Question:
Discuss About The Catholic Principles Self Social Community?
The catholic belief holds God at the center of everything and he ensures the love, justice and peace for all his creations (Vatican.va, 2017). The following principles of CST reflect God’s concern for social lives and are capable of guiding us to establish an intimate relationship between ourselves and others who are surrounding us.
This principle teaches us that human dignity is at the core of society’s moral foundation (Röpke, 2017). Our life is sacred and we must treat our dignity as one of the necessary higher values to live a healthy life. The history of human civilization has experienced great changes in the society; the struggle was difficult at times. The human dignity guided us at such difficult times and it will. The present world has been suffering from acute materialism which leads us to ignore the dignity (Srnicek, Fotou & Arghand, 2013). We forget or deliberately hurt other people’s dignity in order to satisfy our goal of pleasure. We tend to forget that God imprinted himself upon humans as the likeness encouraged him to do so. Catholic Social Teaching has a defined position regarding the beginning and ending of life that reflects in issues like abortion or euthanasia (Hitchcock, 2017). Human life and dignity is sacred. Therefore it is our responsibility to protect our dignity from getting corrupted. The Catholic social thought encourages us to engage in a practice where the right of every innocent soul is protected.
Most humans place individual self at the centre of their life in the world because individualism has become the primary key force of life. Individuals create the community but not alone. The interdependence and coexistence of the individual are the basis of community practice. The self growth in various aspects of life like political, economic, legal or societal gets transcended and spreads in the global platform (Hopper, 2017). The common good is actually the good deeds that individual brings to the society and the mutual benefit that gets generated out of is shared by everyone. Government or other political institutions are active participants in the process of achieving common good (Walker, 2014). For an isolated individual it is difficult to achieve the common good but if we focus more on our collectivity than the self, we might be able to achieve the common good in greater number more successfully. The Government and the community consisting of individuals must work responsibly to achieve the common good and enhance the condition of human existence in the world.
Subsidiarity is capable of producing benefit for both the community and the government. If the issues are handled in a local level without the government’s intervention, it can enhance the economic performance, efficiency and improve the society as a whole. The government is not expected to act as a dominating force rather should defend the common good of the people (McCann, 2014). The people should be allowed to work on their own to achieve their desired performance.
Through the stewardship we can show our respect towards God. The high level of consumerism should not limit us to act as consumers only; we have other responsibilities towards God’s goods. The stewardship will guide us to fulfill our duties towards God’s creations and to improve their condition of life (Caritas.org.au, 2017). We have to do that as a community. The individuals must work collaboratively in taking care of God’s creations. We are just the bearers of God’s messages and must fulfill assigned tasks of God (Tozer, 2015). We do not have any authoritative power over any of God’s creations we are just assigned to take care of them.
Every individual must possess equal right to the resources created by God; otherwise the universal flourishing of human kind cannot be achieved. God’s goods are in various forms like the benefits that individual or institutions achieve through profitable trades or the physical gain of human labor. However these are not to be consumed by individuals, every living being is given the equal right to it. The individual or collective greed works against the God’s purpose of individual goods. To reach the universal destination all men and women should follow the catholic principles and thus the challenges that occurred in stewardship and solidarity will be resolved (Kearns, 2014).
Peace is beyond just the resolution of conflicts; it deals with life’s completeness. Peace can be achieved through mutual respect among individuals, institutions and nations. Catholic Social Thoughts represents peace as an action based positive idea which is in close relationship with justice (Groody, 2015). Peace can be experienced only when justice is achieved. The catholic teaching states that war can bring back the intended peace and there this belief is supported by most contemporary governments.
The suffering and deprivation of the poor affects the society and is capable of failing the purpose of God’s creation. Therefore it is our duty to create options for poor to develop and the benefit will be shared by us or society as a whole. The common good cannot be achieved if option for the poor is not integrated in the process. Like in the stewardship principle everyone must be given equal opportunity to fulfill the purpose of God’s goods is hampered if the options are not created for the poor. The marginal people of the society must be treated with special care and only this way a community can gain its healthy status. The well being of the poor and the community must be protected by establishing an effective social order (Curnow, 2015). The church suggests the government to implement social and national policies that concerns the well being of the poor. There are multiple social service groups that work for improvement and up gradation of the poor and contribute significantly by following the common social orders to improve the society as a whole.
