Posted on 09/03/2012 7:41:32 AM PDT by Alex Murphy
Port Arthur, Texas, Sep 3, 2012 / 06:32 am (CNA/EWTN News).- A Catholic priest involved in labor advocacy says that Labor Day is a time to reflect on Catholic teaching about the role of work in society and in God’s plan for mankind.
“Labor Day is just really an opportunity to focus not on the secular world, but on what our Church teaches,” Father Sinclair Oubre, spiritual moderator of the Catholic Labor Network, told CNA Aug. 30.
Fr. Oubre is pastor of St. John the Evangelist Parish in Port Arthur, Texas, in addition to his duties with the Catholic Labor Network. He said his network aims to “re-establish the wonderful tradition” of Catholic social teaching on labor, the dignity of workers, and their right to organize a union.
“The roots of Labor Day are Catholic,” he said. While the origins of the annual September holiday are disputed, the priest credits 19th-century Catholic labor activist Peter J. McGuire with founding the holiday.
Fr. Oubre said Catholic teaching has a positive view of work. Catholics should remember that they are “co-creators in God’s ongoing creation” and are called to “build up the kingdom of God” in their daily labor.
This means that those who are in positions of responsibility, like management or ownership, have “a moral responsibility to work for justice.” They should “recognize that their workers and employees are not simply another means in the production process.”
Workers, for their part, should “reflect deeply” upon their own responsibilities.
“Whether it’s working for an insurance company processing claims or working at a General Motors plant up in Michigan, they are participating in a common effort,” Fr. Oubre said.
“They owe both God and their employer a full day’s work for a full day’s wages. They are really called to work as best they can because they are participating, while they work, in God’s ongoing creation.”
He encouraged those without work to “remain hopeful” and to look to their religious or parish community as “a source of support.”
In his small, predominantly black Texas parish, the priest reported, the most pressing concern is not unemployment but underemployment.
“Either people are being forced to work part-time to avoid losing benefits that go to take care of health care and retirement, or they are having to work multiple jobs because the wages they are receiving are so low that they and their family cannot live on it,” he said.
He said Catholics should search their souls and “not get caught up in the rhetoric of the secular world saying that the market will take care of it.” The sole reliance on the market has been rejected by papal teaching, he noted.
Fr. Oubre also finds some common views of the unemployed are “troubling.” People sometimes assume that those who can’t care for themselves are “obviously just lazy.”
“I think it’s scary in the rhetoric I hear around me, as we focus so much on Ayn Rand and ‘Atlas Shrugged,’” he said, referring to the 20th century novelist who advocated radical individualism and capitalism.
The priest is wary of the mentality that says, “I’ll take care of myself and pull myself up by my own bootstraps.” He stressed that people are “social creatures” and need to care for those who are born with health problems or who suffer crippling accidents.
“I’m speaking of family members whose children are born with spina bifida and have to try to raise their child and meet their health care needs. I’m thinking of the worker who’s driving to work and suddenly is caught up in an auto accident that’s not his fault and is paralyzed from the waist down,” he said.
“We talk about ‘I just take care of myself.’ There’s somethings that happen where people can’t take care of themselves.”
In order to know how to live in the modern economy, Fr. Oubre encouraged the study of Catholic social thought.
He said Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 encyclical “Rerum Novarum” rejected both socialism and “the brutal, brutal capitalism that was crushing and killing people” in the transition from agricultural to industrial society. The encyclical stressed that workers “could not justly enter into a contract that paid them a wage that did not give them at least a wage that they and their family could live upon.”
“He clearly condemned unregulated free marketism as well as socialism as being an insult to human dignity,” Fr. Oubre said.
Catholic social teaching on the place of labor has continued through various popes to Pope Benedict XVI’s 2009 encyclical “Caritas in Veritate.”
Fr. Oubre also recommended that Catholics read the U.S. bishops’ Labor Day statement.
He noted that Labor Day has traditionally marked an increase in political activity.
