EU president’s praise for Catholic teaching welcomed as bishops urge citizens to vote in elections to stop "nationalist threat"

[Vouthon]

“It therefore cannot be bought and sold like a commodity” is as abundantly clear a statement as possible. If your buying and selling labour on the market as a commodity, that is inherently failing to ‘take into consideration’ the labourer.

For the modern Austrian school, as for the ‘early capitalists’ you were referring to a little while ago, this was kosher. It’s not for the Church.

In his homily during the Holy Mass celebrated for the labour world in Gdansk, Poland, on 12 June 1987, Pope John Paul II said:

Work may not be treated – anywhere or ever – as a commodity, because man may not
be a commodity to man; man must be the subject. Man engages in work through their
whole humanity and their whole subjectivity [. . . ]. It is therefore necessary to perceive all
human rights in relation to man’s work to do justice to all of them. (Jan Paweł II 1999)

 

[Ridgerunner]

I don’t think they conflict. They’re just talking about different things, from different standpoints. Labor is, in fact, bought and sold on the market. One can accurately say it’s “like a commodity” in many ways or one can say it’s different in any number of ways. Grain is indisputably a commodity. It can be used in production of further goods. It can be used for good or for evil purposes. The same is true of labor. But they’re also different. You can ship grain. You can’t ship labor. Grain is severable from the producer. Labor is not.

 

[Vouthon]

He is speaking of extremes and highlighting how under the present system of capitalism (under liberalism) it does reduce labour merely to a commodity

We are agreed there - the present system, under Austrian economics, reduces labour to a commodity.

My only major disagreement with you Josie (other than the origin date of capitalism, although we both agree that it didn’t preced feudalism andthe renaissance unlike Ridgerunner) is that you refuse to admit that, just as Marxist collectivism is referred to in encyclicals as “socialism” and is condemned in toto as such, “capitalism” is similarly referred to as capitalism and referred to, and condemned, as such. Indeed JPII stated that we “should” precisely refer to this reversal of God’s natural order as “capitalism”.

We thus disagree about ‘capitalism’ itself being inherently in conflict with natural law. I repeat: I’m not saying that everything falling under ‘capitalism’ as a label, just like everything following under ‘socialism’ as a label, is proscribed.

You yourself admit that “early capitalism” is immoral, and so it cannot be attributed to the church (hence why your argument about capitalism, which began in this early phase, as arising from Catholicism makes no sense to me).

So if you are referring to something that isn’t part of this “reversal” as capitalism, then you are perhaps using the term wrongly.

 

[Vouthon]

I don’t think they conflict. They’re just talking about different things, from different standpoints.

That is the height of relativistic obfuscation.

They are as irreconcilable as night and day. What is a commodity? Definition: “a product (i.e. raw material/agricultural) that can be bought and sold on the market”. JPII states, in faithfulness to his predecessors, that: “Work may not be treated – anywhere or ever – as a commodity”.

FFS Ridgerunner. Ludwig von Meses says, “yes” it can be treated as a commodity, JPII says “no” it can’t. You say, “both/and”.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Agreed. There are moral dimensions to all things used in the production of goods. Beef is a commodity. But we would not treat a living steer like we would an ingot of steel. We would have no moral qualms about putting Arkansas diamonds in a ring. But we would have them about using “blood diamonds”.

A tractor is like an extension of man’s arm. It is a “power enhancement” to the human body, allowing man to do tasks requiring great strength. But we would leave a tractor out in a snowstorm, naked and with no shelter, where we would never leave a human in that situation. But a farmer would fire a hired hand who left a tractor in the middle of a creek during a rainstorm.
A tractor performs labor for humans, but the conditions we consider reasonable for it or for a human are different.

 

[Ridgerunner]

That is the height of relativistic obfuscation.

They are as irreconcilable as night and day. What is a commodity? Definition: “ a product (i.e. raw material/agricultural) that can be bought and sold on the market ”. JPII states, in faithfulness to his predecessors, that: “ Work may not be treated – anywhere or ever – as a commodity ”.

FFS Ridgerunner. Ludwig von Meses says, “yes” it can be treated as a commodity, JPII says “no” it can’t. You say, “both/and”.

We’re getting nowhere in the disputation and you’re resorting to insult. So we’re finished here. It was entertaining for awhile, and I thank you for that much of it.

