of power to beat all non-compliants into submission.

It is the inner pollution of overconsumption that causes untold damage to the environment. But until this is framed as fundamentally a moral problem, it will never get better. As John Paul II put it in his Message for the World Day of Peace in 1990:

“Modern society will find no solution to the ecological problem unless it takes a serious look at its life style. In many parts of the world society is given to instant gratification and consumerism while remaining indifferent to the damage which these cause. As I have already stated, the seriousness of the ecological issue lays bare the depth of man’s moral crisis. If an appreciation of the value of the human person and of human life is lacking, we will also lose interest in others and in the earth itself. Simplicity, moderation and discipline, as well as a spirit of sacrifice, must become a part of everyday life, lest all suffer the negative consequences of the careless habits of a few.”

Environmental ecology then is a fruitless endeavor without first emphasizing a moral ecology. The crisis in the environment is first and foremost a catastrophic crisis in the moral environment of mankind. Until we solve that problem, we should only expect the environmental crisis to get worse. A Catholic Environmentalism then would be one that emphasizing the proper use of the environment by inculcating the necessary virtues.

On Wasting Moral Capital

May 2, 2020Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Church Authority, Culture, Culture of Life, Economics, WorkBishop Gomez, Cardinal Sarah, Common Good, Democratic Party, Immigration, Just Wage, Redistribution, Republican Party, USCCBtwowingstogod@gmail.com

In response to the President’s order temporarily halting all immigration into the United States, several US Bishops issued a statement condemning his decision. This is not the first time that the Bishops have come to loggerheads with the President over his immigration policies, and rightfully so at times, but this particular statement leaves Catholics wondering whether the shepherds might be moonlighting as lobbyists for the Democratic Party.

To be clear, the problem is not that they are aligning themselves with the Democratic Party’s position regarding immigration, but that they so closely aligning themselves with a political party at all. Trapped in what has been called the “left-right fallacy”, American political parties have succumbed to either/or thinking. The Church on the other hand, is animated by both/and type thinking, especially with respect to her social doctrine. When a group of prelates comes out with a statement that sounds like it was drawn up by a Party member, you can almost always be sure that they are failing to embrace and teach the full Catholic understanding of the issue.

The Church on Immigration

With respect to immigration, the Church’s teaching is quite clear that there is a right to emigrate “when there are just reasons in favor of it” (Pacem in Terris, 25). The right is not absolute, conditioned not only to just reasons on the part of the emigrant, but also depending upon the Common Good of the nation they seek to enter. A State must accept immigrants “so far as the good of their own community, rightly understood, permits” (ibid, 106). As custodian of the “good of the community” or the Common Good, the State must exercise its office by enacting policies that first and foremost look to the Common Good and only then to the good of the individual immigrants.

This precedence of the Common Good over the right of the individual is not merely evidence of, as the Bishops insist, “the indifference of a throw-away mentality” but instead flows from the right to emigrate. The immigrant has an obligation to contribute to the Common Good if he is to become a member of the society in which he seeks to emigrate. From this responsibility flows the right to emigrate. If he does harm to the Common Good, then the right disappears.

There is a flip side to this as well, one that is not often discussed, but his highlighted by Cardinal Robert Sarah in his book The Night is Far Spent. The Cardinal says that “without a precise plan for their integration, it is criminal to offer hospitality to migrants.” The Cardinal speaks of the necessity of a welcoming State to have a “precise plan for giving them all the guarantees of dignified life.” This “dignified life” means not just that they have food and housing, but that they have the means for securing these things themselves. To come to another country and live off of the host is not dignified at all, but instead actually does great harm to both the individual person and the Common Good.

Democratic Party Talking Points?

It seems that the US Bishops have ignored the convergence of these very important principles and instead decided to regurgitate Democratic Party talking points. With 30 million Americans currently unemployed, it would be contrary to the Common Good to allow more people into the country and create additional competition for work. The Bishops obviously have fallen into the “immigrants do jobs Americans won’t do” fallacy. Immigrants don’t do jobs Americans won’t do, they do jobs at far lower wages than Americans will do them. They drive down wages for lower-skilled jobs by flooding the market with more workers. In a 2016 article in Politico, George J. Borjas, Professor of Economics and Social Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, reported that,

