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"We the people is chaos and a failure!"

Michael Novak’s Portrait of Democratic Capitalism

Novak has done a great deal with respect to delineating the theoretical foundation of democratic capitalism. He has devoted much of his life to explaining democratic capitalism’s fundamental principles and will long be remembered for his innovative work, especially for his influence on Pope John Paul II and Centesimus Annus.

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Novak explains that many Catholic social teachings were formed in the pre-capitalist static world of medieval society, which prized stability in economics, politics, and religion. Papal teachings were thus more concerned with the just distribution of available goods than with the morality of systems that produce new wealth and sustain economic growth. The New Testament favors the poor. The spirit of socialism (including self-denial, cooperation, and human solidarity) thus initially appears to many as being closer to the Gospel vision of a redemptive community than the competitive spirit of capitalism. Catholicism has emphasized community and tradition while capitalism has emphasized individualism and innovation. As a result, North American theologians have generally been critical of the nation’s economic system.

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Democratic capitalism assumes pluralism, recognizes that individuals have differing opinions and interests, and allows them to associate in order to further those interests. Pluralism assumes the reality of sin. Pluralism’s multiple groups provide a balance of power. The chief purpose of pluralism is to fragment and check power–not to repress sin.

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Novak emphasizes the primacy of morals–if our moral and cultural institutions fail, all the rest of ordered liberty is lost. He goes on to say that if the primary flaw lies not in the political system or the economic system but in our moral-cultural system, then the prognosis is hopeful. If the fatal flaw lies in our ideals and morals (i.e., in ourselves) then we have a chance to mend our ways. According to Novak, the hardest part of the moral task we now face is the power of the adversary culture with its emphasis on equality of results and moral relativism.

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Michael Novak, the preeminent Roman Catholic social theorist of our time, is the prolific author of numerous monographs, articles, and reviews, and has written over twenty-five influential books in philosophy, theology, political economy, and culture. He holds the George Frederick Jewett Chair in Religion, Philosophy, and Public Policy at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., where he also serves as Director of Social and Political Studies. He has lectured all over the world and has taught at Harvard, Stanford, Syracuse, and Notre Dame. During 1981 and 1982 he served as Chief of the United States delegation to the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva as a Reagan appointee with the rank of Ambassador. His writings have appeared in more than a dozen languages. In 1994, he received the prestigious Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion for his service in defense of freedom and for his incredibly influential work in Christian social teaching on economics.

He once studied for the priesthood and for years was an espoused democratic socialist. Novak at one time believed in socialism because its ostensible ethical system seemed so superior. The son of Eastern European immigrants, he once thought that the communitarian religious ethic of his heritage was being attacked by the individualistic ethic of commerce. However, he was persuaded through observation of human affairs and intense reflection that he was mistaken. He now fervently believes that capitalism is superior to socialism both in practice and in theory and that Judeo-Christian virtues not only survive but flourish under democratic capitalism.

And thus the New Testament, imagined under the aegis of this age (or at least of this writer), pertains to a "zero-sum game."

But Novak is a Roman Catholic. He understands that "in God, all things are made anew." That is, Novak testifies that there is no zero-sum game in God's Creation.

And thus I take issue with dear stfassisi's claim that "We the people is chaos and failure!"

Does he have inside information that the rest of us do not have, to the effect that God is "finished" with His Creation now??? Has withdrawn from the scene of the carnage, the scene of the "chaos?" That some smart-aleck sooner or later will blame God for???

Please.

“”Michael Novak, the preeminent Roman Catholic social theorist of our time””

I believe Michael Novak is a shallow thinker and worships the political conservative

I suggest reading these 2 well thought out articles

http://www.catholicapologetics.info/modernproblems/americanism/myth.htm

excerpt...
This group comprises men like George Weigel, Michael Novak and Richard John Neuhaus. Their passionate reaction to Craycraft merely proves how wedded the dominant Catholic bloc is to an ideology which seeks to reconcile the irreconcilables of Americanist dogma and Church doctrine.

And from Catholic Culture
http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=7630
For dissident Catholic priests and theologians, this high-sounding phrase became the reason to reject centuries of Church teachings, particularly those pertaining to sexual morality. Charles Curran, Daniel McGuire, Michael Novak, and other celebrity dissenters promoted artificial contraception to an all too easily manipulated faithful. Divorce and abortion followed. Today, not a few Catholic politicians defend abortion and think that cohabiting homosexuals should have the right to get married.

Americanism, doubtless more virulent in our day than it was in Leo’s, combines a collective sense of Christian exceptionalism (America as the “Shining City on a Hill”) with the hubristic conviction that America can draw up her own moral code—or, rather, a limitless number of moral codes, arising from each individual’s conscience. Acknowledging the heresy and its internal contradictions helps us understand why Americans today can insist that we are a Christian nation while indulging in all manner of public and private behavior that is decidedly not Christian, from delighting in degenerate diversions, to sanctioning the murder of children, to supporting and prosecuting an unjust war. Although the heresy began as a Catholic controversy, it is hardly less manifest in American Protestant denominations where far too many are eager to cooperate with the “spirit of the age,” using “freedom of conscience” as an excuse to relax some of their own severity.