 

[Vouthon]

We’re getting nowhere in the disputation and you’re resorting to insult. So we’re finished here. It was entertaining for awhile, and I thank you for that much of it.

Fair enough, I suppose someone has to call it a day.

That said, I certainly didn’t mean to insult you - and not sure where I did, apart from using a joking abbreviation for an expletive that is commonly used online, to evidence my frustration at the apparent inability to see the forest for the trees on this thread.

I referred to your non-committal response to my eminently straightforward question, setting out what most people would deem to be two clearly contrasting views on a given issue as any could plausibly be, as an example of “relativistic obfuscation” which I think it is and stand by. I never said anything to you or about you personally. I referred to Josie as similarly obfuscating earlier on concerning a different matter and she never accused me of insulting her, because that is a reference to an act and not to the person doing the act.

If you took it as a personal insult, then my humblest and contrite apologies to you good sir. Thank you for discussing this with me, likewise.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

Catholic Social Doctrine definitively states, “absolutely not” - “Labor is not a mere commodity. It therefore cannot be bought and sold like a commodity” (Pope Pius XI)

The word “mere” is important here. I think you may be overlooking it to manufacture a division between you and @Ridgerunner that is not really that great. Catholic Social Doctrine does not say that labor is nothing like a commodity. It says it is not only a commodity - a point on which Ridgerunner seems to agree.

 

[Vouthon]

I think you may be overlooking it to manufacture a division between you and @Ridgerunner that is not really that great. Catholic Social Doctrine does not say that labor is nothing like a commodity.

Well, I would politely disagree that I am “manufacturing” a division.

I presented the view of Ludwig von Mises. As Harvard University economic professor Paul C. Weiler writes: “from the neoclassical economic point of view, labor is a commodity, a factor of production for which the terms of exchange are ideally determined in competitive markets”.

JPII, by contrast, in 1999:

Work may not be treated – anywhere or ever – as a commodity

There was no “mere” used in this instance, nor was ‘only’ used in that earlier instance either, or elsewhere in papal documents where this principle surfaces, and nor do I regard this singular instance of the term ‘mere’ as significantly changing the meaning from any of these other occasions. Rather, I think that folks are reading far too much into this one word used in a single sentence than is actually necessitated.

Even old U.S. federal law sagely recognised that in principle “labour” is not anything like a commodity. The Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 stated plainly that: “the labour of a human being is not a commodity or an article of commerce”, in section 6.

Between Mises (speaking for the Austrian school) and JPII (speaking for Catholic Social Doctrine), there is significant divergence of opinion on this issue of ‘labor as commodity’ and I struggle to see why that would not be plain when the two views are actually contrasted side-by-side, as I did.

 

[Feanor2]

The Church only teaches against Communism not against Socialism or policies which some call Socialist. It also opposes unbridled Capitalism.

 

[josie_L]

Yes, it can’t, but there are variations of capitalism that do not have to treat labour as a mere commodity. And again, the word “mere” is important here because it does not signify that money in exchange for labour is evil, it is only evil if nothing else is considered.

 

[Canvas]

Don’t cherry pick encyclicals, btw.

https://web.archive.org/web/2006090...f_p-xi_enc_19310515_quadragesimo-anno_en.html

1. The other section, which has kept the name Socialism, is surely more moderate. It not only professes the rejection of violence but modifies and tempers to some degree, if it does not reject entirely, the class struggle and the abolition of private ownership. One might say that, terrified by its own principles and by the conclusions drawn therefrom by Communism, Socialism inclines toward and in a certain measure approaches the truths which Christian tradition has always held sacred; for it cannot be denied that its demands at times come very near those that Christian reformers of society justly insist upon.
2. For if the class struggle abstains from enmities and mutual hatred, it gradually changes into an honest discussion of differences founded on a desire for justice, and if this is not that blessed social peace which we all seek, it can and ought to be the point of departure from which to move forward to the mutual cooperation of the Industries and Professions. So also the war declared on private ownership, more and more abated, is being so restricted that now, finally, not the possession itself of the means of production is attacked but rather a kind of sovereignty over society which ownership has, contrary to all right, seized and usurped. For such sovereignty belongs in reality not to owners but to the public authority. If the foregoing happens, it can come even to the point that imperceptibly these ideas of the more moderate socialism will no longer differ from the desires and demands of those who are striving to remold human society on the basis of Christian principles. For certain kinds of property, it is rightly contended, ought to be reserved to the State since they carry with them a dominating power so great that cannot without danger to the general welfare be entrusted to private individuals.

