CHAPTER 4

THE SOURCES AND METHODS OF CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHING

Ethics almost always involves making generalizations, including laws, moral principles and other behavioral
guidelines.
The Four Sources of Christian Ethics
Catholic social teaching is one such attempt to provide ethical counsel regarding just relationship in political and
economic life.
As new documents are written and as local faith communities attempt to apply the insights of Catholic social
teaching to their particular situations, the tradition of Christian ethics continues to grow and mature.
The development of Catholic social teaching is a creative process, but it is governed by certain standard
approaches and development patterns. This chapter describes the pattern of how certain sources, or fonts,
contribute to Catholic social teaching.
I.

Revelation: The Role of Scriptures

Revelation ways God shows Gods self to people.
The Standard way of speaking about revelation as a source of theology is to emphasize the guidance
offered to all of us in the more public and accessible form of Scriptures.
o The Bible has always been the starting point for Christian ethics. It is the authoritative source of
religious wisdom. But it would be misleading to think of the Bible as a book of detailed rules to
regulate our behavior.
For the most part, Scripture is a record of Gods gracious ways of dealing with fallen humanity, offering
successive covenants that contain the promise of redemption and salvation.
One of the key terms that applies to this picture of the universe is the notion of justice, the controlling
concept in all our reflections on social ethics.
o Justice a virtue of people who are committed to fidelity to the demands of a relationship with
God/individuals/large groups or categories of other people.
Complex task to trace notions of justice through the bible since Hebrew and Greek words for justice
have associated meanings that are broader than what we today mean by legal justice or social
justice.
Places in the scripture where our search for guidance on the topic for social justice is most likely fruitful:
o Books of the Hebrew prophets. (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos etc.)
o Psalms and the Book of Proverbs two sides of justice: harmony with fulfillment and turmoil
with its violation
o The New Testament stories about Jesus in the four gospels offer a glimpse of a vision of
justice that is bound up with the Kingdom of God and which that is somehow present among us.
o Letters of Saint Paul relates justice with freedom and reconciliation
Documents of CTS make use of scripture by citing passages of Scripture directly in texts of encyclicals,
to borrow insight or to justify a judgment.
Biblical materials are also used more indirectly to evoke a sense of urgency and obligation.
Behind such applications of Scripture lies a confident assumption within Catholic social teaching that
word of God revealed many centuries ago still finds relevance today even in new situations that open up
entire worlds far beyond the original context of divine revelation.

II.

III.

The Natural Law

Catholic theologians are eager to combine what they learn in the bible with insights gained by other
means of human knowledge, specifically through human reason.
Modern social encyclicals exhibit a tendency to trust solutions and strategies that we derive by applying
careful rational analysis to complex problems.
One specific way of using reason in the theological writings is to employ a form of argumentation called
natural law reasoning. The fundamental belief of a natural law approach to ethics is that God created the
universe with certain purposes in mind.
God created humans with enough intelligence reason to observe the natural world and make sound
judgments about Gods purposes and how our behavior cooperates with Gods plan.
To ignore the law of nature Disobedience to Gods will
A key claim to natural law theory is that nature is another path by which we learn Gods will in a less
direct way than through revelation. By closely observing the structure of nature, we gain knowledge of
the natural order God intends.
o Most of the 10 Commandments could be derived this way on the basis of natural law reasoning.
It suggests a happy overlap between the contents of revelation and reason.
Endowment of intelligence, however, must always be within the limits of moral law. At best, natural law
assists our moral reflection.
Natural law helps to direct our freedom in moral matters, but it does not completely determine the course
of action we will choose.
Natural law skeleton law: In order to make good moral decisions about practical matters, we need to
know far more than the few hints that natural law reasoning can offer us about divine purposes for the
universe. It is a more modest achievement of reason that discloses a limited set of standards for moral
behavior.
Natural law is a wonderful resource in the fight against ethical relativism, a school of thought that
disputes all claims that there is objective right and wrong in the universe.
In the earliest social encyclicals, popes used natural law reasoning as the basis for criticizing unjust
arrangements of property and wages.
Natural law mandated reforms. Change was necessary because Gods higher law, which stands above
civil law, demanded preservation of life and greater respect for families to live in dignity.
Tradition: Theological Reflection in Church Life
Tradition refers to all previous reflection on social issues that has gone on within Christian theology.
o Trace source of previous reflections on social issues is simply to check the footnotes of the 12
major social teachings documents
Patristic literature advances our understanding of the social implications of faith that come from the
Scriptures, but do not succeed in offering a practical step to improve society. That is why they are cited
by popes in recent social encyclicals primarily as reminders of basic religious virtues such as generosity
and selflessness, but not as offering complete and sufficient blueprints for life in society.
o Example: Competing values which CST recognizes regarding property
A true respect for the common good suggests that the material things necessary for a
good life should be widely available for use by the whole human community. But the
Catholic tradition also makes us aware of the benefits of individual ownership, which not
only encourages the most efficient and the most orderly of property arrangements, but also
gives us an incentive to be productive and to care for the goods God has created.
o Tradition of just war theory (Augustine) defensive wars might be justified
Because scripture has always served as the starting point for Christian theological reflection, there is an
especially intimate connection between scripture and tradition. Our respect for scripture and tradition
cannot be separated. As key sources of Christian ethics, they work together to help believers know and
interpret the word of God as it addresses our world today.

IV.

Experience: Engaging Social Analysis

The Pastoral Circle (Circle of Praxis or Hermeneutical Circle)
Method of understanding and acting on worldly realities.
Help people of faith read and interpret the signs of our times.
A relationship of action and reflection.
1. Experience
o Gaining experience itself
o Requires insertion into a local situation and gathering data about social problems and their
effects.
2. Social Analysis
o Asking hard questions about causes of injustices and the connection between issues as we
seek to discover who is really responsible behind the scenes for social problems and what
systems or patterns of activity perpetuate them.
o Requires assistance of outside experts (specialized knowledge)
3. Theological reflection
o Accompanies social analysis and gives us tools to make proper judgments about social
realities. Experiences we gain and the data we collect must also be viewed in then light of
the living faith.
o It is here that the documents of CTS may be most useful as they open up new ideas and raise
questions.
o Invites creative thinking with a solid commitment to consult established sources of Christian
social wisdom.
4. Pastoral Planning
o Charting a course of action to guide us in preparing for the future.
o Reach informed decisions and choose effective strategies.
o Design programs of action

The Pastoral circle is completed when we are able to return to the experience of insertion phase equipped
with what we have learned from the journey so far.
Process not merely a one time episode but an ongoing process.
If successful, it is not a circle but a spiral ascending upwards where we do not really return to where we
started but rather find ourselves in a higher location.

Universal Principles of Local Applications

Octogesima Adveniens important advice about how we might make use of the Churchs reflections on justice,
peace and life in society
In the face of such widely varying situations it is difficult for us to utter a unified message and to put forward
a solution which has universal validity. Such is not our ambition, nor is it our mission. It is up to the Christian
communities to analyze with objectivity the situation which is proper to their own country, to shed on it the
light of the Gospel's unalterable words and to draw principles of reflection, norms of judgment and directives
for action from the social teaching of the Church.

The center of gravity in social ministries must lie with the local communities of Christians who find themselves
facing greater variety of challenging social conditions. Pope Paul VI reminds us that the universal message from
Rome cannot supply all the wisdom a Christian community might need to meet its local challenges. But the
teachings of the universal church do have an indispensable role to play in offering us general principles
regarding the attainment of justice and peace.