In the last post, we discussed why the Catholic principle of solidarity does not equal socialism. In this post, we’ll be looking at solidarity and the welfare state.
To many Catholics, the call to solidarity boils down to a call for concern for the poor. If welfare is concerned with the poor, then it would seem solidarity means that Catholics should unambiguously affirm the welfare state. In this view, the welfare state is the incarnation of solidarity, a governmental system that takes care of the poor.
But that identity is questionable. Hence the question in the title of this post: “Solidarity and the Welfare State?”
Let me be very clear that by putting it in question I am not saying that the social safety net should be scrapped. Rather, it needs to be reformed, and the beginning of that reform must be a great shift in responsibility, from the state to us, because that’s where solidarity begins.
Why? First and foremost, as we’ve seen in the previous post, solidarity is a virtue, not a system. It’s something we need in us, an essential part of the formation of our moral character needed for our moral perfection, not an impersonal political, economic or bureaucratic system.
To repeat Pope John Paul II’s words from his 1987 encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (For the 20th Anniversary of Populorum Progressio), one develops the virtue of solidarity by creating “a firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good; that is to say to the good of all and of each individual, because we are all really responsible for all” (38).
The responsibility is personal.
It is personal in the way that playing the piano is personal. You don’t get good at it without practice. No one can do it for you.
And just as vague warm feelings about playing the piano do not, without practice, make one a good piano player, so also vague feelings about the common good will not give one the virtue of solidarity, and therefore will not have the effect of real solidarity — bringing about the actual common good.
Lobbying the government to act for the common good is certainly good but it cannot take the place of our personal responsibility to work for the common good. Acting for the common good is, first of all, our personal responsibility, something we must do, not something we must demand of someone or something else while we do little or nothing ourselves.
That’s a hard thing for us to understand these days, almost a foreign thing. Why?
For a host of complex reasons, we moderns are in the habit of transferring what used to be understood as personal virtues to impersonal systems that are supposed to do the work of virtue without any effort on our part. Impersonal systems thereby take the place of personal responsibility.
Rather than demanding personal virtue of those serving in government, we believe that an intricate and ingenious system of checks and balances where ambition is made to counteract ambition can take the place of virtue.
Then we’re surprised when those entrenched in the government adroitly use the system to satisfy their personal ambitions.
Rather than demanding personal virtue in our economic dealings, we believe that each individual eagerly satisfying his self-interest will magically result in mimicking the effects of a just economic order.
Then we’re surprised when the invisible hands in mega-banks grasp the invisible hands in Congress, and the rest of us are caught paying the very visible tab for their self-interested soiree.
In the same way, instead of personally shouldering the moral responsibility for the common good — especially for the poor — as the virtue of solidarity demands, we have shrugged our shoulders, and given that responsibility to the state, the welfare state.
Then we’re surprised when welfare programs end up destroying families by encouraging single motherhood and taking away the moral responsibility of fathers for providing for their children; when the generosity of welfare benefits make staying on welfare a far better deal than finding a job; when government defines taking care of the poor in terms of the provision of contraception and abortion; when welfare ends up becoming a multi-generation way of life rather than a temporary help for those in need in difficult times; when welfare creates an entitlement mentality in its recipients, rather than gratitude and a desire to make it on their own as soon as possible.
While governmental programs certainly could promote virtue, and should therefore be supported if they do, they can also promote vice and social destruction. The welfare system as it currently exists certainly does not promote virtue amongst individuals in the general population or amongst the poor themselves.
The immoral effects of the system are, in large part, the result of removing the proper moral cause — morally good individuals trying to have morally good effects in very particular circumstances — and replacing it with an indiscriminate entitlement system (i.e., a system that does not discriminate between morally good and evil effects in its recipients, but simply hands out benefits).
But just as harmful as any of these ill effects, is the notion that it is primarily, even solely, the state’s job to care for the common good, especially the poor. The harm is moral harm — to us.
Deep moral harm.
If Jesus says to us on Judgment Day, “I was hungry, and you gave me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite me in; naked, and you did not clothe me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit me,” we won’t make much headway in replying, “But Lord, I paid my taxes, and the state did all this for me” or “But Lord I voted for all the candidates that supported increasing welfare benefits.”
And let me repeat: All that doesn’t mean that a social safety net is, as such, a bad thing. We aren’t faced with two stark choices: either a welfare state or let the poor fend for themselves. The goal is to shift the burden of moral responsibility back on us as the primary locus of solidarity, and allow the state to supplement our efforts, rather than supplant them.
