Are pro-capitalists heretics?

  • Thread starter Thread starter fakename
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
“The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of “capitalism,” individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for “there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market.” Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended.”

But what is the definition of socialism/capitalism? The church must step outside of faith and morals and into political science to speak about them mustn’t it? Or is it that these two things can be defined with reference to morality?
 
fakename said:
“The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of “capitalism,” individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for “there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market.” Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended.”

But what is the definition of socialism/capitalism? The church must step outside of faith and morals and into political science to speak about them mustn’t it? Or is it that these two things can be defined with reference to morality?
Click to expand...
I don’t get your question. The Church references it’s morals in this CCC quote…

Communism/Socialism tends to take away peoples rights and free will. Look what happend in China and the USSR in the 20th Century. The Church was persecuted and 100 million people were killed in the name of the state. Countless others starved.

As far as capitalism goes, it can violate social justice teachings of the church - I.e. corporations could get away with “slave labor.”

How are these things not moral issues?
 
"Communism/Socialism tends to take away peoples rights and free will. Look what happend in China and the USSR in the 20th Century. The Church was persecuted and 100 million people were killed in the name of the state. Countless others starved.

As far as capitalism goes, it can violate social justice teachings of the church - I.e. corporations could get away with “slave labor.”

How are these things not moral issues?"

Oh, I see. So the church means by capitalism “slave labor” and by communism “atheism/tyranny”.

Because all this time I just defined capitalism as a sushi economy of 100 laborers who were paid sushi rolls for their work and at t+2 produced more output which was then paid back to them in a continuing cycle. And communism to me was just a bad case of capitalism. Sort of like how human beings are defined as rational animals and a bad human is one that doesn’t fulfill his essence.

One last question though, shouldn’t the church know something outside of faith and morals in order to pronounce on some moral thing? Namely that such a thing exists and that it naturally tends to be destructive?
 
fakename said:
"Communism/Socialism tends to take away peoples rights and free will. Look what happend in China and the USSR in the 20th Century. The Church was persecuted and 100 million people were killed in the name of the state. Countless others starved.

As far as capitalism goes, it can violate social justice teachings of the church - I.e. corporations could get away with “slave labor.”

How are these things not moral issues?"

Oh, I see. So the church means by capitalism “slave labor” and by communism “atheism/tyranny”.

Because all this time I just defined capitalism as a sushi economy of 100 laborers who were paid sushi rolls for their work and at t+2 produced more output which was then paid back to them in a continuing cycle. And communism to me was just a bad case of capitalism. Sort of like how human beings are defined as rational animals and a bad human is one that doesn’t fulfill his essence.

One last question though, shouldn’t the church know something outside of faith and morals in order to pronounce on some moral thing? Namely that such a thing exists and that it naturally tends to be destructive?
Click to expand...
Again, I don’t think you’re understanding the issues at play (properly). Or are asking the proper questions.

What do you mean by:
“One last question though, shouldn’t the church know something outside of faith and morals in order to pronounce on some moral thing? Namely that such a thing exists and that it naturally tends to be destructive?”

I don’t really know what you mean by this. My first thought is that the church can be compelled to comment on anything it would like to.
 
fakename said:
“The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” She has likewise refused to accept, in the practice of “capitalism,” individualism and the absolute primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor. Regulating the economy solely by centralized planning perverts the basis of social bonds; regulating it solely by the law of the marketplace fails social justice, for “there are many human needs which cannot be satisfied by the market.” Reasonable regulation of the marketplace and economic initiatives, in keeping with a just hierarchy of values and a view to the common good, is to be commended.”

But what is the definition of socialism/capitalism? The church must step outside of faith and morals and into political science to speak about them mustn’t it? Or is it that these two things can be defined with reference to morality?
Click to expand...
As far as definitions, the Church probably figures we all know, or can look them up.
As for stepping outside of faith and morals, not sure what you mean – the Catechism seems to have a straightforward statement that we can apply. Beyond that are what the Church calls prudential judgments; “reasonable” regulation, “just” values, &c. These have to be slugged out in the political process and it’s probably better the Catechism doesn’t expand into a political platform.

