Wait, wait, You have actually read the entire Compendium? Really? Or are you basing your opinion on someone’s opinion? Just curious.How would you classify Catholic social teaching?
http://www.vatican.va/content/john-...s/hf_jp-ii_enc_14091981_laborem-exercens.htmlFurthermore, in the Church’s teaching, ownership has never been understood in a way that could constitute grounds for social conflict in labour. As mentioned above, property is acquired first of all through work in order that it may serve work. This concerns in a special way ownership of the means of production. Isolating these means as a separate property in order to set it up in the form of “capital” in opposition to “labour”-and even to practise exploitation of labour-is contrary to the very nature of these means and their possession. They cannot be possessed against labour, they cannot even be possessed for possession’s sake, because the only legitimate title to their possession- whether in the form of private ownerhip or in the form of public or collective ownership-is that they should serve labour, and thus, by serving labour, that they should make possible the achievement of the first principle of this order, namely, the universal destination of goods and the right to common use of them. From this point of view, therefore, in consideration of human labour and of common access to the goods meant for man, one cannot exclude the socialization, in suitable conditions, of certain means of production. In the course of the decades since the publication of the Encyclical Rerum Novarum, the Church’s teaching has always recalled all these principles, going back to the arguments formulated in a much older tradition, for example, the well-known arguments of the Summa Theologiae of Saint Thomas Aquinas.
You are right. I failed to grasp the concept of socialized control of production. I checked a few web sites for a definition. Here is one from Engels.I’ll find the quotes. For the record he said socialized, not just government control. And of certain means of production, not a whole socialization of the means of production. You stated a straw man, unfortunately.
No problem. It can get confusing with certain terminology. To me, what he meant is more in line with mutualist thought, or even certain forms of libertarian socialism, as opposed to the Marxist form. Church teaching still supports private ownership of the means of production and a free market, of course.I am not sure if this is what JPII had in mind, hence my request for a quote from him in this.
A little bit of historical context to JPII’s attitude toward work. At the time of the writing of his encyclical, Poland was in the process of emerging from under 50 years of communist rule, where all production was “socialized”, ie state controlled. Since all socialist countries claimed that they were governed by the people, it was the people who owned the means of production. (see surrent situation in exisitng communist states, such as Cuba, etc.)No problem. It can get confusing with certain terminology. To me, what he meant is more in line with mutualist thought, or even certain forms of libertarian socialism, as opposed to the Marxist form. Church teaching still supports private ownership of the means of production and a free market, of course.