CST Foundational Documents-Encyclicals (Walters)

Rerum Novarum:

• Theme is protecting the rights of the vulnerable, weak, poor, and workers

• Published during the Industrial Revolution

• Revolutionary idea about maintaining workers rights, right to unionize

• Protecting and Valuing Workers as part of their Human dignity as a part of the church’s commitment to social justice

• By ensuring private property rights, the church was combating socialism/communism while still maintaining that workers rights are important

Pacem in Terris:

• Everyone has the right to life

• Common good is guaranteed when personal rights/duties are maintained

• Every human has dignity and should not be treated as objects

• Main theme is peace on earth through mutual trust

• context: Vietnam war, red scare, civil right movement

Centesimus Annus:

• Society has a responsibility to make up what if lost via market system

• Possessions are to be shared but private property must still exist

• The poor are the priority

• Consumerism was a critical concern, capitalism led to greed and socialism led to failure

• Standing up for workers rights in the context of a recession and economic failure

• Social context: Cold War, nuclear war, socialism in the USSR

Evangelium Vitae:

• Addressed the “culture of death”

• We are responsible to care for and love our neighbors

• Abortion, wars, genocide, euthanasia, willful self destruction, and disease

• Protecting life and promoting love

Caritas en Veritae

• Context: Great Recession of 2008/2009, increasing access to and creation of technology

• The church is concerned with advancement of technology for profit 

• The church is not interested in direct interference or technical solutions but wishes to proclaim justice

• Promotes the idea of people-centered ethics in the economy

• Profit cannot be the sole aim of economies

• Workers need protection and rights

Laudato Si

• About the churches connection to nature, we are stewards of the planet and it is out duty to protect the earth

• Reducing participation of materialistic forms of consumer culture

• Society needs to reduce climate change to help the environment and help people to live their best lives

• Poorer countries bear the most problems from climate change, so it is our duty to protect the poor by reducing emissions and protecting the environment