Reading “Caritas in Veritate”: Notes on Chapter One
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(The text of the encyclical is here, and here are my initial thoughts on the introduction, together with the lively discussion that followed. Up for next weekend: chapter two.)
This chapter is meant to provide an introductory overview of Paul VI’s Populorum Progressio, and as other commentators have noted a key goal of Benedict’s (see secs. 10 and 12 in particular) seems to be to show how that encyclical can be understood as continuous with the rest of the tradition of Catholic social teaching; moreover, it seems to me that what he says here should help cast doubt on Michael Novak’s claim to have divined between Rerum Novarum and Centesimus Annus a “development of doctrine” in which the Church reconciled herself fully to the spirit of liberal capitalism. (Having read the encyclicals Novak discusses, I can’t say that I find his view at all plausible.) At the same time, though, Benedict notes in sec. 15 that Paul VI also articulated the sexual ethic of Humanae Vitae, and argues that social ethics and the ethic of life are not at all separable; so score one as well for the “conservatives”. Benedict cautions against treating Paul VI’s words as irrelevant to our present situation; rather, it is our task to determine exactly how they can speak to us today.
Each time I read this chapter, I am struck by this passage from sec. 11:
Without the perspective of eternal life, human progress in this world is denied breathing-space. Enclosed within history, it runs the risk of being reduced to the mere accumulation of wealth; humanity thus loses the courage to be at the service of higher goods, at the service of the great and disinterested initiatives called forth by universal charity. Man does not develop through his own powers, nor can development simply be handed to him. In the course of history, it was often maintained that the creation of institutions was sufficient to guarantee the fulfilment of humanity’s right to development. Unfortunately, too much confidence was placed in those institutions, as if they were able to deliver the desired objective automatically. In reality, institutions by themselves are not enough, because integral human development is primarily a vocation, and therefore it involves a free assumption of responsibility in solidarity on the part of everyone. Moreover, such development requires a transcendent vision of the person, it needs God: without him, development is either denied, or entrusted exclusively to man, who falls into the trap of thinking he can bring about his own salvation, and ends up promoting a dehumanized form of development.
So authentic human development is not a purely material affair; it requires spiritual progress and therefore demands more assistance than that which can be provided by narrowly human institutions. Personal freedom, interpersonal solidarity, and responsiveness to the divine are all integral parts of a human development that does not reduce us to self-serving individualists. This theme comes up often in this chapter, e.g. in secs. 16 and 18.
There is also a terrific discussion in sec. 14 on the need to seek a middle way between two equally false views of specifically technological progress: neither the inclination to “entrust the entire process of development to technology” nor a romanticizing attitude that treats development itself as degrading and anti-human is appropriate; instead, we must acknowledge our constitutional orientation toward development while still maintaining control over its deviations.
From sec. 17 onward, Benedict articulates three characteristics of human development understood as divine vocation: it must be free (i.e., not founded on structures that “reduce man to subservience, to a mere means for development”); it must be truthful (i.e., based on a recognition of Christ’s transcendence); and it must be centered on love (or “charity” – again, like PEG I hate this translation; i.e., driven by a desire for divine brotherhood between all people). The remarks in sec. 19 that point to “the lack of brotherhood among individuals and peoples” as a cause of underdevelopment have occasioned some controversy, though I can’t for the life of me understand why; obviously the crucial question will be that of what restoring such brotherhood will require.
I found this chapter much easier to read than the introduction, though the fact that it consisted mostly of summary may have helped. Thoughts from you all?
Filed under: Caritas in Veritate, reading groups, religion
I think the Pauline principle of “test everything; keep what’s good” is what Pope Benedict is trying to apply here. Neither economic dnevelopment not technology are automatically good or bad, but must be placed in the service of man’s eternal destiny. In no area is this more important than in the area of life “issues”. In the last few days there has been more discussion of the production of human/animal chimeras and of war robats capable of sustaining themselves on any type of “biomass”, vegetable, animal or human. Yet this high tech creepiness, while it must be opposed across the board, can not be used as an excuse for a neo-Luddite mentality which would leave billions in dire poverty for lack of technological advancement.
I agree with you that passage from sec 11 was quite striking. What impresses me most about this chapter is how Christo-centric and evangelical it is. The vocation of man to integral human development, not only of himself but of others, is based on a recognition of God and the image of God in each other: “Only through an encounter with God are we able to see in the other something more than just another creature, to recognize the divine image in the other, thus truly coming to discover him or her and to mature in a love that ‘becomes concern and care for the other’.” (last sentence in #11) and Paul VI “underlined the indispensible importance of the Gospel for building a society according to freedom and justice, in the ideal and historical perspective of a civilization animated by love.” (#13) Regarding our vocation, “progress, in its origin and essence, is first and foremost a vocation”. (#16) To fulfill one’s vocation requires the awareness of our own inability to “supply its ultimate meaning” – we need God. Moreover, we need Christ, who teaches us what true fraternal charity is. We simply cannot succeed in solving our immense economic and social problems without applying Christian principles of charity in truth.