[W]hen the supply of workers goes up, the price that firms have to pay to hire workers goes down. Wage trends over the past half-century suggest that a 10 percent increase in the number of workers with a particular set of skills probably lowers the wage of that group by at least 3 percent. Even after the economy has fully adjusted, those skill groups that received the most immigrants will still offer lower pay relative to those that received fewer immigrants.
Both low- and high-skilled natives are affected by the influx of immigrants. But because a disproportionate percentage of immigrants have few skills, it is low-skilled American workers, including many blacks and Hispanics, who have suffered most from this wage dip. The monetary loss is sizable. The typical high school dropout earns about $25,000 annually. According to census data, immigrants admitted in the past two decades lacking a high school diploma have increased the size of the low-skilled workforce by roughly 25 percent. As a result, the earnings of this particularly vulnerable group dropped by between $800 and $1,500 each year.

Contrary to the Bishops’ insistence that “There is little evidence that immigrants take away jobs from citizens,” it is clear Americans do lose jobs as a result of the influx of immigrants. This Democratic Party taking point, on the lips of Catholic Bishops ought to concern all of us, especially because there are two especially relevant Catholic principles upon which they are silent.

If you search “just wage” “immigration” on the USCCB website, you will find a single mention of just wage in the context of immigration (and that is a 2003 document quoting John Paul II). Why are the Bishops not defending this clear abuse of immigrant workers? The Church has long insisted that the dignity of the human person demands that he receive a just wage that is “sufficient to enable him comfortably to support himself, his wife, and his children” (Rerum Novarum, 46). Of course, neither the Democrats or the Republicans ever speak of just wage either (and no “minimum wage” is not the same thing as a just wage).

The reason that politicians never speak of it is because immigration is a hidden way in which a redistribution of wealth occurs. Thus, the Bishops make the unsubstantiated claim that “Immigrants and citizens together are partners in reviving the nation’s economy.” A closer examination however reveals the exact opposite to be the case. Returning to Professor Borjas’ article, he pointed out that

somebody’s lower wage is always somebody else’s higher profit. In this case, immigration redistributes wealth from those who compete with immigrants to those who use immigrants—from the employee to the employer…I estimate the current “immigration surplus”—the net increase in the total wealth of the native population—to be about$50 billion annually. But behind that calculation is a much larger shift from one group of Americans to another: The total wealth redistribution from the native losers to the native winners is enormous, roughly a half-trillion dollars a year.

Thus we can see how indiscriminately allowing immigrants into the country, even to fill jobs supposedly “Americans won’t do” can do great harm to the Common Good.

There is nothing in the President’s order that is contrary to the Church’s teaching on immigration and thus they have nothing to add to the conversation as Catholic prelates. Their personal opinions, even when stamped with an imprimatur, only serve to damage their credibility as teachers of the truth. Given the great moral crisis we are facing, especially in the United States, it would be great if Catholic Bishops would not waste their moral capital taking what are clearly political positions.

On Redistribution of Property

May 9, 2018Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Economics, Natural Law, SinRedistribution, Robin Hood, Theft, Universal Destination of Goodstwowingstogod@gmail.com

Set in medieval England, the exploits of Robin Hood have captured the imaginations of young and old for the past two hundred years. The story is familiar to most of us—Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor. While it is debatable whether or not Robin of Locksley was a real man or not, there is no debate over the fact that many real men in our own age, especially those with political power have fashioned themselves after him. Like their beloved patron, these men see it as their vocation to take from the rich and give to the poor. Most of us simply cheer them on, quibbling only with the amounts that are taken. “Quibbling” is rather a gentle description as the dispute can often grow quite contentious even though it need not be so. For with a proper understanding of private property the lines are drawn more clearly and Robin Hood himself is revealed not as a hero but a thief.

Private Property

When examining the question of what constitutes theft, St. Thomas Aquinas asks whether it is lawful for men to own private property. He replies in the affirmative, but, in his usual manner, he does not give an unqualified assent. Private property is linked to man’s innate capacity for freedom. First, because man is dependent upon natural resources in order not only to survive but to thrive, he must have access to those resources that are necessary to his survival. In order to remain free he must have not just temporary access but also have the means by which he gains permanent access to those necessary things. This need extends also to goods not just for the man himself but also those necessary for those for whom he has responsibility for. Finally, to assure that this freedom is preserved in the future, especially in time of emergency, he may set aside a certain amount.

