Posted on 01/02/2013 8:34:06 AM PST by marshmallow
We are approaching, in this series, Pope Leo XIIIs great encyclical Rerum Novarum, on the condition of the working classes. Ive been maintaining that it is impossible to discuss Catholic Social Teaching without specifying what Catholics understand as a society. Ive also insisted upon the wise dictum of Saint Thomas, that grace perfects nature, which alone suffices to instruct the attentive Catholic that to sever faith from civic life is artificial and unnatural. Now its time to look at two societies which the Pope holds up for our affection and admiration: the Christian family, and the Church.
Far from seeing religion as a pleasant decoration superadded to civil society, the Pope affirms that religion, and religion only, can create the social bond (Au Milieu des Sollicitudes, 1892). Historyand Leo is an historian with a long and broad vistateaches us as much. The key word in his sentence is bond. This bond is more profound than the phantom contracts dreamed by Hobbes, Locke, and their followers. For Leo sees another dimension, the moral and spiritual depth of manwhat makes it impossible for us to reduce him to his material wealth and appetites. I enter a contract, for self-serving and limited purposes; but I forge a bond. The bond is personal, engaging the whole of my being. And the social bond aims at the good of that whole human being. When different families, Leo writes to French Catholics during a period of severe secular agitation against the Church, unite under the inspiration of nature, in order to constitute themselves members of another larger family circle called civil society, their object is not only to find therein the means of providing for their material welfare, but, above all, to draw thence the boon of moral improvement.
Lets pause there. Time and again, Pope....
(Excerpt) Read more at crisismagazine.com ...
Ping!
Thank you for the ping. I always enjoy and get much out of the aticles you post. Happy new year! May it be filled with God’s blessings for you and yours.
May the New Year be good to you, too!
Otherwise, he saysand did he enter a time-machine to inspect the United States in 2012?society would rise but little above the level of an aggregation of beings devoid of reason, and whose whole life would consist in the satisfaction of sensual instincts.
He seems pretty prescient to me as well.
From the comments posted after the article, by ‘JERD’:
“Leo’s thesis is played out perfectly in the erosion of the marriage covenent in the United States since the mid 20th century. The law of the State built a society founded on no-fault divorce, contraception, and abortion, and now capped by same sex marriage.
Marriage has become more rare, divorce is common, and more children are born out of wedlock. As the number of intact families (mother, father, and children bonded together for life) declines, the morality imposed by law fills the void - tax payer funded abortions, mandatory contraception insurance coverage, and dependency on State benefits for impoverished abandoned mothers and their children.”
Not to mention that the state would actually work to achieve these things, as the more people dependant upon it the more power it has.
Pope Leo XIII warns about about this here:
Freegards, thanks for all the threads on FR
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.