Cooky
Veteran Member
True. Baby-daddy is not a term my culture uses.
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Pope Francis calls tax cuts for the wealthy a 'structure of sin'
- Thread starter Vouthon
- Start date
True. Baby-daddy is not a term my culture uses.
Cooky
Veteran Member
Science says birth control does not cause weight gain (obesity). Yet, most women using it report weight gain.
It's just a myth everyone... Just a myth, that's true.
Cooky
Veteran Member
Well he has the ability to make changes in the organization he heads, doesn't he? Yet he doesn't..?
Wow, what idiotic posts.Science says birth control does not cause weight gain (obesity). Yet, most women using it report weight gain.
It's just a myth everyone... Just a myth, that's true.
This is quite astounding.
If I may ask, in what way Atanu?
There may be two possibilities. First, the Pope may actually be encouraging evangelical activities. Second, the Pope may actually be conveying the true spirit of egalitarianism that is the teaching of the religions. I assume that the latter is more likely.
Recently in India, the government despite the huge budgetary gap gave a tax cut sop to the tune of USD 35 Billion to the wealthy. This was purportedly done to boost development, which has slowed considerably since 2014 when the current government came to power. This decision was taken at a time when in countryside farmer suicides continue unabated. The narrative of the government and the people on the right, who inexplicably claim to be the upholder of religion (Hinduism), is that the tax cuts for the wealthy will stimulate development while helping the poor and the farmers mean pouring money down the drain. This narrative is now so prevalent that people in the centre concur without hesitation and people in the centre-left and left have no voice because the middle class and the poor are divided based on a false narrative of religion propagated assiduously for a long time now.
In this light, I find the stand of the Pope to be very significant. People should now begin to understand that it is not religion that favours inequity. It is not religion that favours animosity and hatred. It is the rulers who control the poor employing religious emotive issues while passing on the sops to the rich who do not require those sops that distort the message of the religions. This, in my opinion, is termed as a 'structure of sin' correctly because greed underlies such far-right philosophy.
The irony is that the majority of common people, blinded with hatred for the other, do not see through this greedy structure. The majority of the common people in India have been made to believe that egalitarianism is evil.
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@atanu An excellent and incisive post.
I think it is a testament to the kind of economically liberal/market fundamentalist/far-right politics the Pope is condemning in his speech: policies which entrench inegalitarianism as an inevitability on the path towards economic development, as typified by laws affording tax cuts for the rich (whereas this superfluity should rather be taxed to fund social care for the poor and their necessities of living), which are supposed to stimulate GDP growth, with the benefits thereof 'trickling-down' to the rest of society - or so the narrative goes.
In practice this, of course, has the contrary effect of actually "impeding the possibility of the dignified and sustained development", to reference the Holy Father again.
As a Westerner, my immediate thoughts turn to the Republican party in the United States, which has long been doing something similar - only vis-a-vis Christianity - to what your above post highlights concerning Modi and the Hindutva in India (especially under the presidency of Donald Trump). Given his longstanding, acrimonious personal relations with this wing of radical Christian Right political theology in America, I believe the Holy Father probably had this example foremost in his mind along with Bolsonaro's government in Brazil (the Pope is Latin American, so he is particularly knowledgeable about affairs in the Americas).
But it applies equally to Erdogan in Turkey, Putin in Russia, Modi in India and many other nationalist-populist leaders who are wont to utilise religion as a weapon of cultural validation for their reactionary fiscal policies, so as to appeal to the religious impulses of their base. Unfortunately, the base in question tends to include many working class people whose interests are most directly harmed by these ideologies - as you correctly note - this being the case for pluralities of lower-middle class Evangelical Christians in the US, impoverished Catholics living in favelas in Brazil, working class rural Anatolian Muslims in Turkey and their Eastern Orthodox social equivalent in Russia.
Brexit and Thacherite Toryism in Great Britain are a secular analogue to these other movements but very much part of the same transnational trend.
I think it is a testament to the kind of economically liberal/market fundamentalist/far-right politics the Pope is condemning in his speech: policies which entrench inegalitarianism as an inevitability on the path towards economic development, as typified by laws affording tax cuts for the rich (whereas this superfluity should rather be taxed to fund social care for the poor and their necessities of living), which are supposed to stimulate GDP growth, with the benefits thereof 'trickling-down' to the rest of society - or so the narrative goes.
