A good life constitutes of the various potentials that the human beings thrive for as well as to receive the opportunity to show their potentiality. Inequality occurs due to the various challenges faced in this Western modern society like the individualism, materialism and consumerism. Ethic of Reciprocity is often termed as the golden rule that is found in some secular philosophies and in various cultures and religions. Often there is transition of various philosophies and traditions have been described as the universal ethical principle and help to build a sustainable society. The main purpose of this assignment is to understand the Catholic Social Thought (CST) as well as its nine principles. The history of the Catholic Social Thought
The Catholic Social Thought is a doctrine of Catholic that relates on the matters of the human dignity and the goodness in the society. The thoughts that have been addressed are oppression, issues related to distribution of wealth, social justice concerns and the state roles.
The root of the Catholic Social Thought was found in the Old Testament of the Jubilee. In the late nineteenth century, the CST was put together into a combined system and from then the Popes have developed the principles of the social teaching. The encyclical letters includes Rerum Novarum, Pope John XXIII, the Second Vatican Council and many more.
The Catholic Social Thought (CST) has nine core principles and they are the Dignity of the Human Person, Common good and Community, Subsidiarity, Stewardship of Creation, Universal Purpose of Goods, Promotion of Peace, Global Solidarity, Participation and Preferential Option for the Poor. Though some of the principles are not unique, they provide a complete understanding of the various relationships between the functions of the society and the individuals. The need of the principles of the CST is to structure, strengthen as well as nourish the relationships between the communities and the individuals that have the objective to increase all the humans to flourish. The community and the humans help to flourish directly the health and the strengths of the relationships (Sison, Ferrero & Guitián, 2016).
Proper understanding of the dignity or the value of the human person is the basics of the foundation of the Catholic Social Thought (CST). The human dignity is considered as the root of a person’s creation in the likeness of God. Dignity is considered as an intrinsic part to the human condition. Promotion should be made on the rights and the dignity of others, as it is slowly diminishing and so is the humanity (Baker, 2015).
The social condition is a sum that allows people to avail and reach out to the fulfillments easily either individually or in groups. The society is collaborated towards making a common good in reality. The common good involves integration and assessment of interests that is based on the hierarchy and values and involves correct understanding of the rights and dignity of a person. The common good is generally for the better improvement of the people that ultimately helps in human flourishing. Loss of these elements may hinder the growth of the humanity (Aguirre et al. 2013).
The principle lies in the distance between the people who make the decisions and the people who are affected by the decisions. Better decisions are made when there is close proximity and a consultation is made with those who are affected. High authority delegates some issues unmanageably. Sometimes the community and the individual help to foster as well as empower the servings while governing the affairs that may limit the inappropriate influences towards the outside community. Catholics are people of good will who help in attempting into the actions of the CST that may help legitimately (Murray et al., 2016).
An acknowledgment in the humanities helps in the dependency that is the principle of the stewardship creation. There is identification in the responsibility of the societies and the individuals that they are acting or caring for as the steward in the environment. Humanity is not an owner but is regarded as a caretaker of the earth.
There is a concept that the purpose of the materials and the goods in the world is to make the humankind flourish in all aspects. The human beings have the right to access the various materials and the goods in order to flourish. The concepts have been considered as a natural right. Property rights along with the right to the free trade have also been considered as the subordinate norm.
The promotion of peace is considered as both dutiful and valuable (David, David, & Hendry, 2013). Human dignity, commitment and peace is regarded as the foundations of the common good. Peace is hampered when all of these foundations are compromised. This is also a principle for promoting the peace, the justice, common good as well as human dignity.
The global solidarity is considered as the responsibilities of the people who are despite of all the human distinctions like the nationality, culture, geography, race and various forms of differences. The common good concept has been used in the solidarity that emphasizes based on the global society that may have marginalized members and may be vulnerable (Wong et al. ,2017).
The essential principle of solidarity is participation. The position of the CST is considered as the right but the responsibility of the individual lies in the representation, that has cultural, political, economic and social life contribution that helps in the community of the civil life to where they belong. CST and subsidiarity are considered as the core components for responsibility in understanding the participation (Thompson, 2013)
The primary importance of the Christian charity to the Catholics has been regarded as the core principle of the preferential option for the Poor that can be distinguished. The poverty is considered as the obstacle to the human flourishing that needs to address the preferences of the choices that needs to be benefitted in the impoverished lives. The preferences have been considered as the primary way to improve the poor to flourish. The cause may lead the community is to flourish as a whole (Cove et al. 2014).
