Can you more clearly define your 3rd way? I’d love to see us all come together but I need to know what we are coming together on.
I believe that subsidiarity is violated just by the very fact of a government (local, state, or federal) run and financed educational system. Federal financing (we already have some) would only make that worse. I’m all for privatizing the school system, but definitely against offering some universal voucher system. You seem to think that it’s somehow inherently wrong that some school systems have more money than other school systems. Why? Also, the actual performance of school systems has no relationship to the actual money spent. One of the worst systems in the country is in Washington, D.C.; yet it has the highest per student funding of any system in the country. And that’s not an aberation.
Amen. We need to lower our material drive so that the mothers may stay home. That way they can either home-school individually or as a community.
Oh, he’s getting there. Between his brother Jeb and the statue of the Blessed Mother in the White House, God’s grace may overwhelm him into the Church.
One can only pray!!
Thank you, James. And I deeply appreciate your thoghtful and respectful replies.
Yes. Catholic Social Thought has always been much more communitarian rather than the extreme individualism that conservatives seem to apply to economic issues and liberals to cultural issues.
Yes. I think part of the wisdom of the church is that its not that any one level of society has a natural responsibility for these things, but the society has a responsibility to address human needs and then we find the level and organ of society that can best do the job.
www.usccb.org
You are right. Since Vatican II, there have been some carefully phrased statements that talk about the human condition in modern society and conclude that it would be hard to see how justice could not demand democracy under present circumstance.
Faith Based Initiative.
I would think that federal funding would be the most sustainable. As the charities themselves would be the first to admit, private charitable giving is very unsustainable and undependable. I think Catholic Social Theorists have tended to like the idea of federal or national funding as it avoids injustices of locals – Morris County New Jersey could solve all of the poverty in that locality and more while it is hard to imagine how a community like West Philadelphia could possibly finance and run social service efforts.
I think it would depend on the issue. The Church, for example, teaches that the freedom or ability to preform these responsibilties comes through community and association. Certainly a parent performing his duties towards family life desires a stable work situation. In association with other workers he can negotiate regular hours, overtime producers, family and medical leave, sickness insurance and other traditional Catholic (and Democratic in these cases) initiatives through collective bargaining.
And that is why we need the Third Way of Catholic Social Thought to take a more significant role in the discussion.
I read it the weekit was issued. It is a great letter and I fully endorse it along with his other letter “On Human Work”
Curious to get feedback from fix, JamesD, katherine2, Brad, StJeanneDArc, Trelow etc on my amatuerish thoughts on the Catholic thinking on Subsidiarty…affirm, discredit, or correct me…Alot of people much smarter than I here.
But I would submit that “decentralization” in matter of government, and population centers, lend itself better to a Catholic Culture.
When I read subsidiarity, I, for some reason, associate the word with ownership. Sharecropping farmers, for example. Ownership implies self-sufficiency and automatically thrusts the person (or family) into the need to be responsible. It creates a “at-stake-ness” for the common good.
I know this might come as a shock to you, but I think Bush is more Catholic than protestant. He cut taxes across to board, took the lowest tax bracket OFF the taxrolls, he doubled the child tax credits (profamily, prolife), He thinks church organizations are beter suited for helping society than government. He wants to create a “ownership society”. Yes, Yes, his policies are profitable to big corporations and overpaid CEOs on Wall Street. BUT, he is a big advocate of small businesses!! The tax cuts were great for home businesses, too! He wants insurance to be more affordable for small businesses by allowing them to come together to afford insurance rates the big dogs get. Ownership over private medical accounts. Ownership over a portion of your social security investment.
When I think of this “third way” as someone noted, I think of not a libertarian capitalist slash-n-burn worker-is-an-expense government-as-enemy way, not the unionist government-as-patron socialist way of doing things, but a society that makes ownership of property desirable and affordable, that encourages family (and large ones at that), that self-suffiency in the form of home industry or small business and community involvement decentralizes the corporate factories as well as the government leviathan.
Ok, I think I just rambled a bit, and I may be speaking without too much knowledge on the matter, but what do you think??
That has been the programme of a certain element of what is sometimes called the Catholic Left, particularly parts of the Catholic Worker movement. I understand their view. Its very appealing from a religious standpoint, but I have always found it a bit romaniticized. Back to the land and all of that.Alot of people much smarter than I here.
But I would submit that “decentralization” in matter of government, and population centers, lend itself better to a Catholic Culture.
Ownership has virtues. But I think it is a different virtue than subsidiarity.
Actually, I think in some of his speeches you have a point. I’m less sure he follows it up in his actions.
Yes, but the relief to the lowest brackets and the child tax credits had been supported by Clinton & the Democrats. He helped make this issue bi-partisan, which I think is admirable.
Of course, our Catholic social assitance organizations don’t agree with this!!!
I fully agree with you.
Advocate, yes. So am I.
How are they not allowed to do that now?
I’m interested in your post. I will like it if you would develop it some more.
It seems to me that the thrust of the notion of subsidiarity, at least as presented in the Catechism, is to acknowledge the fact that while humans are by nature “social” creatures, we each have individual dignity that can potentially be threatened and minimized by the society in which we find ourselves, to-wit certain communist or facsist societies. Subsidiarity can serve as a balance to these extremes, offering preservation for each one. Ultimately, though, I find the purpose of our Catholic faith to be one addressed toward matters of the eternal, in which the whole point of being “Catholic” is to be centralized.
Not to belittle the contributions of Catholic thought on social issues (since such thought is considerably important), the principle of subsidiarity is one of the basic principles of federalism. The Catholic Church didn’t contribute the idea itself, but has rather contributed to the idea.
Living off the lay of the land…sounds hokey…but it sure throws a wrench in the overcomsumption needed for capitalism to succeed, and throws a wrench in the need for government to provide xy and z.
Explain that diference, won’t you? Interested in the distictions.
I thought he has to some degree. His spending on education and healthcare?? Faith Based Initiatives??
It has been supported by republicans for yeeeeeeeeears, too. Republicans just don’t think financiallty successful people are, by existence, eeeeeeevilllll and out to squelch the poor or some such thing. Do I decry the CEO who lays off people and then takes the profits as a year-end bonus??? Of course! But, I’m not quite sure how to remedy that beyond the marketplace (you and me, not government) getting mad enough to force companies to change.
FBI?? Because of governmental oversight watering down effectiveness??
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Collective Healthcare in the private sector: Laws need to be restructured to allow for this
I’d say you hit it fairly well. The new “Compassionate Conservatism” is the closest thing we’ve had to a true christian government.
I apologize if I seem to be picking fights with you. I believe we have the same ends, just different means.