There’s a takedown of political institutions and utopian ideologies in this Chapter, which feels good, and, as mentioned, there’s a lot of expression of Christ’s authoritative stamp on the call to human development – like “God gives a resounding ‘yes’ to man”, which is a happy line. But there’s still some stuff in there that I’ll bet causes a lot of conservatives, or Republicans, to make broad, or slanted, interpretations of the Pope’s meaning for political reasons, particularly starting in Sec. 17, with the stuff about responsibility. I’m starting to wonder at my own reactions to the responsibility talk.
Here’s a pretty silly example:
From section 18: “[I]f it does not involve the whole man and every man, it is not true development.” As soon as I read that, I started to feel a little defensive and to try to figure out what the Pope REALLY meant. And that’s not a very demanding sentence. Like, he really means that on the supernatural plane, everyone is responsible to help each other develop in faith and worship and love; and on the natural plane, we’re all responsible to … be nice to each other, if we ever meet? If I go to Iran ever I shouldn’t be racist, is that it? He couldn’t really be saying that I, in my development on the natural plane, am actually physically responsible to hungry people in Africa? Because that might involve global institutional cooperation, and that’s bad, right?
I don’t know what the simultaneous development of the whole person and every person looks like, but the slightest chance that it could involve a global political effort – like ‘climate change’ does, for example – immediately sends up red flags for me. I don’t really know why that is anymore. I don’t think I’m crazy, like paranoid. A typical Republican, possibly. Naturally, there’s gonna be some tension between me, with my political beliefs, and things like the Law of the Sea Treaty and the North American Union, etc. But why should there have to be any tension between my political beliefs and God’s vocation for me, as the Church explains it? I’ve gotta choose God and the Church. At any rate, I’d love it if someone could deconstruct the conservative, or Republican, aversion to global, or just larger, spheres of economic cooperation. Especially because I’m sure this encyclical is gonna get a lot thicker on that theme.
Actually I think that’s exactly what he’s saying; where else do you think the importance of e.g. supporting the Church’s missions and other charitable work overseas would derive from?
And I fail to see what’s inherently wrong with “global institutional cooperation” (e.g. Paul Farmer’s work in Haiti and elsewhere has, at least so far as I understand, been quite successful) – obviously what matters is that it be done effectively and in a way that rests as much responsibility as possible in subsidiary institutions.
In any case we’ll be delving much more deeply into that latter topic soon enough, from what I understand.
I have an ignorant, very broad, and perhaps off-topic question. What is the history of the concept of “development” in Catholic thought? Having read few or no encyclicals before, I am struck by the pervasiveness of the term and the concept in this one. My initial instinct was to assume that it is a very twentieth-century (especially early-to-mid-20C) concept in social philosophy/philosophical anthropology. Or perhaps we might say that the habit of seeing the world in general (biology, economics, language, etc.) within a developmental rubric is a post-1800 phenomenon, if there is any merit in Foucault’s portrayal in The Order of Things. In this chapter of the encyclical, “development” seems to refer to “advancement” or “human progress” in a broad sense (sec. 11), which would seem to have a much older pedigree. But it also speaks of an imperative for each person “‘to develop and fulfill himself’” (sec. 16) (which brings to mind such early-to-mid-20C lingo as “fulfillment of personality”). Anyway, whatever the terminology, is the tendency to envision the human person as a being who needs to (be) develop(ed) actually a very long-running aspect of Catholic thought, or is it distinctly modern?
And what about Western philosophical anthropology in general? When ancient, medieval, or early-modern thinkers discussed the human person, was the person’s need for development a prominent issue in their minds? (Actually, could we perhaps say that development of the person is a key aspect of Aristotle’s ethics?)
I’ll have to let someone else speak to the history of the term “development” in Catholic thought, but it certainly rings modern to me. Relating it to Aristotle is pretty reasonable, though, and of course understanding the Church as called to improve individual lives and unjust social conditions is not an especially new phenomenon even if this particular way of framing it is.
I think it would be helpful to contextualize BXVI’s remarks in this chapter by pointing back to Spe Salvi. Spe features a remarkable history on the secular notion of “progress,” which BXVI means to contrast with genuine Christian hope. It is anchored by, of all people, Francis Bacon, the father of modern scientific “objectivity.” BXVI narrates this history for a purpose: not simply to criticize it, but rather to explain how “Christian hope” becomes narrowly focused on an individualized afterlife. Thus, in reading it, one must avoid two errors. One is obvious: a purely material progress, narrated largely in terms of technology, and ultimately the sovereign will of the human individual. The other, though, is crucial: a purely spiritualized Christianity, in which “spiritual progress” is understood as simply interior or vertical. Benedict, in Spe Salvi, is rejected BOTH of these as two sides of the same dualism.