115. Such just demands and desire have nothing in them now which is inconsistent with Christian truth, and much less are they special to Socialism. Those who work solely toward such ends have, therefore, no reason to become socialists.

If I read this correctly, it basically says if a Catholic “Socialist” ceases to be a dogmatic, authoritarian Marxist-Leninist collectivist and works for what is described above, he/she are merely being Catholic and not a socialist.

 

[Vouthon]

Yes, it can’t, but there are variations of capitalism that do not have to treat labour as a mere commodity.

Agreed there - there are ‘variations’ under the label of capitalism, in common parlance, that do not do this - but JPII says that ‘capitalism’ should precisely be the term used for anything that does do this.

The reason is that the father of modern capitalist economics, the Scottish philosopher Adam Smith (1723 – 17 July 1790), i.e.

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en.wikipedia.org

Adam Smith FRSA (16 June [O.S. 5 June] 1723[3] – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist, philosopher and author as well as a moral philosopher, a pioneer of political economy and a key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment,[4] also known as ‘‘The Father of Economics’’[5] or ‘‘The Father of Capitalism’’.[6]

Smith laid the foundations of classical free market economic theory. The Wealth of Nations was a precursor to the modern academic discipline of economics. In this and other works, he developed the concept of division of labour and expounded upon how rational self-interest and competition can lead to economic prosperity.

Actually ‘taught’ this. In his Wealth of Nations (1776), we read: “The demand for men, like that for any other commodity, necessarily regulates the production of men”.

In the 20th century, the influential Austrian school of economics - which influences business schools globally till today - reiterates this doctrine. And in 1999 JPII reminded people that it is still prevalent in contemporary capitalism.

So, any modern theory of capitalism which ‘bears’ the influence of this particular strain in Adam’s thought, is ‘proscribed’ accordingly.

 

[Vouthon]

If I read this correctly, it basically says if a Catholic “Socialist” ceases to be a dogmatic, authoritarian Marxist-Leninist collectivist and works for what is described above, he/she are merely being Catholic and not a socialist .

Yep, and the exact same logic applies to a Catholic “Capitalist” for the opposite reasons.

Which is the message I’ve been attempting to convey repeatedly throughout this thread, concerning both “socialism” and “capitalism” in papal encyclicals and other magisterial texts.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Like Marx, Smith was infected with deistic notions possibly derived from Masonic beliefs. Theirs was a “clockwork universe” in which the “Grand Architect of the Universe” (Smith’s words) more or less wound up the world and left it to run in a mechanistic and deterministic sort of way. It is my impression that nobody buys into Smith’s concepts anymore.

 

[josie_L]

I’m not cherry picking anything, and socialism is wrong on many levels not just because it’s dogmatic and authorian, i.e., it’s the entirety of the ideology that is in contradiction with Christianity.

Socialism’s Seven Deadly Sins​

1. Socialism truncates the human person. Catholic teaching has at its heart a focus on the inviolable dignity and wholeness of every human person, as well as the need for personal transformation to transform society. While not all socialists have been atheists, the questions that socialists ask tend to focus on the care of the body instead of the soul — and the answers that they tend to give focus on systems, not people. In his landmark encyclical Rerum Novarum (“Concerning New Things”), Pope Leo XIII taught that even the satisfaction of bodily and material needs was dependent upon the care of the whole person:

And since religion alone, as We said in the beginning, can remove the evil, root and branch, let all reflect upon this: First and foremost Christian morals must be reestablished, without which even the weapons of prudence, which are considered especially effective, will be of no avail, to secure well-being.” (82).

2. Socialism denies the rights of the family. Christian morals and natural virtues are taught and indeed “caught” most often in the family, which the Church has taught is the center of human society. The Compendium of Catholic Social Teaching affirms the “priority of the family over society and over the state.” (214) While socialists classically think in only two categories — the individual and the state — Catholic teaching emphasizes that “society and the State exist for the family” (ibid.). The omnicompetent socialist state supplants the functions of families and shatters society into tiny atoms whirling around a single nucleus: the federal government.