That way, we become better people, and our charitable efforts will be much more likely to do good than harm because we are looking over them ourselves in our own local communities.
And that accords with the very important Catholic principle of subsidiarity, that “a community of a higher order,” i.e., the state, “should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to co-ordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good” (Catechism, 1883).
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The more I understand “common good” the more I realize much of what is called “for the common good” is not really common and sometimes not good either. It is really, “Take from the common populace so that a few receive goods.”
Solidarity as a virtue must also be just and prudent. Like many virtues, it has contrary opposites. Solidarity is not the same as enabling vices. Solidarity is also not the same as putting your head in the sand.
This sounds like the tea party private charity dream. Reality is this: charity is tiny compared to the modern cost of needs. The Vatican gave $200,000 to Haiti after the quake. Let’s imagine that that same $200,000 has not been used yet
and a group of priests are going to use it for the poor next week in Haiti. There are currently 350,000 people still living in tents two years after the quake. In other words, the Vatican donation wouldn’t cover one breakfast for each of those people. US Catholics gave $60 million after the quake to Haiti. Therefore US Catholics in effect ...at $3 per meal…paid for about 60 meals for each of the tent dwellers…20 days of the 350,000 tent dwellers eating three meals a day.
Real charity is too small to cover real need. US people gave $300 billion in charity last year but c. $47 billion was foundations not people and corporate billing was also in that $300 billion and art, science, libraries etc. were often the destination. Medicaid’s budget was recently $401 billion in a year by comparison. It covers 60% of the people in old age homes which can cost between $50,000 and $80,000 per year depending on where and us it staffed by licensed nurses and doctors. If the author’s parish had to pay for five elderly in skilled nursing homes by their own free will charity giving, what happens to the author’s college savings for his children? What if he has to replace his $7,000 furnace of his $20,000 car?
Only government can cover the costly bills of the modern world. Charity ( Catholics) recently covered little of the Haiti
quake’s aftermath. That’s why there are 350,000 people living in tents there two years later. People have parish donation bills, favorite Catholic charity bills, college savings goals, future weddings for daughters bills, car expense etc etc etc.
No parish can afford to replace Medicaid’s funding of even one elderly person in a nursing home…let alone 5 or 10.
To help the poor and ones’ fellow man does not mean one only has to give money at people. Every one should give of their time, talent, and treasure. The interesting thing is that treasure is the easiest to give and probably the least valuable. If only more people gave of their time and talent, myself included, our society would be much more centered on the value and dignity of the human person. Treasure is a means to an end and is replaceable. Time and talent are more holistic, humane, and irreplaceable. Solidarity is not only about giving funds to fix problems, but also about spending time with those in most need.
TRUE:
So Jesus meets this rich young man. The man wants to know what to do for eternal life, he already follows the commandments. Give up what you have, Jesus suggests. The man turns away sad and Jesus notes to his disciples that it is harder for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.
FALSE:
So Jesus meets this rich young man. The man wants to know what to do for eternal life, he already follows the commandments. Give up what you have, Jesus suggests. The man turns away sad. JESUS THEN COMMANDS HIS DISCIPLES TO GO TO THE MAN’S HOME, TAKE EVERYTHING HE HAS, GIVE IT AWAY FOR THE MAN, AND THE MAN WOULD ENTER INTO THE KINGDOM OF GOD.
Yeah. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord—and not the government of the duly elected.
More Tea Party twisting of the Gospel and Catholic Social Teaching.
From Caritas in Veritate http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20090629_caritas-in-veritate_en.html
Some passages, amongst many, on social welfare spending:
“25. From the social point of view, systems of protection and welfare, ... are finding it hard and could find it even harder in the future to pursue their goals of true social justice in today’s profoundly changed environment. ... These processes have led to a downsizing of social security systems ... with consequent grave danger for the rights of workers, for fundamental human rights and for the solidarity associated with the traditional forms of the social State.
Systems of social security can lose the capacity to carry out their task ... Here budgetary policies, with cuts in social spending ... can leave citizens powerless in the face of old and new risks; such powerlessness is increased by the lack of effective protection on the part of workers’ associations. ... The repeated calls issued within the Church’s social doctrine, beginning with Rerum Novarum, for the promotion of workers’ associations that can defend their rights must therefore be honoured today even more than in the past, as a prompt and far-sighted response to the urgent need for new forms of cooperation at the international level, as well as the local level.