We can see why access to the goods is needed, but perhaps not yet why private property is necessary. When we speak of the relationship of man to things there are three aspects of particular interest—the power to procure and disburse the goods and their use. Regarding the first two, St. Thomas says man has a right to possess private property, that is, he might obtain natural resources, apply his personality to them and claim ownership over them. Private ownership is not only expedient, but also necessary for three reasons. First, because a man is more careful to look after what belongs to him than something that is owned in common. All men tend to shun labor and when “someone else” is doing the work and no one then does it. Second, human affairs are more ordered when each handles his own rather than the confusion of who has responsibility for what. Finally, society remains at peace when each is content with his own possessions. Intuitively this is easy to grasp once we reflect on our own experience. A man is more likely to pick up trash in his own yard than in a public park both because he owns the property and wants to keep it looking good and because he knows the boundaries of his responsibilities for the upkeep.

Ownership and use however are not coterminous. Just because a man owns a thing does not mean he has absolute dominion over that thing. Not only does it mean he may not use the thing in a way that is immoral, but also that he may not use it in a manner that inhibits others from reaching their fulfillment. A man may own his own backyard but this does not mean he can landscape it such that all the runoff water floods his neighbor’s house.

The Universal Destination of Goods

The use of property is also limited by a particular mindset. St. Thomas articulates what became the Church’s teaching on the Universal Destination of Goods—“a man should possess external things not as his own but as common so that to wit he is ready to communicate them to others in their need” (ST II-II q.66 a. 2). We may possess as much as we want, but we should use them as if they belonged to everyone. That is because in a very real sense they do. So insistent is the Church on this point that it, at least in appearance, justifies stealing. When a man has an extreme need and cannot otherwise help himself, he may make use of the property of another person. There is an important nuance that must be highlighted because it pertains to use. He may use the thing as if it belonged to no one, but he does not become the owner of the thing. For example, suppose that a man has an allergic reaction but does not have an EpiPen with him nor any money to pay for one. He could enter a pharmacy and take one and not be guilty of theft. He could not grab an extra one for later, but can only take what he needs to keep from perishing.

Now suppose a man meets another man in anaphylaxis, but has neither an EpiPen nor the money to purchase one. He too may enter the pharmacy and take one and administer it to the man without being guilty of theft. Like the first example, he can only take what is immediately needed to save the man’s life. The example seems like common sense until we begin to extend it a little. The Good Samaritan may not enter the pharmacy take an EpiPen for the man who is ill and then take a few more in case he meets another man. Nor can he take five of them and go out and look for five people having allergic reactions. The use of the object that is taken must be immediate and it must be immediately necessary. Otherwise it is theft.

Now we are closing in on Robin Hood and his modern day crony. Assuming the property truly belongs to the rich man, they may not take it from him to give to the poor except in the case of dire need of a specific man. That is, only in the extreme case can they redistribute specific property to a specific man. They cannot take from the rich and then find the poor who might benefit from it. In other words, Robin Hood and his cronies are thieves.

This does not absolve the rich from giving to the poor even if their need is not dire. Because of the Universal Destination of Goods, redistribution is obligatory. As St. Basil the Great said, “the bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry; the coat unused in your closet belongs to the one who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the one who has no shoes; the money which you hoard up belongs to the poor.” But the redistribution must be done freely because the property is truly his. The goods that are redistributed are not the only things that are stolen—forced redistribution robs from the rich the opportunity to exercise charity and from the poor the opportunity to receive it.

The Worker

April 30, 2018Anthropology, Economics, Redemption, The Life of Jesus, Theology, Virtue, WorkCommunism, Liberalism, St. Joseph the Worker, Worktwowingstogod@gmail.com

Was man made to work or was work made for man? The modern answer, enlightened of course by the strange amalgam of Marxism and liberalism is that made was made for work. The Christian, and therefore the true answer, is that work was made for man. In the beginning God made man and placed him in an earthly paradise. Despite declaring creation “good, very good” (Gn 1:31), God left it completely incomplete and commanded man to finish it, to “cultivate and care for it” (Gn 2:15), because man himself was completely incomplete. God commands only what is for our own good so that it is natural for man to work because work is a means of perfecting him. With the Fall, man became incompletely incomplete so that work, while still essential to his fulfillment, lost its sweetness and became labor (c.f. Gn 3:17-19). The effects of this curse are still felt today—especially today—when man is plagued by compartmentalization leaving him alienated from himself. Given the key role that work plays in the integrated life then we must strive to see it in its proper context.

