The progression of peoples in a moral sense is the fundamentally central onus of all social and political activity. The Church as such has always possessed in its social teaching the goal of rescuing peoples not only from spiritual deprivation, for that is its first and foremost objective, but from temporal deprivation, hunger, endemic diseases and the like as part of its mission of mercy in this world. This is particularly relevant in our current time when the world faces the precipice of an economic crisis, wherein the human dimension of economics and of social life is often neglected.
From the economic point of view, the Churchs social teaching calls for the active participation, on equal terms, of people in the international economic process in a thoroughly human paradigm which respects the dignity of man as made in the image and likeness of God. Profit, as such, is useful only if it serves as a means towards an end that provides a sense both of how to produce Profit and how to make good use of it to the benefit of human beings. Once profit becomes the exclusive goal in and of itself, if it is produced by improper means and without the common good as its ultimate end, it risks destroying wealth and creating poverty. The economic development that the Church hopes to see should produce real growth, of the benefit to everyone and in a genuinely sustainable manner. Now it is true that growth has taken place, and it continues to be a positive factor that has lifted many out of misery recently it has given many countries the possibility of becoming effective players in international politics. Yet it must be acknowledged that this same economic growth has been and continues to be weighed down by malfunctions and dramatic problems, born from a lack of Christian virtue and through immoral practices rooted in individualistic greed, and economics divorced from any moral dimension.
These malfunctions and problems, and the picture of development and the economy in general has many overlapping layers. The problems and opportunities within the economic system are complex and are new in the schema of world history. The actors and the causes in both underdevelopment and development are manifold and the faults and the merits are differentiated. This fact should prompt us to liberate ourselves from certain simplistic ideologies popular in the present day, which often construe reality in artificial ways through crass reductionism, and it should lead us to examine objectively the full human dimension of the problems. To begin, as has often been observed in the Church, The world's wealth is growing in absolute terms, but inequalities are on the increase. This is clearly evident in the economic history of the world over the last century. At a domestic level to delve deeper into this broad trend, in rich countries, new sectors of society are succumbing to poverty and new forms of poverty are emerging particularly amongst the working class, as the differentiation between rich and poor continue to widen with this having the catastrophic effect of encouraging proletarist and extremist sentiment. In poorer areas specifically, and even in some richer states, some groups enjoy a sort of superdevelopment of a wasteful and consumerist kind which forms an unacceptable contrast with the ongoing situations of dehumanizing deprivation that exist in the same countries, and is a scandalous and sinful manifestation of unmitigated greed.
Corruption and illegality likewise are unfortunately evident in the conduct of the economic and political class in rich countries, both old and new, as well as in poor ones. A recent example being scandalously evident, is in the Argentine film industry, whose rejection of foreign property rights continues at the expense of the economic development in poorer nations. More broadly, those who also sometimes fail to respect the human rights of workers are large companies as well as local producers, where the right of the worker to a fair wage upon which to support himself and his family is sometimes neglected in the name of pure profit at the expense of the common good. This points to the perfidious influence of sin in the world, and to the denial of many of the reality that sin has temporal consequences.
Indeed sometimes modern man is wrongly convinced that he is the sole author of himself, his life and society. This is a presumption that follows from being selfishly closed in upon himself, and it is a consequence to express it in faith terms of original sin. The Church's wisdom has always pointed to the presence of original sin in social conditions and in the structure of society: Ignorance of the fact that man has a wounded nature inclined to evil gives rise to serious errors in the areas of education, politics, social action and morals. In the list of areas where the pernicious effects of sin are evident, the economy has been included for some time now. We have a clear proof of this at the present time with the currently unfolding crisis. The conviction that man is self-sufficient and can successfully eliminate the evil present in history by his own action alone has led him to confuse happiness and salvation with immanent forms of material prosperity and social action. Then, the conviction that the economy must be autonomous, that it must be shielded from influences of a moral character, has led man to abuse the economic process in a thoroughly destructive way. In the long term, these convictions have led to economic, social and political systems that trample upon personal and social freedom, and are therefore unable to deliver the justice that they promise. History is thereby deprived of Christian hope, deprived of a powerful social resource at the service of integral human development, sought in freedom and in justice. The principles of trust, and solidarity are also degraded and subverted.
We see for example that in a climate of mutual trust, the market is the economic institution that permits encounter between persons, inasmuch as they are economic subjects who make use of contracts to regulate their relations as they exchange goods and services of equivalent value between them, in order to satisfy their needs and desires. The market is subject to the principles of so-called commutative justice, which regulates the relations of giving and receiving between parties to a transaction. But the social doctrine of the Church has unceasingly highlighted the importance of distributive justice and social justice for the market economy, not only because it belongs within a broader social and political context, but also because of the wider network of relations within which it operates. In fact, if the market is governed solely by the principle of the equivalence in value of exchanged goods, it cannot produce the social cohesion that it requires in order to function well. Without internal forms of solidarity and mutual trust, the market cannot completely fulfil its proper economic function. And today it is this trust which has ceased to exist, and the loss of trust is a grave loss. The economic system itself, for example, would benefit from the wide-ranging practice of justice, inasmuch as the first to gain from the development of poor countries would be rich ones. The poor as such are not to be considered a burden, but a resource, even from the purely economic point of view.
