some oldies but goodies…
"The right to have a share of earthly goods sufficient for oneself and one’s family belongs to everyone.
– Second Vatican Council
Minimum material resources are an absolute necessity for human life. If persons are to be recognized as members of the human community, then the **community **has an obligation to help fulfill these basic needs unless an absolute scarcity of resources makes this strictly impossible. **No such scarcity exists in the United States today. **
–
Economic Justice for All (#70)
There are needs and common goods that cannot be satisfied by the market system.
It is the task of the state and of all society to defend them. An idolatry of the market alone cannot do all that should be done.
– **C****entesimus Annus **
Society as a whole,
acting through public and private institutions, has the moral responsibility to enhance human dignity and protect human rights. In addition to the clear responsibility of private institutions,
government has an essential responsibility in this area. This does not mean that government has the primary or exclusive role, but it does have a positive moral responsibility in safeguarding human rights and ensuring that the minimum conditions of human dignity are met for all. In a democracy, government is a means by which we can act together to protect what is important to us and to promote our common values.
–
Economic Justice for All (#18,PM)
The complex circumstances of our day make it necessary for
public authority to intervene more often in social, economic and cultural matters in order to bring about favorable conditions which will give more effective help to citizens and groups in their free pursuit of man’s total well-being.
–
The Church in the Modern World (#75)
By its nature private property has a
social dimension which is
based on the law of the common destination of earthly goods. Whenever the social aspect is forgotten, ownership can often become the object of greed and a source of serious disorder, and its opponents easily find a pretext for calling the right itself into question.
–
The Church in the Modern World (#71)
As for the State, its whole raison d’etre is the realization of the common good in the temporal order.
It cannot, therefore, hold aloof from economic matters. On the contrary, it must do all in its power to promote the production of a sufficient supply of material goods, “the use of which is necessary for the practice of virtue.” It has also the duty to protect the rights of all its people, and particularly of its weaker members, the workers, women and children. It can never be right for the State to shirk its obligation of working actively for the betterment of the condition of the workingman.
–
Mother and Teacher (#20)
The government should make similarly effective efforts to see that those who are able to work can find employment in keeping with their aptitudes, and that each worker receives a wage in keeping with the laws of justice and equity. It should be equally the concern of
civil authorities to ensure that workers be allowed their proper responsibility in the work undertaken in industrial organization, and to facilitate the establishment of intermediate groups which will make social life richer and more effective.
–
Peace on Earth (#64)
The very nature of the common good requires that all members of the state be entitled to share in it
– John XXIII
**Governments must provide regulations and a system of taxation **which encourage firms to preserve the environment, employ disadvantaged workers, and create jobs in depressed areas. Managers and stockholders should not be torn between their responsibilities to their organizations and their responsibilities toward society as a whole.
–
Economic Justice for All (#118
I am trying not to blow the top of my head off. If any of your Bishops are involved in this, how do you feel. 
It was an immoral act to vote for John Kerry because of his pro-choice stance, even though five million unborn babies were killed under President Bush’s first term, and even though it seems very likely that five million more unborn babies will be killed under President Bush’s second term. That is, actually saving unborn lives doesn’t matter in determining the morality of a particular voting choice. 
So why should actually achieving particular economic results matter in determining the morality of a particular tax structure and budget outlay? 