If we are to be honest, absent the Christian message as a whole, the secular response is the best we can come up with. Even the pre-Christian pagans thought that all men were made to work, or, at least some men were made for servile work so that others didn’t have to. That is because all they can see is the bad news—the curse of the Fall. But the Redeemer of Mankind came spending most of His earthly life as a manual laborer redeeming work itself. He came preaching, as St. John Paul II reminded us, “the Gospel of Work.” And just as His mother Mary received the first fruits of His redemptive act, it is His earthly father Joseph, the man who worked beside Him those many years, that first reaped the fruits of the redemptive gift of work. It is for this reason that the Church puts forth St. Joseph as “The Worker.” If we are to see work in its proper context then we should look to St. Joseph as the model.

First a word about the seeming necessity of compartmentalization. Most of us spend more time at work than anywhere else. It becomes a compartment because it seems to only be related to the material. Man applies his labor and ingenuity on creation in order to produce something that he can use. The emphasis really seems to be on the finished product so that we can stockpile just enough to take a break (even if indefinitely) and do the really meaningful things including the compartment of “religion and God.” While we may hear niceties about “praying while you work,” avoiding compartmentalization seems a practical impossibility.

The Finished Product

But this is where the emphasis on work as made for man is important. The finished product of him work is not just the material thing produced, it is himself. Good work is that which makes us good men. Work ought to be judged first and foremost on what it turns us into. Work that helps us grow in virtue is good work regardless of the actual task. Seeing work in this subjective sense, the person produced, rather than solely in the exterior production can free us from compartmentalization because it is a means of forming the whole person. The interior fruits of our labor are carried throughout the rest of our life.

Still man is confronted with the challenge of integrating work with his relationship to God. There is always a gravity of work that pulls man towards creation, even if it is towards his own virtue, and away from God. And this is why we need St. Joseph as our intercessor and model. He, quite literally, worked for and with God.

Working For and With God

All of the work that St. Joseph did was, even if indirectly, for Jesus. The “righteous man” sought always to serve God especially through his work. What this means for us is that we can redeem our work by setting our intention. At the beginning of any of our work we should make of it an offering to God. Then all that we accomplish becomes a gift to Jesus. We can also willingly accept, like St. Joseph did, the toilsome-ness of work. Because work became labor through mankind’s sin, our acceptance of the burdens is an offering for our sins. It was in this way that St. Joseph shared in Christ’s redemptive act and so can we.

Work also helps us to pay the debt of gratitude to God for the gifts, especially the special skills, He has given us. Gratitude, properly speaking, carries with it not just the obligation to say “thank you” but also the obligation to repay the benefactor. The fruit of our labor then becomes a means by which we repay to God this great debt.

There also needs to be a paradigm shift in order to see our work as working with God. We should see it as a means of not only completely creation, but also as distributing it to all of mankind. Just because you are getting paid to work doesn’t mean it isn’t also an exercise of charity towards our neighbor. All workplaces can be charities when we take upon ourselves the spirit of St. Joseph. This desire not only to give someone what they have paid for but also to go “above and beyond” by making manifest the love of God can sanctify the most secular of work environments.

When Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of Saint Joseph the Worker in 1955 it was in response to the dehumanizing effects of Communism; offering an alternative to their May Day celebrations for workers. In the subsequent sixty-three years we have seen work became a source of further disintegration in the lives of mankind. By seeing work through the eyes of the Church and the illumination offered by St. Joseph the Worker we can restore work to its rightful place in the lives of all of us.

St. Joseph the Worker, pray for us!

Death of Taxes?

April 14, 2018Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Economics, MoneyTax Day, Taxes and Catholicismtwowingstogod@gmail.com

Is there a day in the year that strikes more dread in the working man’s heart than April 15^th; the day when the tax man cometh to fill his coffers? Dread indeed. Unless, that is, the man is in the middle class and has received the latest tax break. Or he is a wealthy man who has discovered loop holes in the tax code that greatly reduce his overall payment. Or he is a poor man whose low wages have earned him a tax credit. The only constant in the tax code is that it is guaranteed to change, shifting the burden from rich to poor to middle class and back again, subject only to the fiscal attitude of the ruling party and administration. In fact, the shifting of the tax burden is arguably the most hotly contested political debate of our times. Yet with all this talk of deciding who should find taxes the most taxing, there is little discussion of taxes themselves. Determining whether the distribution of the tax burden is just presupposes that taxes themselves are just, something that is far from self-evident. Therefore, with the IRS watching over us, it is enlightening for us to examine taxes in general.

