Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences presents conclusions of Plenary
The Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences presented the conclusions of their XVIII
Plenary Session on Wednesday at the Press Office of the Holy See. Below, please find
the full text of the Academy's Press Release detailing the work of the Plenary. Click
the following link for our audio report:
**************************************************** PRESS
RELEASE 2 May 2012
On the eve of the fiftieth anniversary of
the publication of the Encyclical Pacem in Terris we have chosen to devote a session
of our Academy to the study of the contribution of this major document to the social
doctrine of the Church. Published between the first and second sessions of the Second
Vatican Council, the encyclical of Blessed John XXIII falls within the framework of
the renewal of the Church’s social thinking which that Council aimed at promoting,
in particular in its constitution Gaudium et spes, on the Church and the world. At
the time the topic of peace was extremely relevant, as it still is. In 1963, in the
midst of the Cold War and in a severe international crisis, the encyclical was addressed
to “all men of good will”, sending a powerful message of hope above all ideological
and religious divisions. The voice of the Church rose on the ground of our common
humanity, appealing to the consciences of all human beings in the name of their common
nature. Humanity was invited to rethink its structures of economic, political and
cultural collaboration on the basis of the universal principles of “freedom, truth,
love and justice” (cf. PT 35). In the wake of the great encyclicals of Leo XIII
and Pius XI, a few years after the encyclical Mater et Magistra, Pacem in Terris was
a breath of fresh air for the social doctrine of the Church. In truth, the reason
why the encyclical was so favourably received by all milieus, especially within international
institutions, was because it touched men so deeply. It was a social encyclical in
the fullest sense of the term, an in-depth reflection on man in society, the centre
and summit of every social institution. The encyclical reaffirms very strongly
the central thesis of the entire social doctrine of the Church, which is that “each
individual man is truly a person. His is a nature, that is endowed with intelligence
and free will” (PT 9). This is the basis on which the whole social doctrine of the
Church is built. The human being mirrors his Creator. Human nature is nothing but
the humanity of man, created in the image of God, capable of knowing and loving. The
challenges that men face, be they peace or a just order in economic exchanges, are
always of an ethical nature. Pacem in terris well says that “Ordo autem, qui in hominum
consortione viget, totus incorporali est natura” (PT 37). Fifty years after this
great encyclical, the international panorama is no longer that of the Cold War, but
of a globalised world and a financial and economic crisis affecting many countries.
Peace is also in danger where nationalism and religious and racial hatred expose entire
societies to violent conflict. We remark that the encyclical strongly emphasized
that the common good – that is to say, “all those social conditions which favour the
full development of human personality” (PT 58) – takes on a universal dimension (PT
132). Today this is truer than ever. The further the common good extends, the further
it should progress in understanding. The common good cannot but be determined in relation
to man, since “it is intimately bound up with human nature” (PT 55). It is not possible
to identify the common good without reference to what human beings claim on behalf
of their very humanity. Man in society is made to live in peace with his neighbours,
in justice, truth, love and freedom. The Catholic Church, for her part, is aware
that through the revelation of Christ she knows the truth about man and is therefore
duty bound to stand up for the values that are valid for human beings as such, transversally
of the various cultures. She makes a distinction between the specificity of her faith
and the truths of reason that often derive from faith and which are also accessible
to the person as a person regardless of this faith. As Pacem in Terris recognized,
a fundamental defense of all the universal human values became positive rules in the
declarations on human rights after the Second World War, because, after the errors
and horrors of the two World Wars, enlightened people of different areas and cultures
recognized their universal validity that is based on their anthropological truths
and expressed them in effective rights. Today, the fundamental values of the human
being, in which human dignity as such is questioned, are once again being debated.
Here, over and above her faith, the Church considers it her duty to defend in our
society as a whole the truths and values in which the very dignity of man is at stake.
The demand for truth is probably the most argued over today, while the reference
to natural law is ignored in many sectors of society. I hope that our work can help
our contemporaries to rediscover the truth of the human being and of the common good,
which are the cornerstones of all life in society. In a way, the contribution of the
social sciences especially in this Year of the Faith, must be to help the Church find
new and perennial truths in the current social context. They should serve as an aid
or as preambles of the social doctrine of the Church, of theology and even of faith,
to make easy for our contemporaries the path from reason to faith and from faith to
reason, as indicated in Fides et ratio. St Thomas Aquinas, who was ahead of his times
with his clear distinction and complementarily between faith and reason, wrote that
“theology – although all other sciences are related to it in the order of generation,
as serving it and as preambles to it – can make use of the principles of all the others,
even if they are posterior to it in dignity” (Super Boetium de Trin., q. 2, a. 3 ad
7). Our statutes say that the Academy “offers the Church the elements which she can
use in the development of her social doctrine” (art. 1): thus, the Academy tries to
collaborate with the Church’s new evangelization programme with a critical sense of
research, and a love of truth of sciences and of faith. Among the questions examined
by the members of the Academy were: • What the “kingdom of God” proclaimed by Jesus
means for peace in the world today, with special reference to the Holy Father’s book
on Jesus of Nazareth by H.E. Msgr Ladaria. • The importance of living in truth
and the new possibility, offered by the communications revolution, to be more transparent.
• The question of global governance in light of both Pacem in Terris and Caritas
in Veritate, addressed in particular by H.Em. Cardinal Marx • Economic globalization
and patterns of migration as both causes of friction and possible avenues of cooperation. • Ecological
dimensions of the global order. • Human rights and democratization, with special
attention to the phenomenon of the Arab Spring and the emergence of global economic
prowess on the part of China, India and the Pacific. • New information technology
as an instrument of peace, including a paper by Jimmy Wales, the creator of Wikipedia. • The
functioning and regulation of financial markets after the economic crisis, with the
special contribution of Academicians Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz and Dr Hans Tietmeyer,
former President of the Deutsche Bundesbank. H.E. Msgr Toso also explained the meaning
of the recent document of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Towards Reforming
the International and Monetary Systems in the Context of Global Public Authority (http://bit.ly/ADcGcN). •
The challenges of achieving a workable union among European nations, and its global
implications. • The contribution of religion to the search for peace. Please
write to the Academy (pass@pass.va) if you are interested in receiving the individual
papers and visit our website www.pass.va for the Proceedings of this and of our past
meetings.