In practice this, of course, has the contrary effect of actually "impeding the possibility of the dignified and sustained development", to reference the Holy Father again.
As a Westerner, my immediate thoughts turn to the Republican party in the United States, which has long been doing something similar - only vis-a-vis Christianity - to what your above post highlights concerning Modi and the Hindutva in India (especially under the presidency of Donald Trump). Given his longstanding, acrimonious personal relations with this wing of radical Christian Right political theology in America, I believe the Holy Father probably had this example foremost in his mind along with Bolsonaro's government in Brazil (the Pope is Latin American, so he is particularly knowledgeable about affairs in the Americas).
But it applies equally to Erdogan in Turkey, Putin in Russia, Modi in India and many other nationalist-populist leaders who are wont to utilise religion as a weapon of cultural validation for their reactionary fiscal policies, so as to appeal to the religious impulses of their base. Unfortunately, the base in question tends to include many working class people whose interests are most directly harmed by these ideologies - as you correctly note - this being the case for pluralities of lower-middle class Evangelical Christians in the US, impoverished Catholics living in favelas in Brazil, working class rural Anatolian Muslims in Turkey and their Eastern Orthodox social equivalent in Russia.
Brexit and Thacherite Toryism in Great Britain are a secular analogue to these other movements but very much part of the same transnational trend.
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I could never imagine that the Pope could be such a radical since we have been brainwashed to think that it is radical to speak of welfare-ism, to favour socialism rather than laissez-faire capitalism. We fear to speak plainly. The plain words of the Pope are: ........These are almost official data: the 50 richest people in the world have an equity equivalent to 2.2 billion dollars. Those fifty people alone could finance the medical care and education of every poor child in the world, whether through taxes, philanthropic initiatives or both. ..... Sin structures today include repeated tax cuts for the richest people, often justified in the name of investment and development; tax havens for private and corporate profits; and, of course, the possibility of corruption by some of the largest companies in the world, not a few times in tune with some ruling political sector.
@atanu You may be interested to read some of his previous magisterial teachings on the economy, such as his 2013 apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium:
Evangelii Gaudium : Apostolic Exhortation on the Proclamation of the Gospel in Today's World (24 November 2013) | Francis
A few excerpts from it:
Laudato si' (24 May 2015) | Francis
Evangelii Gaudium : Apostolic Exhortation on the Proclamation of the Gospel in Today's World (24 November 2013) | Francis
A few excerpts from it:
"Some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralised workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting…
“202. The need to resolve the structural causes of poverty cannot be delayed, not only for the pragmatic reason of its urgency for the good order of society, but because society needs to be cured of a sickness which is weakening and frustrating it, and which can only lead to new crises...
As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation and by attacking the structural causes of inequality,[173] no solution will be found for the world’s problems or, for that matter, to any problems. Inequality is the root of social ills.
“204. We can no longer trust in the unseen forces and the invisible hand of the market. Growth in justice requires more than economic growth, while presupposing such growth: it requires decisions, programmes, mechanisms and processes specifically geared to a better distribution of income, the creation of sources of employment and an integral promotion of the poor... I am far from proposing an irresponsible populism, but the economy can no longer turn to remedies that are a new poison, such as attempting to increase profits by reducing the work force and thereby adding to the ranks of the excluded.
208. If anyone feels offended by my words, I would respond that I speak them with affection and with the best of intentions, quite apart from any personal interest or political ideology. My words are not those of a foe or an opponent. I am interested only in helping those who are in thrall to an individualistic, indifferent and self-centered mentality to be freed from those unworthy chains and to attain a way of living and thinking which is more humane, noble and fruitful, and which will bring dignity to their presence on this earth.”
And his 2015 encyclical Laudato Si:“202. The need to resolve the structural causes of poverty cannot be delayed, not only for the pragmatic reason of its urgency for the good order of society, but because society needs to be cured of a sickness which is weakening and frustrating it, and which can only lead to new crises...
As long as the problems of the poor are not radically resolved by rejecting the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation and by attacking the structural causes of inequality,[173] no solution will be found for the world’s problems or, for that matter, to any problems. Inequality is the root of social ills.