Administrative Taxes

In our day and age there are essentially two types of taxes. As the name suggests, administrative taxes are those that are collected for the administration of the State. This includes the costs associated with maintaining public safety (like police and military), the building up and upkeep of public properties (like roads, courthouses, parks, etc.) and as remuneration for the work of civil servants (like lawmakers, judges, etc.). In essence, administrative taxes are collected to fund legitimate governmental functions. There may be reasonable debate as to which functions are considered legitimate, but these functions must always conform to the principle of subsidiarity which keeps the arms of Big Brother from over-reaching. Only tax systems within this context of a limited government (not in the Libertarian sense) can be considered just. As a State moves away from a limited government the tax system will move accordingly towards injustice.

Redistributive Taxes

Most of us intuitively grasp that administrative taxes are necessary and in justice each man ought to pay his share. What an individual man’s share is can legitimately be debated, but administrative taxes are just in principle. But this debate tends not to be as hotly contested as the debate over the second type of taxes—redistributive taxes. It is here that social welfare programs exist and every man is fighting for his favorite pet program. Redistributive taxes take from one man and give to another, necessarily setting up an inequality in the tax burden and pitting rich versus poor.

Most of the debate today centers around how to justly allocate the payment of these types of taxes. Yet no one really asks whether these taxes are just in themselves. They are not unjust simply because of the inequality. In order to see this we must first speak briefly about private property.

Private property is not just about owning, but also about using. A man has a right to own his own property and use it in any manner that he sees fit, provided he uses it in accord with the moral law. But this right is not absolute. Assuming he is able to fulfill his own needs and those whom he has care for as well as having enough to maintain his station in life, a man has an obligation to give to the man in absolute need from his superfluity. Our tax code recognizes this to a certain degree in the way in which it grants deductions that adjust for absolute needs and those of one’s station in life. These deductions are meant to target the rich man’s superfluity, but end up instead leading to further injustice.

First, the obligation is towards a man who is in absolute need. In other words, our obligation to help the poor extends no further than those who are destitute. We may (and should) give freely to those in need, even if they are not destitute, and hopefully not just from our superfluity, but this constitutes a move from strict justice to to love of neighbor. Such giving cannot be codified in any way as it must be done freely and not by force, even if it is the force of civil law.

The obligation also rests with the individual himself. Although he may freely choose to transfer that obligation to something like a charitable organization, only he can determine exactly how much of his property is superfluous. Herein lies the primary injustice of any tax system that is redistributive in nature—there is no formula that can be applied to determine exactly how much of a man’s property is superfluous. There are too many variables. Should the man who helped to pay to replace his neighbor’s leaky roof (which is not a “deduction”) really pay more taxes than the miser who only gave to “tax deductible” organizations even if he paid significantly more to help his neighbor?

This exposes another problem with redistributive tax systems—it discourages face to face giving and encourages faceless giving. Most certainly I am my brother’s keeper, but now it is Big Brother who controls what I give. Society as a whole suffers because real bonds between individual occur when a man gives of his property directly to another person in need. It also leads to an institutionalizing of envy because the poor begin to see the rich as stealing from them and look to the State to play Robin Hood.

We have heard much recently about the need for a “tax overhaul.” Unfortunately, this just means looking at how our current tax system distributes its burden. What becomes obvious after discussion here is that what is truly necessary is an examination of taxes in general. We have institutionalized injustice and any society in which this occurs will eventually crumble.

The Economic Third Way

June 28, 2017Catholic Social Teaching, Church and State, Economics, Money, VirtueCapitalism, Distributism, Pope Francis, Socialismtwowingstogod@gmail.com

When Pope Francis visited with a group of workers and business people in Genoa last month, he praised their entrepreneurial spirit. Praises flowing from the mouth of someone who has been so critical of Capitalism came as a shock for many people, including those in the media. Someone who criticizes Capitalism must be a Socialist, or so the reasoning goes. The Holy Father must be a closeted Capitalist or a secret Socialist. While his criticisms of Capitalism receive more airtime in the West because it the predominant economic model, that he might be neither a Socialist nor a Capitalist is a priori eliminated. The problem of hearing the Pope is that many of us are stuck in what I would call an either/or fallacy. We assume that there are only two mutually exclusive players in the economic game and we must choose one or the other.