Sadly, the USCCB does gush out political statements all over the place about global warming, immigration, the death penalty, &c. ad nauseum.
 
didymus said:
As far as definitions, the Church probably figures we all know, or can look them up.
As for stepping outside of faith and morals, not sure what you mean – the Catechism seems to have a straightforward statement that we can apply. Beyond that are what the Church calls prudential judgments; “reasonable” regulation, “just” values, &c. These have to be slugged out in the political process and it’s probably better the Catechism doesn’t expand into a political platform.

Sadly, the USCCB does gush out political statements all over the place about global warming, immigration, the death penalty, &c. ad nauseum.
Click to expand...
I’m glad I’m not the only one who doesn’t quite understand the question(s). 👍

fakename, what you’ll find is the Church will give us general guidelines to base government decisions on. New teachings will be based on current events and flushed out from previous teachings.

For example, communism is a 19th/20th century invention/implementation of government. The church saw what was going on and re-iterated/formed a teaching based on this.

Same could be said of artificial contraception, “The Pill” didn’t exist until the 1960’s or so. The church re-iterated/modified it’s teaching that it was a sin.

And so on.
 
Ah, well don’t worry I got it now. I always try to split hairs for extra clarification of my thinking. I suppose that it unfortunately has the opposite effect on others. What I was thinking was that for one to know that anything is moral one would have to know two things 1) that thing’s essence and its existence 2) that thing’s resulting implications for morality. But then, how could the church make decisions regarding #1, since that is a question that seems to be outside of ethics? But now I realize that to teach on faith and morals is not to teach ethics but to teach ethics applied to things so the church can legitimately search for the definition of things when pronouncing on their moralities.

Anyways so I guess the church defines capitalism as something which inherently leads to injustice and communism as something that is also unjust?
 
fakename said:
Ah, well don’t worry I got it now. I always try to split hairs for extra clarification of my thinking. I suppose that it unfortunately has the opposite effect on others. What I was thinking was that for one to know that anything is moral one would have to know two things 1) that thing’s essence and its existence 2) that thing’s resulting implications for morality. But then, how could the church make decisions regarding #1, since that is a question that seems to be outside of ethics? But now I realize that to teach on faith and morals is not to teach ethics but to teach ethics applied to things so the church can legitimately search for the definition of things when pronouncing on their moralities.
Click to expand...
:confused:

I think you’re a bit wordy here.

I think it is vitally important that the Church has it’s finger on the pulse of society. I don’t see what the conflict of interest between faith and morals and knowing what is going on in the outside world is.

How could they make any proclimation or refinements on faith and morals if they didn’t know what was happening outside of the Vatican? 😉
fakename said:
Anyways so I guess the church defines capitalism as something which inherently leads to injustice and communism as something that is also unjust?
Click to expand...
This is slightly incorrect. As per CCC that was quoted, IMHO, it is uncontrolled capitalism/socialism/communism that poses a problem. Capitialism isn’t bad when it is carried out in a moral fashion.
 
“How could they make any proclimation or refinements on faith and morals if they didn’t know what was happening outside of the Vatican?”

Now that the problem is solved, I guess this is more of an academic answer but I figured that one could make an ethical proposition that didn’t have to do with the real world necessarily, as in, “If there are humans then murder is unethical”.

“This is slightly incorrect. As per CCC that was quoted, IMHO, it is uncontrolled capitalism/socialism/communism that poses a problem. Capitalism isn’t bad when it is carried out in a moral fashion.”

This then, is really a definitions game. The encyclicals are so confusing to me primarily because I defined capitalism as the working of an economy and not just a particular mode of economics where the rich dominate the poor. Although the latter can happen under capitalism, It is not a necessary nor sufficient ingredient for something to be labelled capitalism. That’s why I was always so confused. 🤷
 
Is there anything else I should know, I still feel like I’m missing something.
 
"What do you think you’re missing? "

How did the popes define capitalism/socialism?
 
“I don’t really know the answer, but I think it will be your textbook answers.”

So they mean, “the system where the means of production are privately owned”=capitalism, while socialism=,“the system where the means of production are publicly owned”?
 
fakename said:
“I don’t really know the answer, but I think it will be your textbook answers.”

So they mean, “the system where the means of production are privately owned”=capitalism, while socialism=,“the system where the means of production are publicly owned”?
Click to expand...
In rereading the quote from the Catechism, I notice that it says ""The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” Technically, the Church actually hasn’t flatly rejected socialism (public ownership of means of production)–only totalitarianism and atheism. Likewise, the Church does not flatly reject capitalism (private ownership of means of production)–only those practices of capitalism that “fail social justice”. I think that’s deliberate.

