439 . SOCIAL TEACHING

YOUCAT Lesson 439

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic youth

439  How did the Church’s social teaching develop?

Catholic social teaching was a response to the economic problems of the nineteenth century.  Whereas industrialization had led to an increase in prosperity, the ones who profited from it were primarily factory owners, while many people sank into poverty as laborers with practically no rights.  From this experience Communism drew the conclusion that there was an irreconcilable opposition between labor and capital, which must be decided by class war.  The Church, in contrast, advocated a just balance between the interests of the laborers and those of the factory owners.  [2421]

Citizens gathered at the Madison State Capitol protesting the 2011 Wisconsin Act 10 signed into law by Governor Scott Walker.   Photo by Joe Rowley. ….. 439

The 2011 Wisconsin Act 10, was legislation proposed by Govenor Walker and passed by the Wisconsin Legislature to address a projected $3.6 billion budget deficit. The legislation primarily impacted collective bargaining, compensation, retirement, health insurance, and sick leave of public sector employees with the exception of firefighters and law enforcement.

The Church recommended that not only a few but everyone should benefit from the prosperity recently made possible by industrialization and competition.  She therefore supported the development of labor unions and advocated protecting laborers from exploitation through legislation and government assurances and insuring them and their families against sickness and emergencies.

“Capital cannot do without labor, nor lab or without capital.”  Pope Leo XIII (1810-1903)  Encyclical “Rerum Novarum”  (1891)

[2421]

III. THE SOCIAL DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH

2421 The social doctrine of the Church developed in the nineteenth century when the Gospel encountered modern industrial society with its new structures for the production of consumer goods, its new concept of society, the state and authority, and its new forms of labor and ownership. The development of the doctrine of the Church on economic and social matters attests the permanent value of the Church's teaching at the same time as it attests the true meaning of her Tradition, always living and active. (Compare Centesimus Annus 3.)²⁰¹