3. Socialism crushes civil society. The Church teaches that the state exists to protect and empower families and other parts of civil society — those “little platoons” of professional, local, cultural, artistic, religious and other associations that fulfill people’s material, social, and spiritual needs. (This key principle is called subsidiarity.) While prudence may dictate that in certain limit situations the state must step in and fulfill some needs that civil society or even a family or families cannot provide for, the Compendium of Social Doctrine observes that such “intervention” should always be seen as “ exceptional ” (no. 188). If someone outside the government can accomplish something without using coercion, it’s at best a dangerous lack of prudence and quite often simply a serious violation of justice to get the government involved.

 

[josie_L]

4. Socialism tramples on the sacred human right to private property. Socialists assert that private property essentially belongs to the state to be used for the common good. While Catholics have always believed that the goods of this earth belong to the whole human race and are to be used by all, this does not mean that the state should control all of them. In Rerum Novarum Leo XIII defended not only the practical benefits of private property, but argued that those benefits came from the fact that private property was according to natural law: The human race, he said

has found in the law of nature itself the basis of the distribution of goods, and, by the practice of all ages, has consecrated private possession as something best adapted to man’s nature and to peaceful and tranquil living together.” (11)

This right is of course accompanied by the duties to use private property to provide for the needs of one’s family and those in need. But it is still a right even if it’s sometimes abused.

5. Socialism promotes class warfare. Because of its Marxist origins, socialism goads workers into the unrelenting “class warfare” which Marx himself saw as the engine driving human history. Instead of partners in productivity and human cooperation, owners and investors are seen as workers’ enemies — as if all wealth were a fixed, unchanging pie over which citizens should fight for their limited share. Pope Pius XI condemned this view of society, urged socialists to renounce the very concept of class warfare, and warned Catholics of the dangers of cooperating with socialists under any circumstances: “Whether considered as a doctrine, or an historical fact, or a movement, Socialism, if it remains truly Socialism, even after it has yielded to truth and justice on the points which we have mentioned, cannot be reconciled with the teachings of the Catholic Church because its concept of society itself is utterly foreign to Christian truth.” ( Quadrogesimo Anno , 117)

6. Socialism thwarts our right to take economic initiative. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states bluntly, “Everyone has the right to economic initiative ; everyone should make legitimate use of his talents to contribute to the abundance that will benefit all, and to harvest the just fruits of his labor.” (2429) The abundance created by economic activity is clearly designed for the good of all, but this in no way negates the justice of entrepreneurs and inventors “harvesting” profits. Prevent them from doing that, and soon there will be no economic initiative at all — and perhaps no economy, as the unfortunate citizens of Venezuela are discovering.

 

[josie_L]

7. Socialism replaces love with bureaucracy and class conflict.* This right to economic initiative is also connected to the benefit of the human person. St. John Paul II observed in his encyclical Sollicitudo rei socialis that to deny the right of economic initiative in the name of an “alleged ‘equality’” would be a violation of “the creative subjectivity of the citizen” (no. 15). Again, human persons don’t just have material needs, but spiritual ones that creativity and economic initiative help fulfill.

Socialism focuses on justice, but Catholic teaching emphasizes that for a good society, something much deeper is needed: love. Yes, justice is the main goal of politics, but political life is not all there is, because human persons are more than just material beings. Pope Benedict XVI wrote that even the most just society would require love, something that cannot be given by the state

In that very same encyclical, the pope said:

1. If Socialism, like all errors, contains some truth (which, moreover, the Supreme Pontiffs have never denied), it is based nevertheless on a theory of human society peculiar to itself and irreconcilable with true Christianity. Religious socialism, Christian socialism, are contradictory terms; no one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true socialist.

You are cherry picking!!!

 

[Canvas]

It is my impression that nobody buys into Smith’s concepts anymore.

Really? People still buy into Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged type economics. Some of the most influential people in modern American history have been Ayn Rand disciples, like former Fed Chair Greenspan and House Speaker Paul Ryan.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Perhaps I should have said that it is my impression that the economic community doesn’t. Probably in some high school somewhere students are still taught that Smith is the “father of economics” and that it’s determined by the “invisible hand” and so on. That is, if high schools teach anything about economics anymore.

But I think later economists have pretty much debunked Smith’s theories. Many have condemned Smith himself, as a lot of his writing was plagiarized.

But a word about Ayn Rand. In my view she was a “one trick pony”. She wrote a book that was widely read, and it was a critique of socialism at a time when some kind of critique was important. And, her flight from Russia was heroic. But nothing she ever did after that novel mattered to much.