Abstract
This book’s importance for interpreting Catholic social thought (CST) is obvious: the lead author is the head of the Dicastery for Integral Human Development, and the pope himself contributes the foreword! C. and B. offer the key starting point for understanding Francis’s social teaching: that CST is “no longer an addendum to the Gospel,” but intrinsic to it, such that “the kerygma has a clear social content” (3). The criticism of a privatized or spiritualized gospel of the rich and comfortable is not new—it can be found clearly in previous popes, even Leo XIII. What is new here—and what will be most interesting to scholars—is the delineation of two contrasting approaches to discovering that social content. The book’s first part describes these contrasting methods, suggesting that the uses of the phrase “signs of the times” is a sort of “litmus test” (6). The contrast hinges on “the relationship between the Church and contemporary history” (7). Vatican II marks a “transition from an ahistorical paradigm to a historico-salvific reading of contemporary events” (9). The Council “abandoned the judgmental attitude that had led the Church to stigmatize, almost a priori, every innovation as an ‘error’” (14). Importantly, the authors contend that this change was not merely “aimed at making the proclamation of the Gospel more effective,” but is “necessary for grasping the signs of Christ’s presence that emerge from contemporary history” (15). The signs ultimately “point to our duty to seek the traces of God’s coming among us through people’s concrete experiences in contemporary history” (17). While their criticism is gentle, C. and B. leave no doubt that John Paul and Benedict adopted a different, less conciliar approach. These popes pinpointed the “ambiguity” (30) or “ambivalence” (34) of any “signs,” insisting on “divine Revelation” and “natural law” to judge them (30). Benedict sometimes used the phrase to point toward “every expression of evil that in social reality gives rise to situations of manipulation and oppression” (35); the authors describe his approach as a “demonization of history” (37). Francis has revived the conciliar perspective, though still recognizing “ambivalence” (39). Importantly, Francis’s attitude “admits that the Church does not have an exclusive monopoly on the truth” (40–41), and so, “compared to his two predecessors, Pope Francis shows a greater historical awareness of the progress of certain secular processes” (xxxi).
Despite this strongly contrastive typology, much of the rest of the volume demonstrates greater continuity among the papacies. In the next chapter, the authors introduce five “criteria for discernment”—a critique of lifestyles, a prioritization of the common good, an insistence on “the integration of charity into the typical dynamics of justice” (52), a privileging of the poor, and a care for the planet—all of which they explicitly show are vividly present in John Paul and Benedict. Moreover, when outlining Francis’s critiques of a “closed world” in Fratelli Tutti’s (henceforth, FT) first chapter, it appears that the current Holy Father is just as ready to denounce social evils as were his predecessors! Francis uses the paradigmatic story of the Good Samaritan to criticize “the virus of indifference” (100) and present “an alternative to disengagement” (95), once again suggesting the key target of Francis’s theology: “sacristry Christians” who retreat from engagement with the messy world. The authors go on to helpfully divide FT between the “judging” of chapters 3 and 4, which emphasize the importance of universal love and sibling-ship, especially in the signal issue of migration, to the “action” called for in the following chapters, seeking a politics and an international community rooted in genuine dialogue, one that can be fruitfully catalyzed by interfaith cooperation among all religions. While recognizing the dialogical or “polyhedric” (113) character of the task, C. and B. underscore certain non-negotiables: the “inalienable right to integral human development” for all (106), and the refusal to “legitimize violence on the basis of the wrong suffered” (144) that undergirds Francis’s teachings against war and capital punishment. The reading has many intriguing footnotes linking FT to the tradition.
The book raises pointed questions about method in CST. One wonders why it is necessary to draw such a stark methodological contrast, when the substance of the social teaching seems so continuous. The authors strike a balanced note at the end of their first part, noting that “[i]f ‘see-judge-act’ is a limited inductive method that thinks it can ‘scientifically’ proceed from social data to pastoral action, by contrast the deductive method, convinced that it can determine how to act starting from universally valid principles, risks being incapable of detecting the complexity of reality” (41–42). Acknowledging the limitations of each approach and seeking a both/and instead of an either/or would guard against a naivete that assumes “reality” is just “there” to be seen. A deeper dialogue would also address a different tension: between the understanding of the mission of Jesus implied in the various papacies. C. and B. rightly insist that, in Gaudium et Spes, the “sole reference” for examining history is “the center of the faith, the message of Jesus” (9). John Paul and Benedict insisted on that, too. But what, exactly, is that message? Nevertheless, whatever contrasts might emerge, all three popes follow the Council in preaching a Christocentric, socially active faith that is not merely about pie in the sky when you die.