“204. We can no longer trust in the unseen forces and the invisible hand of the market. Growth in justice requires more than economic growth, while presupposing such growth: it requires decisions, programmes, mechanisms and processes specifically geared to a better distribution of income, the creation of sources of employment and an integral promotion of the poor... I am far from proposing an irresponsible populism, but the economy can no longer turn to remedies that are a new poison, such as attempting to increase profits by reducing the work force and thereby adding to the ranks of the excluded.
208. If anyone feels offended by my words, I would respond that I speak them with affection and with the best of intentions, quite apart from any personal interest or political ideology. My words are not those of a foe or an opponent. I am interested only in helping those who are in thrall to an individualistic, indifferent and self-centered mentality to be freed from those unworthy chains and to attain a way of living and thinking which is more humane, noble and fruitful, and which will bring dignity to their presence on this earth.”
Laudato si' (24 May 2015) | Francis
"Once more, we need to reject a magical conception of the market, which would suggest that problems can be solved simply by an increase in the profits of companies or individuals. Is it realistic to hope that those who are obsessed with maximizing profits will stop to reflect on the environmental damage which they will leave behind for future generations? Where profits alone count, there can be no thinking about the rhythms of nature, its phases of decay and regeneration, or the complexity of ecosystems which may be gravely upset by human intervention” (#190).
“The human environment and the natural environment deteriorate together; we cannot adequately combat environmental degradation unless we attend to causes related to human and social degradation. In fact, the deterioration of the environment and of society affects the most vulnerable people on the planet: ‘Both everyday experience and scientific research show that the gravest effects of all attacks on the environment are suffered by the poorest’” (#48).
“When people become self-centered and self-enclosed, their greed increases. The emptier a person’s heart is, the more he or she needs things to buy, own and consume. It becomes almost impossible to accept the limits imposed by reality. In this horizon, a genuine sense of the common good also disappears” (#204).
“One particularly serious problem is the quality of water available to the poor…. Yet access to safe drinkable water is a basic and universal human right, since it is essential to human survival and, as such, is a condition for the exercise of other human rights. Our world has a grave social debt towards the poor who lack access to drinking water, because they are denied the right to a life consistent with their inalienable dignity” (#29-30).
“The human environment and the natural environment deteriorate together; we cannot adequately combat environmental degradation unless we attend to causes related to human and social degradation. In fact, the deterioration of the environment and of society affects the most vulnerable people on the planet: ‘Both everyday experience and scientific research show that the gravest effects of all attacks on the environment are suffered by the poorest’” (#48).
“When people become self-centered and self-enclosed, their greed increases. The emptier a person’s heart is, the more he or she needs things to buy, own and consume. It becomes almost impossible to accept the limits imposed by reality. In this horizon, a genuine sense of the common good also disappears” (#204).
“One particularly serious problem is the quality of water available to the poor…. Yet access to safe drinkable water is a basic and universal human right, since it is essential to human survival and, as such, is a condition for the exercise of other human rights. Our world has a grave social debt towards the poor who lack access to drinking water, because they are denied the right to a life consistent with their inalienable dignity” (#29-30).
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@atanu Also see:
Pope Francis' blunt critique of capitalism praised as needed warning
Pope Francis' blunt critique of capitalism praised as needed warning
NEW YORK — Pope Francis' social teaching offers a dire and needed warning about the twin calamities of economic inequality and climate change, said Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, and Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs at a Sept. 5 seminar at Fordham University's Lincoln Center campus here.
"The system's gangrene cannot be whitewashed forever," said Tobin, quoting the pope's candid remarks via video to the 2017 World Meeting of Popular Movements held in Modesto, California.
Sachs agreed that the pope's sometimes-scathing statements on capitalism are a needed counterweight to American overconfidence that unfettered capitalism can provide a pathway out of the dual crises of climate change and economic inequality.
Sachs, director of Columbia's Center for Sustainable Development, described Francis' encyclical on the environment, "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common Home," as "one of the great messages of our time" that "tells us things we will not hear from any other place."
The pope focus on seeing social justice issues from the peripheries, through the eyes of those left behind by the world economy. The periphery, said Tobin, is a place often ignored, described by Jesus in Matthew 25.
"It's people we don't see at all," said Tobin.