Since the Church cannot envision every permutation of economics/politics, it is making a statement that doesn’t really rely on the definitions of socialism or capitalism. Instead, it refers to consequences of the systems that have been called “capitalist” or “socialist” that it has observed. Those consequences are matters of faith and morals, so the Church speaks out on them.

Does that make any sense? It’s certainly brain-bending . . .🙂
 
"In rereading the quote from the Catechism, I notice that it says ""The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” Technically, the Church actually hasn’t flatly rejected socialism (public ownership of means of production)–only totalitarianism and atheism. Likewise, the Church does not flatly reject capitalism (private ownership of means of production)–only those practices of capitalism that “fail social justice”. I think that’s deliberate.

Since the Church cannot envision every permutation of economics/politics, it is making a statement that doesn’t really rely on the definitions of socialism or capitalism. Instead, it refers to consequences of the systems that have been called “capitalist” or “socialist” that it has observed. Those consequences are matters of faith and morals, so the Church speaks out on them. "

So the church is against (to put it quickly) dickensian nightmares and 1984ish society?
 
fakename said:
"In rereading the quote from the Catechism, I notice that it says ""The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic ideologies associated in modem times with “communism” or “socialism.” Technically, the Church actually hasn’t flatly rejected socialism (public ownership of means of production)–only totalitarianism and atheism. Likewise, the Church does not flatly reject capitalism (private ownership of means of production)–only those practices of capitalism that “fail social justice”. I think that’s deliberate.

Since the Church cannot envision every permutation of economics/politics, it is making a statement that doesn’t really rely on the definitions of socialism or capitalism. Instead, it refers to consequences of the systems that have been called “capitalist” or “socialist” that it has observed. Those consequences are matters of faith and morals, so the Church speaks out on them. "

So the church is against (to put it quickly) dickensian nightmares and 1984ish society?
Click to expand...
Yes.
 
But I can think of a period where a dickensian nightmare might be advantageous:

So the businessman needs 100,000,000 dollars to produce things for a worker & give him a wage of 100 dollars to keep that worker alive, in health, with enough left over for consumption over and above that needed to sustain his life. The worker can then use his tools to produce 100,000,001 dollars worth of goods for the businessman.

Assuming this whole process is all that they know, switching away from it is impossible or deadly.

But if someone were to change the amount either one was paid, then there would be an imbalance in production (the businessman could only produce a few of the tools or too many tools for the worker or the worker could end up consuming his income too quickly, etc.). And of course final output would decrease.

My question is, should this situation of grossly unequal pay be tolerated or not?
 
"But I can think of a period where a dickensian nightmare might be advantageous:

So the businessman needs 100,000,000 dollars to produce things for a worker & give him a wage of 100 dollars to keep that worker alive, in health, with enough left over for consumption over and above that needed to sustain his life. The worker can then use his tools to produce 100,000,001 dollars worth of goods for the businessman.

Assuming this whole process is all that they know, switching away from it is impossible or deadly.

But if someone were to change the amount either one was paid, then there would be an imbalance in production (the businessman could only produce a few of the tools or too many tools for the worker or the worker could end up consuming his income too quickly, etc.). And of course final output would decrease.

My question is, should this situation of grossly unequal pay be tolerated or not?"

help with this?
 
fakename said:
"But I can think of a period where a dickensian nightmare might be advantageous:

So the businessman needs 100,000,000 dollars to produce things for a worker & give him a wage of 100 dollars to keep that worker alive, in health, with enough left over for consumption over and above that needed to sustain his life. The worker can then use his tools to produce 100,000,001 dollars worth of goods for the businessman.

Assuming this whole process is all that they know, switching away from it is impossible or deadly.

But if someone were to change the amount either one was paid, then there would be an imbalance in production (the businessman could only produce a few of the tools or too many tools for the worker or the worker could end up consuming his income too quickly, etc.). And of course final output would decrease.

My question is, should this situation of grossly unequal pay be tolerated or not?"

help with this?
Click to expand...
If the businessman paid his workers more than a livable wage, comiserate with experience of the worker, etc. then it is perfectally moral.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top