The Church for her part has chosen neither Socialism nor Capitalism. Pope Leo XII’s Encyclical Rerum Novarum is considered the foundational document for the modern day corpus of what would become the Church’s Social teaching. In it condemns Socialism for its exploitation of the “poor man’s envy of the rich” and says it is clear that socialism “must be utterly rejected” (RN, 15). Expanding on the same thing, forty years later, after Socialism had bound its test subjects, Pius XI said Socialism “cannot be reconciled with the teachings of the Catholic Church” (Quadragesimo Anno, 117). This criticism has continued down to our own time with St. John Paul II, in Centesimus Annus, his encyclical marking the 100^th Anniversary of Rerum Novarum, says Socialism in all its forms is doomed to fail because it makes a fundamental error in anthropology by denying that man is a free being that exercises his freedom in the world through the acquisition and use of private property (CA, 13).

With such a clear condemnation of Socialism, many would conclude that the Church is pro-Capitalism. Scouring the Magisterial documents however, one would be hard pressed to find a single endorsement of Capitalism in the form that it takes in the West. At best the Church is cautiously Capitalistic, a stance which best finds expression in Pope St. John Paul’s aforementioned encyclical Centesimus Annus:

“If by ‘capitalism’ is meant an economic system which recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property and the resulting responsibility for the means of production, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector, then the answer is certainly in the affirmative, even though it would perhaps be more appropriate to speak of a “business economy”, “market economy” or simply “free economy”. But if by ‘capitalism’ is meant a system in which freedom in the economic sector is not circumscribed within a strong juridical framework which places it at the service of human freedom in its totality, and which sees it as a particular aspect of that freedom, the core of which is ethical and religious, then the reply is certainly negative.” (John Paul II, Centesimus Annus, 42)

This short history lesson is not so much meant to trace the development of the Church’s teachings on modern economic models, but to show that the Church supports neither Socialism nor Capitalism directly. John Paul II’s definition quoted above is a far cry from what most of us would label as true capitalism and explains why he is tempted to give it a different name. He will not fall into the either/or trap and is inviting us to do the same. But in order to see that there might be a third option, we must look more closely at the two in terms of strengths and weaknesses.

The Centrality of Private Property

Notice that the condemnation of Socialism and the caution of Capitalism both make reference to the central moral ideal of all valid economic models, private property. Grasping this concept and its importance helps us to more objectively evaluate the competing economic models. This term remains elusive for many of us, stymying any real discussion. Private property does not refer so much to having a lot of money (just a medium of exchange) or to owning your own home, but has to do with the control of wealth.

When we speak of “property” we are referring to those things that have economic value attached to them. Property is the collection of things that can be used and exchanged for other things of economic value. Of critical importance on the question of property is who controls that property. Private property simply means that wealth is in the hands of private individuals.

The Church praises those models that protect and promote private property and condemns those that don’t because private property is bound up closely with man as a free creature. In fact, private property is how man exercises his freedom in the economic realm. Private property keeps man free from the control of others and enables him to do those things that are both needed and wanted for his and his family’s fulfillment. But freedom in the economic realm is not just freedom from restriction, but the best system would be one in which his economic activity contributes to his freedom for his own perfection. Freedom actually increases when virtue grows. With this in mind we should not just look at the system that has the least amount of restrictions but also that which is best suited to increase the man’s virtue.

A concrete example might help to see why private property is pivotal. Suppose a man needs food for his family. In which of these three systems is the man best able to exercise his own personal freedom?

The Three Economic Ways

First we have the system in which the man waits in a bread line so that those in authority can give it to him. The State, or more accurately a group of men acting in the name of the State, determine how and how much bread the man will consume because they own all the means of making the bread. The man is assigned some task to contribute to society, although there is no proportion in the amount of work or energy the man himself expends to obtain that bread. Each person receives strictly according to need. Lacking such an incentive, he will do the minimum amount of work. In this system, which is called Socialism, man is obviously not free to accumulate wealth, but he also has no incentive to grow in virtue and thus his growth in freedom. The man trades security for freedom.