27. Life in many poor countries is still extremely insecure as a consequence of food shortages, and the situation could become worse: hunger still reaps enormous numbers of victims among those who, like Lazarus, are not permitted to take their place at the rich man’s table, contrary to the hopes expressed by Paul VI. Feed the hungry (cf. Mt 25: 35, 37, 42) is an ethical imperative for the universal Church, as she responds to the teachings of her Founder, the Lord Jesus, concerning solidarity and the sharing of goods ...”
BB refers to private charity as a “dream”....
But, BB, what you seem unaware of is that for nigh-on a hundred years economists have shown repeatedly that, when examined over long periods of time, welfare state programs do not add to private almsgiving, but rather supplant it.
That is to say: In any given country, when there is little or no governmental support system, persons tend to give 10-20% of their pretax incomes to help their neighbors and their churches and poor people in Somalia. When welfare systems are introduced, and taxes go up 10% to pay for them, people tend to allocate 10% less of their pretax income for charitable purposes. When studies examine the change in attitudes, the drop in private almsgiving is attributed to an increase in the view that “I already gave to the poor when I paid my taxes. It’s not my job any more; it’s the government’s job.”
So dollar-for-dollar, it’s not a both-and proposition, because a society’s culture is inevitably altered by it. It really is an either-or.
And this explains what we see in Europe and the former Soviet Union, and in the differences in giving habits between politically-conservative persons and politically-leftist persons in the U.S.:
In the U.S., politically-conservative persons give an average of 6.7% of their pre-tax incomes to church and charity. They also give blood frequently, volunteer at soup kitchens frequently, and so on. By contrast, polticially-leftist persons give an average of 2.7% of their pre-tax incomes to church and charity, and proportionally do less volunteerism as well. In any given local organization, the paid administrator is often left-leaning, but the unpaid volunteers typically have right-of-center voting patterns.
Why the difference? Well, right-of-center persons view assisting the poor as a personal responsibility. Left-of-center persons view it as “the government’s job” and therefore think themselves absolved of any responsibility to personally help the poor, as soon as they finish pulling the lever for Obama or whomever.
In Europe, this attitude is far more pronounced, such that most European citizens’ private almsgiving averages under 2%. And in former Communist countries, the attitude is even more pronounced: In the former Soviet Union, the idea of private almsgiving is considered hilarious and fantastical. The government effectively stamped that culture out of existence during the communist years. Incidence of private charity of any kind is so tiny as to be effectively nonexistent: A small fraction of a percent.
So, facing this reality, a person might ask, “Well, if private almsgiving and public welfare statism tend to be mutually-exclusive because the one supplants the other, then why not go with public welfare statism? After all, if the poor get the same amount of money either way, the real difference is that under a welfare state, everyone pays in proportionally to his income, whereas under a society of private charity, some people have to give more to make up for the stingy folks who give less.”
And this is true, but it misses some of the other differences between private almsgiving and public welfare statism:
1. The recipient of private almsgiving feels gratitude because he knows his neighbor didn’t have to give, but did. By contrast, the recipient of public largesse feels entitled, like he was only given what should have been his to begin with. So private almsgiving knits society together in love whereas public welfare statism does not.
2. The recipient of private almsgiving feels moral obligation to give to others as soon as he himself is no longer in need. But the recipient of public largesse feels no similar obligation. So private almsgiving perpetuates a culture of giving, whereas public welfare statism does not.
3. The persons who give voluntarily are choosy about the recipients. They thus do not suspect that someone unworthy has received a handout. But everyone has heard of “welfare brood mares” and “people who buy steak with food stamps,” and while we all know these accusations are untrue of most folks on welfare or food stamps, we also know they are true sometimes. Thus the person who gives voluntarily does not feel he is being gypped; the person whose money is taken via taxation feels that he might be. Distrust of the needy is sown by the welfare state.
4. The politicians who favor expansion of the welfare state frequently rely on class-warfare rhetoric to secure re-election: “Vote for me, because the other guy will allow the evil rich to keep their money, and you won’t get any more.” Thus distrust of the wealthy is also sown by the welfare state. It does not solve class warfare; it exacerbates it.
5. Politicians who create programs for the needy tend to headquarter them in their states or districts or to appoint political allies or donors to positions of authority within them. (Example: Barney Frank’s lover’s position of authority in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.) The Welfare State is intrinsically corruptive.