While the cardinal praised the pope's vision, Sachs was effusive.
He said that Francis is one of the few world leaders who understands the depth of the crises facing the planet and is willing to address them. "We have to listen and understand very clearly," he said about the pope's warnings on the environment.
Sachs, a regular participant at Vatican conferences on global concerns, said the pope's vision is difficult for many schooled in an uncritical Anglo-American view of unfettered capitalism. He said the largely Protestant vision grew out of the nation's founding at the beginning of a new economic order.
"The birth of global capitalism was not nice. It was ruthless in its birth," he said of the European colonial powers taking over native peoples, imposing slavery, and risking all for the cause of greed.
Global capitalism, Sachs said, contained an incredible energy, which inspired European conquerors. It unleashed addictions — such as a hunger for sugar — that reinforced the plantation slave system of the Americas.
It's been up to the popes, since Pope Leo XIII's 1891 landmark social encyclical, Rerum Novarum, to warn against the excesses of capitalism, a tradition that Francis has continued in more direct language.
Francis is warning that the current global capitalist system oppresses the poor and threatens the life of the planet, including efforts by the Trump administration to subvert the Paris Accords on climate change. It is a moral challenge, said Sachs, which often fails to connect with economists who don't appreciate the ethical challenges of the profession. As an economist, Sachs said he was never formally schooled in ethics, a lack that permeates practitioners of his craft.
The pope is warning the world that global capitalism is "putting us in profound peril," said Sachs. As a result, Francis has emerged "as the most important person on the planet."
"The system's gangrene cannot be whitewashed forever," said Tobin, quoting the pope's candid remarks via video to the 2017 World Meeting of Popular Movements held in Modesto, California.
Sachs agreed that the pope's sometimes-scathing statements on capitalism are a needed counterweight to American overconfidence that unfettered capitalism can provide a pathway out of the dual crises of climate change and economic inequality.
Sachs, director of Columbia's Center for Sustainable Development, described Francis' encyclical on the environment, "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common Home," as "one of the great messages of our time" that "tells us things we will not hear from any other place."
The pope focus on seeing social justice issues from the peripheries, through the eyes of those left behind by the world economy. The periphery, said Tobin, is a place often ignored, described by Jesus in Matthew 25.
"It's people we don't see at all," said Tobin.
While the cardinal praised the pope's vision, Sachs was effusive.
He said that Francis is one of the few world leaders who understands the depth of the crises facing the planet and is willing to address them. "We have to listen and understand very clearly," he said about the pope's warnings on the environment.
Sachs, a regular participant at Vatican conferences on global concerns, said the pope's vision is difficult for many schooled in an uncritical Anglo-American view of unfettered capitalism. He said the largely Protestant vision grew out of the nation's founding at the beginning of a new economic order.
"The birth of global capitalism was not nice. It was ruthless in its birth," he said of the European colonial powers taking over native peoples, imposing slavery, and risking all for the cause of greed.
Global capitalism, Sachs said, contained an incredible energy, which inspired European conquerors. It unleashed addictions — such as a hunger for sugar — that reinforced the plantation slave system of the Americas.
It's been up to the popes, since Pope Leo XIII's 1891 landmark social encyclical, Rerum Novarum, to warn against the excesses of capitalism, a tradition that Francis has continued in more direct language.
Francis is warning that the current global capitalist system oppresses the poor and threatens the life of the planet, including efforts by the Trump administration to subvert the Paris Accords on climate change. It is a moral challenge, said Sachs, which often fails to connect with economists who don't appreciate the ethical challenges of the profession. As an economist, Sachs said he was never formally schooled in ethics, a lack that permeates practitioners of his craft.
The pope is warning the world that global capitalism is "putting us in profound peril," said Sachs. As a result, Francis has emerged "as the most important person on the planet."
Quiddity
UndertheInfluenceofGiants
Among the interested and learned in the Catholic faith, they know the Pope or any clergy for that matter have their private opinions that are made public. They carry little weight to them. As much weight as those that without angst or pang can't help themselves and say the usual in vogue commentary about anything catholic.
These are not "private" opinions but magisterial teachings on the social doctrine of the church.