Second, we have the system in which the man works for another man or, as is usually the case, group of men, who give him a wage in exchange for his labor on the capital they provide. He can exchange some portion of this wage in a grocery store for the food he needs. The man is free in the sense that he is not compelled to work for another. He is compensated for his work and thus has an incentive to work well. But he also works at the service of another man’s capital and lives perpetually under the fear of losing his job and his family starving. Without any capital of his own to generate wealth, this fear greatly limits his freedom and he will submit to greater and greater demands from the capitalist, who acts solely based on the profit motive. We call this system Capitalism.

Certainly if one had to choose between the first and the second, the second is far superior. But is there another option, perhaps a middle-ground of sorts? Imagine the system in which the man has sufficient private property and capital where he is able to work as say a craftsman of some sort and trades some of the wealth he generates from the fruit of his labor (either directly or through the exchange of money) for food. This man is not merely a “small business owner” in the second system, but works within a system of nothing but “small business owners.” He lives more freely than in the second system as well. He no longer depends on the Capitalist for an allowance, but depends only (or at least mostly) on his own hard work and use of his allotment of capital. This will motivate him towards excellence, increasing his freedom, especially knowing that those “who don’t work, don’t eat.” He is also more secure than in the first case without any tradeoff of his freedom. This system has been dubbed Distributism because it assures the diffusion of private property into the greatest number of hands.

Notice how this third option closely parallels what John Paul II described as the ideal, although he does not use the term “Distributism.” When people first hear this name, they assume it is essentially like Socialism, which properly understood is Re-distributism. Distributism consists in a free market and does not involuntarily take from the rich to give to the poor. The State owns no property and produces nothing (except where necessary for public works, defense, etc.) but does help to limit the amount of private property an individual might own, especially when it encroaches on the ownership and use of others.

For example, suppose a town might not have a butcher and the people must visit the butcher in the town over. Sam the Butcher could open a second butcher shop in that town or he could help train a new butcher (or help an existing butcher) so that he might meet the demand and make a profit. The State could heavily tax Sam for the new butcher shop to the point where it does not make it worth it and it could incentivize Sam to help by way of tax cuts. Notice that the State in such a system actually helps to form the virtue of its citizens by punishing vice (greed) and rewarding virtue (love of neighbor). Just like a good government is one in which the people are (morally good), so too a good economic system is one in which the people are good.

By its fruit, you shall know it—this is at the heart of the current Pope’s criticism of Capitalism. He looks at the fruit and questions the tree. Does this mean he is a Socialist? I don’t know. But I do know that it doesn’t mean he has to be. There is a Third Way.

A New Labor Day

September 8, 2015Catholic Social Teaching, Economics, Worktwowingstogod@gmail.com

In an attempt to remove the effect of all religious superstition, the leaders of the French Revolution invented a new calendar in 1793 to replace the Gregorian calendar. The calendar consisted of 12 months of 30 days, with five days left over that represented secular holidays (sometimes 6 in a leap year). The new calendar replaced the Christian holidays with festivals commemorating reason, virtue, genius, rewards, the revolution itself and finally labor. The revolutionaries borrowed this habit of creating secular holidays from the Roman Empire. While the observance of this calendar only lasted a short time, the habit of inventing secular holidays did not. In fact, we just celebrated the Labor Day holiday this week—a day that, according to the Department of Labor, is “dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.” What this really marks is a “flattening out” of our horizons. Festivals have always been celebrated to mark and recognize that which is a pure gift. Labor Day and our other secular holidays we celebrate are all about us and what we do. Trapped inside our own world, we are greatly in need of a Christian revolution like what happened when Christianity “baptized” the secular holidays of the Roman Empire and attached deeper meaning in them. While it is fresh in our minds, we might start with Labor Day.

On the one hand we should not be surprised that work is one of the areas in which there is a flattening. When man is created on the sixth day of creation, the reader is told that God created mankind in His image (Gn 1:27). To remind mankind of this truth, He gives them two primary tasks, namely, “Be fertile and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it” (Gn 1:28). These two tasks are the two main ways that mankind can image God—through procreation and through work. It is also these same two tasks that bear the curse of the Fall (Gn 3:16-19). In trying to become like gods (Gn 3:5) in the wrong way, the two primary ways in which man really is like God become distorted. Both childbirth and work become “labor” and the imaging of God is difficult to see.

Interestingly enough, these two topics were areas of primary focus for St. John Paul II. Most are familiar with his “rereading of Humanae Vitae” through a personalistic perspective in his Theology of the Body, but less are aware of his teachings on the Theology of Work that marked much of his pontificate. Perhaps there is no better summary of his teachings than in his encyclical Laborem Exercens.