6. When people give to charity, they often give through church-related programs like Samaritan’s Purse or the St. Vincent de Paul society. When the welfare state undermines their sense of responsibility for giving to charity as a part of good citizenship, it is often Christian charitable organizations which cease to be well-funded; and, their tendency to give for the upkeep of the Church simultaneously drops also. Meanwhile, the government welfare programs become increasingly better-funded. The Welfare State thus displaces the role of Christianity in a society. People thus increasingly say, “What role has God in my life? My needs are never met by anything associated with Him; only government ever meets my needs. And, what good deeds do Christians ever do? It’s the government who takes care of the poor; Christians just spend their time telling me that I’m immoral for sleeping with people to whom I’m not yet married. God is irrelevant to my life and Christians are the one group in society I’d most like to get rid of.”
7. And, for the same reasons as given in #6, above, a society with a welfare state is a society in which the churches are poorly-made and poorly-maintained, with underfunded parish schools unable to afford to educate the poor children…who wind up in public schools, where the education is inferior both academically and morally. This in turn prevents poor children from acquiring the academic and moral values that will take them out of poverty.
In short: The Welfare State supplants private and church-based assistance for the poor with government-based, compulsory wealth transfers. The upshot of this is perpetuation of poverty, increased class warfare, the slow starving-out of the churches, and a displacing of the role of God and Christians in public life which relegates God to the periphery of most people’s everyday thought. It also undermines the culture of private almsgiving, thereby reducing the likelihood that any individual person will take positive action to love his needy neighbors on his own initiative; this in turn, if the words of Jesus are to be believed, reduces that person’s likelihood of going to Heaven.
Even shorter: The welfare state, for all its good intentions, is one of the best weapons in the Devil’s arsenal against the Church and individual souls. Compulsory almsgiving just isn’t the same as voluntary almsgiving; it is, rather, the Devil’s poor imitation of the charity of Christ.
agreed my good man
I do not believe that Christ asked us to solve poverty or world hunger.
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He asked us as individuals to feed, clothe, shelter and comfort those in need.
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You will be judged on what YOU do, not what someone you voted for or someone you coerced does. Feeding more people by doing it through taxes eliminates the personal sacrifice and free-will and gains you NOTHING.
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In fact if you pay your taxes and vote for welfare and never give to the poor you are bound for hell. On the other hand if you vote against welfare, reluctantly pay the minimum tax you legally can and give generously to charity I believe you will have avoided condemnation and eternal suffering.
Taking others money to give to the poor:
Sirach 34
21 Ill-gotten goods offered in sacrifice are tainted.
22 Presents from the lawless do not win God’s favor.
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Taxation:
Sirach 34
24 One who slays a son in his father’s presence—
whoever offers sacrifice from the holdings of the poor.
26 To take away a neighbor’s living is to commit murder;
27 to deny a laborer wages is to shed blood.
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Failing to give to charity:
Sirach 34
25 The bread of charity is life itself for the needy;
whoever withholds it is a murderer.
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Matthew 25
The Judgment of the Nations.
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit upon his glorious throne,
32 and all the nations will be assembled before him. And he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.
33 He will place the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.
34 Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me,
36 naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.’
37 Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?
38 When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?
39 When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’
40 And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’
41 Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you accursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink,
43 a stranger and you gave me no welcome, naked and you gave me no clothing, ill and in prison, and you did not care for me.’
44 Then they will answer and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or ill or in prison, and not minister to your needs?’
45 He will answer them, ‘Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me.’
46 And these will go off to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
@Leo
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The church has always taught personal charity and the right to personal property which cannot be taken from men in the name of charity.
I see nothing in your quotes that implies that charity and welfare are the responsibility of the state.
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In fact Caritas In Veritate specifically re-emphasizes Rerum Novarum which explicitly condemns Socialism.
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RERUM NOVARUM - ENCYCLICAL OF POPE LEO XIII ON CAPITAL AND LABOR
4. To remedy these wrongs the socialists, working on the poor man’s envy of the rich, are striving to do away with private property, and contend that individual possessions should become the common property of all, to be administered by the State or by municipal bodies. They hold that by thus transferring property from private individuals to the community, the present mischievous state of things will be set to rights, inasmuch as each citizen will then get his fair share of whatever there is to enjoy. But their contentions are so clearly powerless to end the controversy that were they carried into effect the working man himself would be among the first to suffer. They are, moreover, emphatically unjust, for they would rob the lawful possessor, distort the functions of the State, and create utter confusion in the community.