“It is absolutely imperative that Catholics be authentic to their Catholic social teaching, and not be ‘cafeteria Catholics’ of the left or the right. The real challenge is to conform ourselves to what our Church calls us to.”
“That means being pro-life, that means standing up for the dignity of marriage,” he said. “That also means fighting for the rights of our immigrant community and acknowledging the rights of workers to organize unions and participate in collective bargaining.”
“We have to try to live every aspect of Catholic social teaching,” he said.
“I think you’re conflating social justice with socialism.”
Please have another look at my longer note. Social justice *is* socialism. It cannot be otherwise.
Simply put, it's because not everyone subscribes to the same type of "conservatism" as Free Republic does. I'm glad for the support that we do get in these areas:
I don’t think you’re distinguishing between cafeteria Catholics—empty-eyed, loopy-smiled libtards—and what one might call Free Republic Catholics, who have no problem with any of the things you listed.
I have considered your question since I read it earlier. America has reached a tipping point of almost no return under this twisted curse called 'social justice'. Even our founding fathers specifically stated that government could not establish any religion. This writing basically flips that international sign to what it was the made America the superpower of superpowers.
Personally I resent that a 'church' can require me to fund their socialism.
Who administers the social justice among your Jehovah’s Witnesses?
And, as Ryan has confirmed: Government is one word for things we do together. But it is not the only word. We are a nation that prides itself on looking out for one another– and government has an important role to play in that. But relying on distant government bureaucracies to lead this effort just hasn’t worked.
It could have a better translation into English, but it is as you said, a call to charity, mercy, and love.
As stated —> Calvin’s famous soberness has its roots in his effort for social justice!
Calvin considered it unthinkable that a rich man would keep on enriching himself while witnessing poverty around him. In his view, the rich man had, according to the Bible, the duty to help the poor and certainly the refugees in his vicinity. It is for this reason that Calvin in his sermons sometimes ranted relentlessly against frivolity and decadence because the money spent on such things would be better spent on the poor. So Calvin’s famous soberness has its roots in his effort for social justice! from the dutch christians portal
You left out environmental justice, economic justice and all those other justices that turn out to be just another injustice.
Whatever they may be, that's a separate issue. Or are you against legal justice as well?
Social justice is clearly NOT socialism and is against big government -- a society does not necessarily have to be defined as "government doing everything" - in fast that does not work, as the Vatican has stated -- better for "society" as in individuals to remember their Christian duties, believing in Christ as the Son of God and work as a society, not relying on govt to do everything.
In the legal system no degree of innocence can prevent the accused person from being financially ruined even if they receive “legal justice”.
“Social justice is clearly NOT socialism and is against big government”
It never starts out as socialism and overweening government but it must end that way as the advocates for “social justice” turn to the state to be the enforcer of their vision of justice.
Thus “social justice” sounds especially good to the ‘labor advocate’ who asks for nothing more than the right of workers to organize and ends up closing the workers place of employment.
And what about the guy that didn't want to be “organized”? Well, he's out of a job too and wonders how that's justice.
You want to go on to “social justice” for illegal aliens?
So, you are against justice for murder victims or rape victims? Really?
Not really, to say it must is incorrect.
You want to go on to “social justice” for illegal aliens? -- nope, but I want to get justice for those who were killed by the Islamists. Are you against justice for that?
Oh, but I wasn't speaking of the cafeteria-dwellers. You might be surprised what some of the hard-core Free Republic Catholics believe, politically. You might be even more surprised what their bishops - the ones hard-core Free Republic Catholics say are the most conservative - believe, politically.
Calvin considered it unthinkable that a rich man would keep on enriching himself while witnessing poverty around him. In his view, the rich man had, according to the Bible, the duty to help the poor and certainly the refugees in his vicinity. It is for this reason that Calvin in his sermons sometimes ranted relentlessly against frivolity and decadence because the money spent on such things would be better spent on the poor. So Calvin’s famous soberness has its roots in his effort for social justice
“Must” because Catholic social doctrine cannot be satisfied with Catholics alone practicing the ideologies of social and economic justice but this Owellian notion absolutely requires the power of the State to enforce it.