Flash forward to CV: here again, “the perspective of eternal life” should NOT be read as some sort of exhortation to a “spirituality” – that is not “integral.” After all, in Spe Salvi, Benedict rejects the notion of “eternal life” as simply an extended afterlife, but rather describes it as the fullness of life in communion with God and all of humanity. Thus, before John’s selected quote from paragraph 11, BXVI points out the “first” of Paul VI’s concerns, stemming from the Council’s deep probing of the Church in the service of the world, which is that “the whole Church, in all her being and acting – when she proclaims, when she celebrates, when she performs the works of charity – is engaged in promoting integral human development.” (This is all italicized) The “salvation” of “eternal life” (or at least its firstfruits) is already available, the “new humanity” of the “Last Adam” (see #12), in the sign that is the entire life of the Church itself.
OK, how can I put that in (slightly oversimplified) terms: BXVI takes down utopian secular ideologies of the social, because they offer themselves as salvific and autonomous alternatives to the utopian, salvific social reality that already exists: the Church! As Spe Salvi shows, when (think: Reformation) the Church abandons her place as the sacrament of God’s Kingdom, of the healing and direction toward human unity (#8), and instead begins to play the game of vendor of the individual’s otherworldly salvation, what do we get? We get other ideologies that come in and pretend to offer themselves as the social salvation, the unification of all humanity. BXVI, in #7, quite forthrightly reclaims “the universal city of God” as “the goal of the history of the human family.” Within this larger journey, the “earthly city” can be “an anticipation and a prefiguration of the undivided city of God.” BUT… this is only possible if the earthly city does not pretend to be autonomous, but rather understandings its beginnings as a gift from God, and understands all material reality as precisely that. Not raw nature, but original gift.
And how does this get worked out practically? Global international cooperation? Paul Farmer? The severe limitation of fossil fuels (and thus, bringing our energy use back into line with the ecological “grammar” of God’s gift)? The use of technologies that are actually ingenious, rather than merely exercises of brute strength or trvivial diversion? Yes, yes, yes, yes. Yes to all of it, if it truly sees the goal of the “eternal life” of all humankind.
BXVI criticizes the “narrowing” of Christian hope in Spe Salvi. In Caritatis in Veritate, he shows how wide the hope really is.
DDanicic’s comment is very revealing and wonderfully honest. There is a mysterious distinction between the “supernatural plane” – which involves “helping each other develop in faith and worship and love” – and the “natural plane” – which apparently has to do with material solidarity.
Imagine a parent, if you will, who took their child to church and taught them about God… and who didn’t give them any food or shelter. We’d say the parent is neglecting the child. Imagine a parent who gave their child every possible material benefit… and who didn’t pay attention to them or teach them about God. We’d say the parent is neglecting the child. Thus, when BXVI talks about these planes, he is at pains to indicate that the Christian vocation always applies to “both,” and that the natural is understood properly when it is the means towards the supernatural. That is, when the natural is “sacramental.”
Democrats tend to believe that the natural can be provided by neutral institutions, and at the extreme should even exclude any considerations of the supernatural. At best, they tend to get the order wrong – well, let’s just worry about feeding people first, or getting them health care, and then maybe they’ll have a chance to worry about spiritual stuff. BXVI insists we need to feed our brothers and sisters in Africa, if the term “brother and sister” means anything. But in what ways? In sacramental ways. In ways that make clear the priority of grace.
Republicans? Well, to be fair, the Republicans think the market will feed people in Africa, with maybe a little charity work coming up from behind. The best interpretation here is that Republicans are rightly suspicious of the unintended (and in some cases intended) consequences of well-intentioned large bureaucracies. But instead of letting this collapse into a market individualism, supported by a spiritual/material dualism, perhaps Republicans could think about spheres and networks of cooperation that avoided these consequences. That is, sacramental networks of cooperation, that prioritize grace.
“Democratic” individualism (state socialism) and “Republican” individualism (pure market capitalism) are still both individualism. Solidarity means creating and sustaining networks that are not individualistic, but familial, that make us one in Christ’s body.
Good question re: clarifying DEVELOPMENT. If I may take a stab (I’m an autodidact here not a scholar, so caveat emptor)
i-m-h-o, DEVELOPMENT as a term categorizes a personal tendency, distinct from an historical trend such as “progress” used by empiricists/logical posivists, aka in contemporary slang “attaining one’s full potential” but where “one” is a not merely a member of a species or a kind of creature like animals that have a limited biological development, but “one” as unique and immortal, fashioned with the potential to mirror perfectly the imago dei.