The CST principles have to uphold the interrelationships between the community and the self (Eick & Ryan, 2014). All around the world the common thing is the Human social thought. “I am what I am because of who we all are” is best understood from the interrelationships. The concept of flourishing can be easily understood from the interrelationships between the community and the self. A person must meet the psychological, physiological, and emotional and be social to flourish as a person. Some of the aspects of their life is to associate with the individual flourishing are family relationships, employments and friendship (Carr, 2016).
In order to flourish there is a need to achieve something that may have a short-term happiness or may have pleasure (Melé, 2015). There is a need to live a meaningful and virtuous life. The interrelationship is important between the community and the self that may hold consideration that is meaningful to the human person. The flourishment of the humans is regarded as a distinct feature to the term of the human happiness (Streater et al., 2016).
The idea that has been assumed from the CST is that the human beings are social animals. Aristotle described that by nature, the humans are a social animal and by culture, they are a person through another person. Humanity is regarded as the basic of all relationships and could diminish if it is unable to flourish. There is a need for the humans to be in a relationship with the community. The process of the mutual flourishment helps in describing the interrelationship between the community and the self. Both the community and an individual is inter dependable on each other, one cannot flourish without the help of another.
Conclusion:
From the above assignment, it can be deduced that the nine principles helps to summarize the essentials of the Catholic Social Thought (CST) from the Leo XIII through Benedict XVI. The teachings of the CST are both noble and simple and make an effort to the words and actions that Jesus said in order to uplift and transform the social life of the people in the light of the gospel. The history of the CST along with how the principles are derived has been discussed thoroughly. The good life has also been explained in the context of the Cartholics.
Reference:
Eick, C. M., & Ryan, P. A. (2014). Principles of Catholic Social Teaching, Critical Pedagogy, and the Theory of Intersectionality: An Integrated Framework to Examine the Roles of Social Status in the Formation of Catholic Teachers. Journal of Catholic Education, 18(1), 26.
Carr, J. (2016). Preaching and Catholic Social Teaching. A Handbook for Catholic Preaching, 275.
Cove, J., Jacobi, N., Donovan, H., Orrell, M., Stott, J., & Spector, A. (2014). Effectiveness of weekly cognitive stimulation therapy for people with dementia and the additional impact of enhancing cognitive stimulation therapy with a carer training program. Clinical interventions in aging, 9, 2143.
Melé, D. (2015). Virtues, values, and principles in Catholic social teaching. In Handbook of Virtue Ethics in Business and Management (pp. 1-13). Springer Netherlands.
Streater, A., Spector, A., Aguirre, E., & Orrell, M. (2016). Cognitive stimulation therapy (CST) for people with dementia in practice: An observational study. British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 79(12), 762-767.
David, J. M., David, J. M., & Hendry, S. J. (2013). Using Principles of Catholic Social Thought to Evaluate Business Activities. Journal of Catholic Social Thought, 10(1), 155-177.
Wong, G. H., Yek, O. P., Zhang, A. Y., Lum, T., & Spector, A. (2017). Cultural adaptation of cognitive stimulation therapy (CST) for Chinese people with dementia: multicentre pilot study. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry.
Thompson, J. M. (2013). The Almighty and the Dollar: Reflections on “Economic Justice for All.” Edited by Mark J. Allman. Winona, MN: Anselm Academic, 2012. 281 pages. $27.95 (paper). Horizons, 40(01), 145-147.
Murray, C. M., Gilbert-Hunt, S., Berndt, A., & de la Perrelle, L. (2016). Promoting participation and engagement for people with dementia through a cognitive stimulation therapy programme delivered by students: A descriptive qualitative study. British Journal of Occupational Therapy, 79(10), 620-628.
Aguirre, E., Hoare, Z., Streater, A., Spector, A., Woods, B., Hoe, J., & Orrell, M. (2013). Cognitive stimulation therapy (CST) for people with dementia—who benefits most?. International journal of geriatric psychiatry, 28(3), 284-290.
Sison, A. J. G., Ferrero, I., & Guitián, G. (2016). Human dignity and the dignity of work: Insights from Catholic social teaching. Business Ethics Quarterly, 1-26.
Baker, S. (2015). Augustinian Caritas as an Expression of Concern for Social Justice and Equity in Teacher Education. Journal for Peace and Justice Studies, 25(1), 30-51.
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