As John Paul II said:
“...society and the State must ensure wage levels adequate for the maintenance of the worker and his family, including a certain amount for savings. This requires a continuous effort to improve workers’ training and capability so that their work will be more skilled and productive, as well as careful controls and adequate legislative measures to block shameful forms of exploitation, especially to the disadvantage of the most vulnerable workers, of immigrants and of those on the margins of society. The role of trade unions in negotiating minimum salaries and working conditions is decisive in this area (Centesimus Annus, no. 15).”
Islamists? What?
“You want to go on to “social justice” for illegal aliens? — nope, but I want to get justice for those who were killed by the Islamists. Are you against justice for that?”
Have you quit beating your wife? Of course, any practical examination of the fraud called “social justice” is off limits and to be ignored with silly questions like that above or something about rape victims.
Any examination of the socialist political platform called “social justice” reveals it to be just the old State coercion behind a certain mask of religiosity.
“You might be surprised what some of the hard-core Free Republic Catholics believe, politically.”
I don’t think so.
There is a common practice here of telling Catholics what they believe instead of listening to Catholics telling what they believe.
Arguments to the effect that:
“Social justice” is about “relationships,” not “socialism.”.....This is in contrast to socialism, he explained, which is an ideology in which private property and private interests are totally placed in the service of government policies...”
...are entirely without merit.
The phrase “social justice” was a commie buzzword before the Church started using it. It was engrafted onto Catholic thought specifically to create confusion. Here’s how it goes, step by step:
1. Tell people that Catholic social justice is different from commie social justice.
2. One by one, gradually incorporate elements from commie social justice into so-called Catholic social justice.
3. Argue that since Catholic social justice is in agreement with these elements of communism, communism is Catholic.
4. Die and burn in Hell.
It is a fact—a stone cold fact—that the moment the concept of “justice” is introduced, “private property and private interests are totally placed in the service of government policies.” Always have been, always will be.
The Church must jettison this Satanic trojan horse and return to terminology and theology that predates communism.
It all depends on what we mean by "Catholic". Do we mean a group of politically conservative laypeople who happen to attend church together? A united group of bishops? Catholic tradition? The Magisterium? Who here purports to speak for the moniker "Catholic"?
All I can offer is quotes from their bishops on the subject of universal healthcare, illegal immigrant amnesty, expansion of federal and union powers, entitlement programs, etc., since "where the bishop is, there is the Catholic Church" or something like that. It's up to FR's Roman Catholics to speak for themselves, as to whether they believe likewise. The sad part is, most of them (at least those active in the Religion Forum) publicly offer up those same bishops as political conservatives.
I'll give credit where credit is due. Will the Catholics give debit where debit is due?
“Social justice” is about “relationships,” not “socialism.”.....This is in contrast to socialism, he explained, which is an ideology in which private property and private interests are totally placed in the service of government policies...”...are entirely without merit.
The phrase “social justice” was a commie buzzword before the Church started using it. It was engrafted onto Catholic thought specifically to create confusion. Here’s how it goes, step by step:
1. Tell people that Catholic social justice is different from commie social justice.
2. One by one, gradually incorporate elements from commie social justice into so-called Catholic social justice.
3. Argue that since Catholic social justice is in agreement with these elements of communism, communism is Catholic.
4. Die and burn in Hell.
It is a fact—a stone cold fact—that the moment the concept of “justice” is introduced, “private property and private interests are totally placed in the service of government policies.” Always have been, always will be.
The Church must jettison this Satanic trojan horse and return to terminology and theology that predates communism.
FWIW, your entire post was seriously awesome, especially that paragraph about "justice". I wouldn't argue with a single word of it.
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