CHURCH IN FOCUS:
Caritas in Veritate -15
07 August 2011

Pope Benedict XVI, in his third Encyclical Caritas in Veritate, released on the 7^th of July 2009, gives his teachings as he addresses the “bishops, priests and deacons, men and women religious, the lay faithful and all people of good will”. This encyclical begins with the affirmation that “Charity in truth, to which Jesus Christ bore witness” is “the principal driving force behind the authentic development of every person and of all humanity”. The first words and early paragraphs introduce the name of the encyclical, Caritas in Veritate ‘Charity in Truth’, and the integrating relationship between the two components of the title. The introductory paragraphs describe love as an extraordinary force that has its origin in God and leads us to discover our own truth that reflects the face of Christ, who is Truth. Charity in truth leads to the authentic development of all persons. It is the principle behind social teaching and gives rise to criteria for social action such as, justice and the common good. Love in truth when it comes to social affairs is the great challenge for the Church in a world that is becoming globalised.
The development of peoples is intimately linked to the development of individuals. The human person by nature is actively involved in his own development. The development in question is not simply the result of natural mechanisms, since as everybody knows; we are all capable of making free and responsible choices. Nor is it merely at the mercy of our caprice, since we all know that we are a gift, not something self-generated. Our freedom is profoundly shaped by our being, and by its limits. No one shapes his own conscience arbitrarily, but we all build our own “I” on the basis of a “self” which is given to us. Not only are other persons outside our control, but each one of us is outside his or her own control. A person's development is compromised, if he claims to be solely responsible for producing what he becomes. By analogy, the development of peoples goes awry if humanity thinks it can re-create itself through the “wonders” of technology, just as economic development is exposed as a destructive sham if it relies on the “wonders” of finance in order to sustain unnatural and consumerist growth. In the face of such Promethean presumption, we must fortify our love for a freedom that is not merely arbitrary, but is rendered truly human by acknowledgment of the good that underlies it. To this end, man needs to look inside himself in order to recognize the fundamental norms of the natural moral law which God has written on our hearts.
The challenge of development today is closely linked to technological progress, with its astounding applications in the field of biology. Technology — it is worth emphasizing — is a profoundly human reality, linked to the autonomy and freedom of man. In technology we express and confirm the hegemony of the spirit over matter. “The human spirit, ‘increasingly free of its bondage to creatures, can be more easily drawn to the worship and contemplation of the Creator'”. Technology enables us to exercise dominion over matter, to reduce risks, to save labour, to improve our conditions of life. It touches the heart of the vocation of human labour: in technology, seen as the product of his genius, man recognizes himself and forges his own humanity. Technology is the objective side of human action whose origin and raison d'etre is found in the subjective element: the worker himself. For this reason, technology is never merely technology. It reveals man and his aspirations towards development; it expresses the inner tension that impels him gradually to overcome material limitations. Technology, in this sense, is a response to God's command to till and to keep the land that he has entrusted to humanity, and it must serve to reinforce the covenant between human beings and the environment, a covenant that should mirror God's creative love.
Integral human development concerns the whole person in every single dimension – material, moral and spiritual. Without the perspective of eternal life, Pope Benedict says, human progress in this world is “denied breathing space”. He emphasises the importance of relationality: we are not “lost atoms in a random universe.” One of the deepest forms of poverty we can experience, he says, is isolation … as spiritual beings; we are defined through interpersonal relations. The development of peoples depends, above all, on the recognition that the human race is a single family working together in true communion, not simply a group of subjects who happen to live side by side.
Explaining further the concept of development Pope Benedict XVI says that this deviation from solid humanistic principles that a technical mindset can produce is seen today in certain technological applications in the fields of development and peace. Often the development of peoples is considered a matter of financial engineering, the freeing up of markets, the removal of tariffs, investment in production, and institutional reforms — in other words, a purely technical matter. All these factors are of great importance, but we have to ask why technical choices made thus far have yielded rather mixed results. We need to think hard about the cause. Development will never be fully guaranteed through automatic or impersonal forces, whether they derive from the market or from international politics. Development is impossible without upright men and women, without financiers and politicians whose consciences are finely attuned to the requirements of the common good. Both professional competence and moral consistency are necessary. When technology is allowed to take over, the result is confusion between ends and means, such that the sole criterion for action in business is thought to be the maximization of profit, in politics the consolidation of power, and in science the findings of research. Often, underneath the intricacies of economic, financial and political interconnections, there remain misunderstandings, hardships and injustice. The flow of technological know-how increases, but it is those in possession of it who benefit, while the situation on the ground for the peoples who live in its shadow remains unchanged: for them there is little chance of emancipation.
Pope Benedict XVI in the encyclical Caritas in Veritate stresses the importance of development in the world of today. It is not merely confined to the economic growth alone, even though economics is its major concern. Development is understood as the all round progress in the economic, cultural, social, and religious spheres. Economic development in particular is the increase in the standard of living in a nation's population with sustained growth from a simple, low-income economy to a modern, high-income economy. Also, if the local quality of life could be improved, economic development would be enhanced. Its scope includes the process and policies by which a nation improves the economic, political, and social well-being of its people. Cooperation for development must not be concerned exclusively with the economic dimension: it offers a wonderful opportunity for encounter between cultures and peoples. If the parties to cooperation on the side of economically developed countries, as occasionally happens, fail to take account of their own or others' cultural identity, or the human values that shape it, they cannot enter into meaningful dialogue with the citizens of poor countries. If the latter, in their turn, are uncritically and indiscriminately open to every cultural proposal, they will not be in a position to assume responsibility for their own authentic development.
The Pontiff tells us that even peace can run the risk of being considered a technical product, merely the outcome of agreements between governments or of initiatives aimed at ensuring effective economic aid. It is true that peace-building requires the constant interplay of diplomatic contacts, economic, technological and cultural exchanges, agreements on common projects, as well as joint strategies to curb the threat of military conflict and to root out the underlying causes of terrorism. Nevertheless, if such efforts are to have lasting effects, they must be based on values rooted in the truth of human life. That is, the voice of the peoples affected must be heard and their situation must be taken into consideration, if their expectations are to be correctly interpreted. One must align oneself, so to speak, with the unsung efforts of so many individuals deeply committed to bringing peoples together and to facilitating development on the basis of love and mutual understanding. Among them are members of the Christian faithful, involved in the great task of upholding the fully human dimension of development and peace.
In today’s episode we studied the encyclical dealing with the human situations such as global, social, political, ethical and economic and directs individuals to conceptualise the doctrine of the Church. Caritas in Veritate is a magnificent gift to the world from the point of view of Catholic Social Teaching and gives a descriptive account of the activities and perspectives found in the spheres of social action in the church.

Sunday August 07, 2011 Fr. Eugene Lobo S.J.