What makes his teaching in this area so unique is his emphasis on the subjective aspect of work. The emphasis in the past was always on the objective part of work, namely the kind of work being done. This led to the distinction between intellectual and servile work, with the latter being somehow viewed as less than the former. Aristotle made a similar distinction between doing and making to reflect these two types and we also label work either “white collar” or “blue collar.” There is nothing wrong with making these distinctions per se, but there is always the danger that a utilitarian view of work arises. Workers simply become cogs in a machine that is aimed solely at production, whether of material or intellectual goods. What Christianity did was proclaim a “Gospel of work” (LE, 6) where it is not primarily about the kind of work that is being done, but the fact that it is a person that does it. This is especially true because we worship a God who took flesh as a manual worker.

Rather than just being an instrumental good, work is an intrinsic good. Recall the distinction between instrumental goods and intrinsic goods are that instrumental goods are good for something else while intrinsic goods are good in themselves. Work is an intrinsic good because of what it does to us interiorly. In other words, work is good for us because of what it makes us into. In fact this ought to be the sole criterion upon which we judge our work—what is my work turning me into? Otherwise there is always the grave danger of compartmentalization which leads to a disintegration in our personality.

The fruit of our work ought to be a growth in virtue. Two in particular are mentioned by St. Josemaria Escriva when he says that our work ought to develop in us “two human virtues, industriousness and diligence, which merge into one, for they both help us in our efforts to make good use of the talents we have each received from God” (Friends of God, 81). So important is this principle that Jesus Himself warned about becoming like the slothful (and wicked) servant who buried his talents rather than making them as an offering to the Master (Mt 25:26).

Primarily though work ought to serve as a labor of love. Through our work we ought to grow in charity through a love of God and service of our neighbor. St. Josemaria again, “”A complete range of virtues is called into play when we set about our work with the purpose of sanctifying it: fortitude, to persevere in our work despite the difficulties that naturally arise and to ensure that we never let ourselves be overwhelmed by anxiety; temperance, in order to spend ourselves unsparingly and to overcome our love of comfort and our selfishness; justice, so as to fulfil our duties towards God, society, our family and our fellow workers; prudence, to know in each case what course to take, and then to set about it without hesitation…And all this, I emphasize, is for the sake of Love” (Friends of God, 72).

From this emphasis on the subjective over the objective flows the Church’s principles related to economics. If things are meant merely to serve persons then there is a priority of labor over capital. The right to private property flows from the fact that man, because he rationally participates in his work, always ought to know that he is working for himself in some ways and not just a cog in a huge machine from above (CE 15). But it also serves as a limiting factor on private property by subordinating it to the universal destination of goods based upon a solidarity of all mankind.

I mentioned above that the problem with Labor Day now is that “it is all about us” but that this could somehow be redeemed. By reflecting on work, we begin to see work as an unmerited gift that calls for celebration. This is because work is not just a way in which we image God. If that were the case we would merely be like the beavers imaging God’s wisdom when they build a dam. But instead what makes work uniquely human is that man consciously participates in God’s activity as Creator. When God created the earth, it was not yet done. He left it to man to perfect the earth by participating in His creative act. God still creates today through man’s free participation and instrumentality.

As John Paul II said, “man, created in the image of God, shares by his work in the activity of the Creator and that, within the limits of his own human capabilities, man in a sense continues to develop that activity, and perfects it as he advances further and further in the discovery of the resources and values contained in the whole of creation” (LE 25). This awareness brings new meaning to work and ought to permeate even the most ordinary everyday activities.

In many ways a Christian Labor Day would be much like what the Sunday Sabbath rest is intended to be—a time to do the work of reflection and contemplation through participation in God’s work of resting. While the Sabbath is a time of reflection on the goodness of Creation and gratitude for the New Creation in Christ, a Christian Labor Day would be a day of contemplation and gratitude for the goodness of Creation that God has brought about through the labor of mankind.

The point is that work is not simply something we must do to take care of our bodies, but our souls as well. It is not something merely to be tolerated but something that perfects us and makes us ready for heaven. Does this describe our work? If not, perhaps we are all in need of a Christian Labor Day!

St. Joseph, the Worker, pray for us!

Two Wings to God

"Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth"Pope St. John Paul II

Category Archives: Economics

The Worker

The Finished Product

Working For and With God