Naïveté cannot begin to describe what I have gleaned from the new, and quite inconsequential “note,” issued by the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace (PCJP), Towards Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of Global Authority.
Let me begin with an obvious point: The heads of the PCJP are not economists. The president, Cardinal Peter Turkson, is a theologian. And while it is not likely that Cardinal Turkson, a Gahanna Archbishop, personally wrote this note, it would be worth suggesting that the PCJP hire more economists before making suggestions about reforming the world financial system. (Might I suggest, from the Mises Institute and the Acton Institute, both of which are replete with Catholic economists.).
Because, it appears that every so often Christians are given the odd assignment of accepting Communism as the true Christian economic worldview. No segment of Christianity has escaped this debate: Catholics, Protestants and Eastern rites are awash in bigmouths who think a little socialism will trigger the Second Coming. After all, Jesus was a socialist, right? God help us…
What disturbs my silence here is that the PCJP’s bizarre suggestions for a central world bank appear to carry an air of Catholic authority. Well, appearances aren’t everything.
NOTES, ENCYCLICALS, AND INFALLIBILITY
a. What is the Catholic Church?
The Catholic Church claims to be the Christian church (not a church, or a sect) established by Christ Himself. “Simon Peter answered and said: Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus answering, said to him: Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona: Because flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven. And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: And whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven.” [Mt. 16: 16-19]
St. Peter and St. Paul mainly preached the Gospel from Rome, the cultural and municipal heart of the empire, where they were eventually martyred. The other apostles preached from their respective corridors of the empire, setting up other important Episcopal Sees. St. Andrew the Apostle, for instance, established the See of Byzantium (later called the Patriarchate of Constantinople), where he placed Stachys as first Bishop.
St. Peter was well understood to be the chief of the twelve apostles. Christ gave him the name Peter, meaning, “rock.” His name was listed first in every canonical list of apostles. He confessed his faith in Christ as the Son of God repeatedly throughout the Gospels; and Peter appears at the center of all the most teachable incidents in the life of Christ, including the Transfiguration. Within in his own life, and more so in the immediately succeeding generations and Church histories, the primacy of Peter is manifest. Eusebius, St. Augustine, St. Jerome, Origen, St. John Chrysostom, Tertullian, and every one of the Church Fathers (the generation following the Apostolic generation) attests to the universality (or Catholicism) of the one true Church and the primacy of the Episcopal See of Rome.
Since Peter, 264 men have held the Roman bishopric. According to St. Iraeneous of Lyons, St. Peter personally installed St. Linus as his successor. Linus is the second and last Bishop of Rome to be mentioned in what later became the Canon, or Bible. The consensus of every credible historian, bishop, clergyman, martyr, saint, or observer of Christians from the Crucifixion and well into the Middle Ages and beyond is clear: The Church was Catholic, and the bishops looked to the Roman See as the head Bishopric.
In 325 A.D., all the bishops of the Catholic Church convened in Nicaea at the urging of the Emperor Constantine, for the crucial task of laying out a bulwark against current heresies. The most daunting of which was the Arian Heresy, then gaining momentum as an alternative body of quasi-Christian teachings within the empire. Nicaea cut the legs from under the Arian Heresy, declared the divinity of Christ as dogmatic, and issued the Nicene Creed. The Nicene Creed then represented (and still represents) the complete definition of the Universal Church, containing four elements: It is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.
b. Encyclicals
Encyclicals are circular letters issued by the pope to the bishops or clergy of a certain region, or, sometimes, to the whole Universal Church. They are not necessarily binding, authoritative documents. Rather, these letters are intended to point out grave errors and provide spiritual advice and commentary on current issues affecting societies and the Church. Pope Pius IX, the second-longest serving pope (St. Peter being the longest), can be attributed with the modern revival of the encyclical, condemning the evils of materialism, socialism and modernism, in his blistering encyclical of 1864, commonly called the Syllabus of Errors.
His successor, Leo XIII issued the watershed encyclical of 1891, Rerum Novarum. Again blasting the bleak and ungodly philosophy of socialism, Leo XIII commented on the spiritual relationship between labor and capital. From Rerum Novarum was born a “third-way” school of politics (not socialist, and not capitalist), calling itself “Distributist.” The Distributists desire widespread capital ownership. To paraphrase G.K. Chesterton, the problem with capitalism is not too many capitalists, but too few.
c. Catholic Economics?
Catholic apologists like Chesterton and Hillarie Belloc were neither “liberal” nor “conservative,” for whatever worth those terms were in their 19th century context; but they saw economic life in light of Christian Salvation, and desired a just society, above all else: Socialism and the abuse of labor being, dually, anathema to this goal.
Although not an economist himself, Belloc even had some influence on Austrian economists like Frederic Hayek, who praised The Servile State and even quoted Belloc at the opening of his most famous tract, The Road to Serfdom. Considerable areas of debate remain among Distributists, Austrian School economists, and Chicago School economists. What sets the first of these groups apart, is that is not a complete economic theory at all. Rather, it is a collection of normative principles derived from Catholic Social and economic teachings.
The Church by its nature is a metaphysical institution, not of this world. It is no truer to say that the Church has a specified economic view as it is to say the Church has chosen the ideal government or the perfect political party. True, Catholic theology has an immense amount to say on issues concerning politics, government and economics. One can often discern a moral versus an immoral course of action in these fields, based on Catholic teaching. The Church steers clear of highly specific pronouncements concerning policy or the adoption of specific theories (although, Pius IX’s and Leo XIII’s rebukes of socialism can be smoothly defended in light of Catholic theology).