The community cannot work effectively if everyone does not engage in participating. In order to protect the human dignity and common good the participation from everyone of the community is necessary (Reader, 2016). It is not expected that some are getting more opportunities and some are getting excluded from participation. The communal activities demand our participation as we demand justice from the society.
Catholic Social thoughts teaches us that solidarity helps us to achieve the common good as it has already taught us that all human beings create the large family and we are responsible for taking care of each other. The interconnected humans must embrace the solidarity in order to secure the progress of the whole society. The solidarity teaches us to treat everyone equally irrespective of their national, racial or cultural identity (Beyer, 2014).
The flourishing is not just achieving the desired goal for a temporary period of time. The flourishing must possess a sustainable quality which will differentiate it from momentary happiness (Neave, 2016). The collaborative nature of among the individuals and communities will ensure the human flourishing.
We are all social beings. Our existence is difficult to imagine without the peaceful coexistence of other social beings. The individual human represents the family and the community and it is his duty to carry out the responsibilities within the community (Tonnies, 2017). Humans are defined by the relationships they maintain; otherwise the flourishing becomes impossible to achieve. It is not just the relationship among individual but also the relationship between the individual and the community.
The individual flourishing is directly related to the community flourishing. Catholic Social Thoughts will lead the individual and the community to lead an substantial and meaningful life (Tablan, 2015). The human dignity, common good, solidarity or promotion of peace provides us with a common framework that prepares the platform for us to work on our relationships. Our smallest contribution can bring great changes in the society so we have to be careful about our contribution. Appreciation of hard work, protection of the poor and developing together are the principle desire in which the catholic thoughts help us. Catholic Social Thoughts is essential in our journey to maintain the relationship of self and community in order to achieve the ultimate good.
Reference
Beyer, G. J. (2014). The meaning of solidarity in Catholic social teaching. political theology, 15(1), 7-25.
Compendium of the social doctrine of the church. (2017). Vatican.va. Retrieved 12 September 2017, from https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_compendio-dott-soc_en.html
Curnow, R. M. (2015). Which Preferential Option for the Poor? A History of the Doctrine’s Bifurcation. Modern Theology, 31(1), 27-59.
Groody, D. G. (2015). Globalization, Spirituality, and Justice Revised Edition: Navigating a Path to Peace. Orbis Books.
Hitchcock, J. (Ed.). (2017). Abortion, Religious Freedom, and Catholic Politics. Routledge.
Hopper, P. (2017). Rebuilding communities in an age of individualism. Taylor & Francis.
Kearns, A. J. (2014). Catholic social teaching as a framework for research ethics. Journal of Academic Ethics, 12(2), 145-159.
McCann, D. P. (2014). Who is responsible for the common good? Catholic social teaching and the praxis of subsidiarity. In The common good: Chinese and American perspectives (pp. 261-289). Springer Netherlands.
Neave, G. (2016). Contextual Issues: Learning and Human Flourishing. A Handbook of Chaplaincy Studies: Understanding Spiritual Care in Public Places, 301.
Reader, J. (2016). Together for the Common Good. Journal of Beliefs & Values, 37(1), 118-120.
Röpke, W. (2017). The moral foundations of civil society. Routledge.
Srnicek, N., Fotou, M., & Arghand, E. (2013). Introduction: Materialism and world politics.
Stewardship of Creation – We must all care for and share the resources of the earth. (2017). Caritas.org.au. Retrieved 12 September 2017, from https://www.caritas.org.au/learn/catholic-social-teaching/stewardship-of-creation
Tablan, F. (2015). Catholic social teachings: Toward a meaningful work. Journal of Business Ethics, 128(2), 291-303.
Tonnies, F. (2017). Community and society. Routledge.
Tozer, A. W. (2015). The Pursuit of God: The Human Thirst for the Divine. Moody Publishers.
Walker, G. (2014). Review of” The Common Good of Constitutional Democracy: Essays in Political Philosophy and on Catholic Social Teaching” by Martin Rhonheimer. Journal of Markets & Morality, 16(2).
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