DEVELOPMENT first attested 1756. from 1656, “unroll, unfold,” from Fr. developper, replacing Eng. disvelop (1592, from M.Fr. desveloper), both from O.Fr. desveloper, from des- “undo” + veloper “wrap up,” (one can consider it as distint perhaps from a gnostic dualist “envelope” of the corrupt material body wrapping the perfectable mind) in the sense of Aristotolean “becoming” an authentic ( auctor : author, originator; auctoritas : authority; auctus : growth, enlargement, increase) essence.
Playing with words, the playing out of the generative force of life, the ‘anima’ting powers, the soul’ifying (electrifying) of a human being “connected to the grid” of sacramental Grace, Christ’s Love. The German original from (5) in the intro uses “verknupft” to describe the knotting or intertwining meant by the English term “weave” (which fails to capture the unique connecting taking place of certain individuals at certain times and in certain places in a “network of charity”. Weaving leaves one with the impression of general vertical or horizontal continuities of interchangeable actors, which is not the case, since an actor open to supernatural grace can bind/knot/secure a witness to Divine Providence that “random” human development is incapable of (not lacking in the spiritual faculty, merely unaware of one’s capacity for exercising it). China thinks it “weaves” by controlling the Church’s episcopal warp in its political weft. A truely free Catholic Church in China would be “verknupft” at all levels of society in connections hertofore unimagined by the secular powers (gratuitous love of neighbor in need, one thinks of the hoards of ageing-in-place childless villagers who have to rely on ‘charity’ of their one-child neighbors for material assistance). China can prevail as a “patrimony” only if it embraces integral development, if it adheres to its man-made mantra it will atrophy from within, with unnecessary suffering and perhaps violently.
And DDanicic that is why it should be of concern to us both politically (you expressed reservations about a putative “brother’s keeper” role in a global sense) and evangelically, we have to support the Church’s witness to our Chinese Catholics brothers and sisters, and encourage our American brothers and sisters to recognize the folly of promoting “reproductive rights” which in fact lead to “deproductive” sujugation, the antithesis of the liberty we have have arrived at by our own painful process of conversion from the sins committed against our indigenous and enslaved peoples. We are called to a new conversion – away from mercantile juridical corporate personhood, and embracing de natura human personhood developing in utero with expiry date chosen by our Creator. But David C. acting persons in “sacramental networks of cooperation, that prioritize grace” will first have to be in the civic realm, not the partisan political one. Republicans have no obligation to secure a Catholic republic, they have a commitment to secure a peaceful Republic of predominately Catholic populated States perhaps (MA, NY, NJ, PA, IL, OH, MO, LO, FL, CA) competing with states of populations with predominately heterodox traditions. This is where the logic of truth calls us to witness to our culture . . . what is heterodox about the way we conduct business as we understand it? What is orthodox (is what teaches truely). Mass examination of conscience was called for 40 yrs ago, and remains the same prophetic call today, this is what is unchanging in the apostolic transmission of Salvation – make straight the way of the Lord!
Thus for a Christian concerned with DEVELOPMENT, the end is already a given, an a priori in the Catholic metaphysic, temporal activities are the means to a certain end (not to be confused with some pie-in-the-sky end ex post facto we pursue by steps on an aggregate mass-improvement escalator to perfection) Each individual has a complete perfection within themselves, to be lived out in a temporal span limited in historical terms but infinite in transcendent terms, possible here and now.
Thanks, this has been a really great post. I’d definitely like to think more (or, in this case, be taught more) about networks of cooperation that prioritize grace, stand as witness to Christ, and accomplish natural objectives across physical boundaries, too – and I’m hoping, as John suggests, that we get into more of that in the chapters to come. Guess we’ll see – it’s a long letter!
Back to the concept of “development” I can’t speak with any authority on the long term history of it, but I know that in the 20th century several people emphasized a personalistic philosophy based on I/thou relationships and one of those philosophers was Karol Wojtyla, who influenced the Pastoral Constitution of the Church in the Modern World (Gaudium et spes) at Vatican II. (Multiple references in Caritas in Veritate to Gaudium et spes)
I think of development of the whole person to mean this – we exercise to develop our muscles, we read and study to develop our intellect, we fast to develop discipline, we pray to develop our spirituality – our relationship with God. When we make difficult self-less choices to give of ourselves for the other, we develop the Image of God within us, and become more like Jesus Christ, the perfect man. We are created with the potential to become the person God wants us to be. When we work to develop ourselves we turn the potential into reality and raise ourselves closer to that person. However when we are struggling just to survive on a day to day basis, this development is difficult if not impossible. We are called to help each other in areas where the other is weak, to further the development of each.
Clare and Linda, thanks for the responses on development. Your thoughts help me to hear some connotations in “development” that I was otherwise tending to miss when reading this.