The Church has always held that economic action is not to be regarded as something opposed to society. In and of itself, the market is not, and must not become, the place where the strong subdue the weak. Society does not have to protect itself from the market, as if the development of the latter were ipso facto to entail the death of authentically human relations. Admittedly, the market can be a negative force, not because it is so by nature, but because a certain ideology can make it so. It must be remembered that the market does not exist in the pure state. It is shaped by the cultural configurations which define it and give it direction. Economy and finance, as instruments, can be used badly when those at the helm are motivated by purely selfish ends. Instruments that are good in themselves can thereby be transformed into harmful ones. But it is man's darkened reason that produces these consequences, not the instrument per se. Therefore it is not the instrument that must be called to account, but individuals, their moral conscience and their personal and social responsibility, and it is this truth that calls the Christian towards the moralisation of the market, and its transformation in light of Christian virtue and divine and Catholic faith.
This is particularly pertinent in light Church's social doctrine, which holds that authentically human social relationships of friendship, solidarity and reciprocity can also be conducted within economic activity, and not only outside it or after it. The economic sphere is neither ethically neutral, nor inherently inhuman and opposed to society. It is part and parcel of human activity and precisely because it is human, it must be structured and governed in an ethical manner.
The Church's social doctrine has also always maintained that justice must be applied to every phase of economic activity, because this is always concerned with man and his needs. Locating resources, financing, production, consumption and all the other phases in the economic cycle inevitably have moral implications. Thus every economic decision has a moral consequence. Canons of justice must be respected from the outset, as the economic process unfolds, and not just afterwards or incidentally. Space also needs to be created within the market for economic activity carried out by subjects who freely choose to act according to principles other than those of pure profit, without sacrificing the production of economic value in the process. The many economic entities that draw their origin from religious and lay initiatives demonstrate that this is concretely possible, and likewise the economic dimension of charity, of the gift, should be increasingly considered and respected within economic thinking.
Indeed, what is needed, is a market that permits the free operation, in conditions of equal opportunity, of enterprises in pursuit of different institutional ends other than pure profit. Alongside profit-oriented private enterprise and the various types of public enterprise, there must be room for commercial entities based on mutualist principles and pursuing social ends to take root and express themselves. It is from their reciprocal encounter in the marketplace that one may expect hybrid forms of commercial behaviour to emerge, and hence an attentiveness to ways of civilizing the economy. Charity in truth, in this case, requires that shape and structure be given to those types of economic initiative which, without rejecting profit, aim at a higher goal than the mere logic of the exchange of equivalents, of profit as an end in itself. The creation of a model of market economy capable of including within its range all peoples and not just the better off is a fundamental imperative of our time. A more human world for all, a world in which all will be able to give and receive, without one group making progress at the expense of the other is imperative in developing a positive future.
When however this is not the case, and the logic of the market and the logic of the State come to an agreement that each will continue to exercise a monopoly over its respective area of influence at the expense of all others, in the long term much is lost: solidarity in relations between citizens, participation and adherence, actions of gratuitousness, all of which stand in contrast with giving in order to acquire (the logic of exchange) and giving through duty (the logic of public obligation, imposed by State law) are marginalised and subverted. In order to defeat underdevelopment and combat the economic problems this duopoly within the economic system imposes, action is required not only on improving exchange-based transactions and implanting public welfare structures through charity and community solidarity, but above all on gradually increasing openness, in a world context, to forms of economic activity marked by quotas of gratuitousness and communion. The exclusively binary model of market-plus-State is corrosive of society, while economic forms based on solidarity, which find their natural home in civil society without being restricted to it, build up society. The market of gratuitousness does not exist, and attitudes of gratuitousness cannot be established by law. Yet both the market and politics need individuals who are open to reciprocal gift if they are to be reconstituted in a sustainable and moral order for the benefit of humanity into the future.
Without God however, we can be certain that man neither knows which way to go, nor even understands who he is. In the face of the enormous problems surrounding the development of peoples, which almost make us yield to discouragement, we find solace in the sayings of our Lord Jesus Christ, who teaches us: Apart from me you can do nothing (Jn 15:5) and then encourages us: I am with you always, to the close of the age (Mt 28:20). As we contemplate the vast amount of work to be done, we are sustained by our faith that God is present alongside those who come together in his name to work for justice. Man cannot bring about his own progress unaided, because by himself he cannot establish an authentic humanism and ultimately falls into his own hubris. Only if we are aware of our calling, as individuals and as a community, to be part of God's family as his sons and daughters, will we be able to generate a new vision and muster new energy in the service of a truly integral humanism. The greatest service to development, then, is a Christian humanism that enkindles charity and takes its lead from truth, accepting both as a lasting gift from God. Openness to God makes us open towards our brothers and sisters and towards an understanding of life as a joyful task to be accomplished in a spirit of solidarity. On the other hand, ideological rejection of God and an atheism of indifference, oblivious to the Creator and at risk of becoming equally oblivious to human values, constitute some of the chief obstacles to development and economic moralisation today. A humanism which excludes God is an inhuman humanism. Only a humanism open to the Absolute can guide us in the promotion and building of forms of social and civic life structures, institutions, culture and ethos without exposing us to the risk of becoming ensnared by the fashions of the moment. Awareness of God, moving beyond the limited and the ephemeral, gives us the courage to continue seeking and working for the benefit of all, even if this cannot be achieved immediately and invokes in us the great hope of the renewal of men in the light of Christ the Lord.
