Dr. Robert Moynihan, in his latest Inside the Vatican Newsflash, has more details on Pope Benedict's forthcoming encyclical:
The Pope's new encyclical is only a few days away now. I have been
continuing to read the Church's social teaching from the past century,
and the writings of those who have contributed advice to this
encyclical. I will be able to write a more complete report soon.
But what is clear is that the encyclical will speak in categories
that go beyond the usual economic discussion. The letter will not focus
just on earnings and profits and lossses, but on the meaning of work,
on the goal of producing goods, on the ends of human life. There will
be a discussion of anthropology -- what is a man? What is a human
person? And how does the nature of man affect our understanding of his
economic activity, its justice and injustice, its usefulness and its
wastefulness?
One of the key concepts which will be discussed is that the goal
of society is to create relationships worthy of human beings, of human
persons created in the image of God, and that this includes something
more even than the concept of justice. There is more than justice in
the concept of the free gift, and yet the free gift, inside a family,
or between two friends, or even between strangers, is an economic
transaction which transcends the calculation of most economics
textbooks.
The idea of the economy for man, and not man for the economy, will
be among the ideas in this upcoming encyclical, as will the idea of the
gift which creates the common good, which creates a society where
people are treated as persons with transcendent dignity, and not as
consumers, or clients, to be satiated.
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