Now an Austrian economist might personally agree with Distributists on several critical moral goals. The Austrian, just happens to have a better idea of how to achieve these goals through the Market system. A Distributist is not anti-Market, but is anti Market abuse. Who isn’t?
d. Infallibility
But it must be noted that encyclicals do not carry absolute indefectibility, or as it is popularly known, “Papal Infallibility.” Teachings on the Blessed Virgin Mary aside, Papal Infallibility is likely the most misunderstood and misrepresented of Catholic doctrines. Let me provide an analogy:
If one asked me, “Under the Constitution, is the President your Commander in Chief,” my response would be, “Of course not!” And yet, it is right there in Article II that he is. Is it, though? Indeed, “The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States.”
In fact, Barack Obama is not my Commander in Chief, at all. As a free citizen of the United Stated, I do not have a commander.
Fact: The President of the United States is not the Commander in Chief of the United States or its citizens.
Is the pope infallible? Not exactly. A pope, indeed, any bishop, is capable of holding private and personal opinions, any number of which are false.
Infallibility has a narrow application. It can be exercised in Ecumenical Councils like Nicaea (which may only be called by the Pope). And, it can be exercised by a sitting Pope acting ex cathedra (literally, “from the Chair” of Peter. “Cathedra,” also relates closely to the word “rock.”), in his authoritative capacity as head of the Universal Church (“And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven”), and with intent to do so; and he must exercise this charism with the purpose of placing some specific doctrine or dogma beyond theological dispute.
In 2,000 years, there have been 21 Ecumenical Councils, the last being the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). Eighteen of these Ecumenical Councils occurred prior to the Protestant Revolution. Papal Infallibility has been exercised twice, first by Pius IX in 1854 and again by Pius XII in 1950; both times, the dogmas represented the culmination of a dozen and a half centuries of debates, traditions, and documented miracles.
e. Encyclicals and the Development of Catholic Social Teaching
Thus, neither Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum, nor Paul VI’s 1967 encyclical Populorum Progressio, nor Benedict XVI’s 2009 encyclical Caritas in Veritate are completely beyond debate and comment. Now, needless to say, as a Catholic (indeed, as a Christian, in general) I recognize that these documents are replete with eternal and incontrovertible truths. The animating principle of these three documents is to recall our duty to seek justice, spread the Gospel and place the Trinity at the heart of all our social and economic institutions. But it would be dishonest to say there are not points of debate in these letters, despite their authors being three great and inspiring theologians.
While the virtuous and manifestly Catholic goals of these encyclicals are praiseworthy, specific suggestions and references to ‘living wages’ and greater regulation of the market are often question begging. Should it happen that, tomorrow, the entire world experience a mass conversion to Catholicism, and ‘come home to Rome,’ as all men and women chain hands in peace in harmony under the glory of Christ, abandoning their jealousies and personal motives, perhaps I will cede that global governmental structures can help foster a world of peace and humanity.
I love the Holy Father, but I cannot take Caritas’ urgent call for a “true world political authority,” seriously, unless there are men of pure and motive-free hearts available to run it. And while I would love for development aid to poorer countries to be a feasible means of lifting up undeveloped nations, this aid has done the exact opposite. Moreover, such suggestions beg the question: From where do ‘governments’ derive this aid? Charity indeed, but is it a secular government’s role to give to the poor, after taking it from the citizens? Perhaps it is, to some extent. But what if this government aid includes providing abortions and condoms? Perhaps the Holy Father should call for private aid and an increase in Non Governmental Organizations. Because frankly I do not trust my own secular government’s ability to distribute foreign aid with the ‘common good’ in mind.
Still, these encyclicals are not complete failures, and must give us pause and reflect on the metaphysical status of the Church Militant: More than economic agents, we are creatures of divine worth. Yet, beyond the important contributions to Catholic Social teaching these encyclicals have had, are the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which expressly promotes the doctrine of Subsidiarity, and, indeed, the Seventh Commandment (Thou Shalt Not Steal).
The principle of Subsidiarity suggests that it is decentralization in governmental power that helps foster a more humane Christian Society. Indeed, the history of Catholic Europe suggests this as well. The current international monetary system, as well as various national banking regimes, are not just “sort of like” theft.
So while it is helpful to speak of reform, as Benedict has in Caritas, in fact, a trained lay-economist understanding Catholic Social teaching might submit reforms never mentioned by the Holy Father, such as a return to the Gold Standard. Indeed, the Holy Father is not an economist. And as economist Thomas Woods recalled in his book, The Church and the Market, Pope Leo XIII once declared, “If I were to pronounce on any single matter of a prevailing economic problem, I should be interfering with the freedom of men to work out their own affairs. Certain cases must be solved in the domain of facts, case by case as they occur.”
A ONE WORLD BANK?
But this ridiculous note issued by the PCJP, a minor office within the Roman Curia, went much further than Caritas in Veritate. Its suggestions are not only not worthy of credible debate, they do not even approach a clear understanding of the drama that ensconces the market, world politics, human nature, and Catholic theology. The idea that because the International Monetary Fund has failed to work properly, and must therefore be replaced with a new “independent” committee rising out of the United Nations, begs the question: How do we expect the new bank to be an improvement upon the last? Not to be cheeky, but shall the PCJP be nominating angels for the new post?
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07790a.htm
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/281140/pope-chaplain-ows-rubbish-george-weigel
http://takimag.com/article/truth_charity/#axzz1bi7Xsdvx
http://www.crisismagazine.com/2011/right-diagnosis-deadly-cure
http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otn.cfm?id=856