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What the church has always taught is that law should and must ensure personal property rights and the right for fair treatment of both the business and the workers. That both the worker and the business MUST live up to the employment contract as agreed to and that govt must not unfairly favor the rights of one over the other. Also Rerum Novarum goes on to state that business should offer a fair and living wage and should support a right of association of workers - to join [or not join] a guild/union.
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The church also condemns the pitting of the rich against the poor and the pitting of classes against each other.
I think that a part of the reason that our system is such a mess is that to preach, teach, highlight, inform the general population about the reality of the consequences of one’s actions is viewed as “imposing one sub-culture’s views upon others”, “inappropriate”, “judgemental”. And the decision to refrain from ameliorating to the greatest extent of our ability the unpleasant and / or uncomfortable natural consequences that follow, as the night follows the day, from our actions, is viewed in our culture as “judgemental” and “mean-spirited.”
Young guys skate-boarding or snow-skiing fall hard and break a bunch of bones. They are med-evaced at the cost of tens of thousands to the hospital, receive tens of thousands in surgery and other treatment, and tens of thousands in rehab. Who pays? The young guys? Their parents? The manufacturers of the sports equipment? No, the insurance companies pay for most of it, and that means you and me, in the sense that those costs are spread around among all of us.
What if a fat bill were presented to those parents and to the boys doing the skate-boarding or skiing? Guess what? You’re not going to college - you’re going to be working at Home Depot until you’re 35 to pay this off. Once word gets around that that’s the score, I suspect that there will be a lot fewer risk-taking injuries.
I worked at a crisis pregnancy center for quite some time. On occasion, 22 and 23-year-old young men would come in with their 15 or 16-year-old girlfriends. The happy couples would be delighted to learn that a baby was on the way: now she would qualify for all kinds of public assistance - an apartment of her own, money for food, utilities, clothing for herself and for the baby. The men would sometimes express their happiness, too, that “they” now had their own place - more privacy for the young couple - no Momma around when they wanted to be together. All at taxpayer expense!
I remember filling out the paperwork to make the arrangements for the couple, er, I mean, the client, and thinking to myself: “I believe I have a pretty good idea what ‘justice’ and ‘charity’ are supposed to look like, and this ain’t it!”
Whatever happened to maternity homes? Much better use of resources!
In that same crisis pregnancy program, I learned that we had at one time sponsored young mothers-to-be to stay in the homes of volunteers. *That* didn’t work out. Quite a few of the young mothers-to-be were accustomed to staying out all night with their friends. Their doing so at their new volunteer home caused worry and sleepless nights to the families, and the young ladies’ attitude so often was: “This is who I am; I won’t be kept to a curfew as if I were 11; get over it!” There were other issues: disreputable friends coming around, alcohol, drugs and smoking in the house; the program had to be phased out.
This is so sad! Why can’t there be rules, and why can’t they be enforced? It would save everyone a lot of money, pain, and grief?
“CATECHISM of the CATHOLIC CHURCH, Second Edition” -
CCC: ” 2411 Contracts are subject to commutative justice which regulates exchanges between persons and between institutions in accordance with a strict respect for their rights.
Commutative justice obliges strictly; it requires safeguarding property rights, paying debts, and fulfilling obligations freely contracted.
Without commutative justice, no other form of justice is possible.
One distinguishes commutative justice from legal justice which concerns what the citizen owes in fairness to the community, and from distributive justice which regulates what the community owes its citizens in proportion to their contributions and needs. “
Using the Catechism, for the answers to:
“Is there a conflict in the Church’s teachings on Social Justice, Solidarity, Subsidiarity, Commutative Justice, the Commandment to Love our Neighbor, the Commandment not to covet our neighbor’s goods? Please define Commutative Justice.”
on the net go to: ’ What Catholics REALLY Believe SOURCE ‘.
The Nazi’s and Communists push Class Warfare.
OBAMA’s policial actions to push CLASS WARFARE violates Church teaching on: “SOLIDARITY”.
CCC: ” 1941 Socio-economic problems can be resolved only with the help of all the forms of solidarity: solidarity of the poor among themselves, between rich and poor, of workers among themselves, between employers and employees in a business, solidarity among nations and peoples. International solidarity is a requirement of the moral order; world peace depends in part upon this. “
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