As Pope Pius XI stated in Quadragesimo Anno (1931):
Quadragesimo Anno (May 15, 1931) | PIUS XI
“ It is Our right and Our duty to deal authoritatively with social and economic problems. It is not, of course, the office of the Church to lead men to transient and perishable happiness only, but to that which is eternal. But she never can relinquish her God-given task of interposing her authority … in all those [matters] that have a bearing on moral conduct. For this deposit of truth entrusted to Us by God, and Our weighty office of propagating, interpreting and urging in season and out of season the entire moral law, demand that both social and economic questions be brought within Our supreme jurisdiction ….”
It is just as binding on conscience as any other element of doctrine / sacred tradition and one should note that most of the principles are there already in the Patristics / Church Fathers (as I demonstrate in my posts from time to time, linking back to New Advent Church Fathers translations):
From the Compendium on the Social Doctrine:
Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church
80. In the Church’s social doctrine the Magisterium is at work in all its various components and expressions. Of primary importance is the universal Magisterium of the Pope and the Council: this is the Magisterium that determines the direction and gives marks of the development of this social doctrine. This doctrine in turn is integrated into the Magisterium of the Bishops…The doctrinal body that emerges includes and integrates in this fashion the universal teaching of the Popes and the particular teaching of the Bishops.
Insofar as it is part of the Church’s moral teaching, the Church’s social doctrine has the same dignity and authority as her moral teaching . It is authentic Magisterium, which obligates the faithful to adhere to it[115].
And the consist teaching of the social enyclicals, exhortations and other magisterial texts in this regard is clear:Insofar as it is part of the Church’s moral teaching, the Church’s social doctrine has the same dignity and authority as her moral teaching . It is authentic Magisterium, which obligates the faithful to adhere to it[115].
Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (30 December 1987), Encyclical of Pope St. John Paul II:
“The tension between East and West is an opposition… between two concepts of the development of individuals and peoples, both concepts being imperfect and in need of radical correction…This is one of the reasons why the Church’s social doctrine adopts a critical attitude towards both liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism"
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Quiddity
UndertheInfluenceofGiants
Extrapolations are. The Church always lays out groundwork and foundational as binding and allows the fine tuning to be worked out. It rarely gets deep into the woods with socio economic systems.
The church does not dole out concrete proposals / technical solutions (except as suggestions to guide implementation of the social teaching) because it is the role of the laity to internalize and concretize these social doctrines but her social doctrine very much does get "deep into the woods with socio-economoc systems" if you read carefully what Pius XI was saying in Quadragesimo Anno.
If her doctrinal teaching condemns a certain policy, system or piece of legislation as violating natural law and the common good, we cannot in good conscience reject it as "mere opinion".
Capitalism, just like statist collectivism, is condemned in it's foundations as having an inordinate anthropology of man in John Paul II's 1981 encyclical Laborem Excercens:
Laborem Exercens (“On Human Work”) , Pope St. John Paul II, 1981 #30:
"In the modern period, from the beginning of the industrial age, the Christian truth about work had to oppose the various trends of materialistic and economistic thought… the danger of treating work as a special kind of “merchandise,” or as an impersonal “force” needed for production (the expression “workforce” is in fact in common use) always exists , especially when the whole way of looking at the question of economics is marked by the premises of materialistic economism…
In all cases of this sort, in every social situation of this type, there is a reversal of the order laid down from the beginning by the words of the Book of Genesis: man is treated as an instrument of production. Precisely this reversal of order, whatever the program or name under which it occurs, should rightly be called “capitalism” …Everybody knows that capitalism has a definite historical meaning as a system, an economic and social system, opposed to “socialism” or “communism.”
It should be recognized that the error of early capitalism can be repeated wherever people are treated on the same level as the whole complex of the material means of production, as an instrument and not in accordance with the true dignity of their work.
In all cases of this sort, in every social situation of this type, there is a reversal of the order laid down from the beginning by the words of the Book of Genesis: man is treated as an instrument of production. Precisely this reversal of order, whatever the program or name under which it occurs, should rightly be called “capitalism” …Everybody knows that capitalism has a definite historical meaning as a system, an economic and social system, opposed to “socialism” or “communism.”
It should be recognized that the error of early capitalism can be repeated wherever people are treated on the same level as the whole complex of the material means of production, as an instrument and not in accordance with the true dignity of their work.
The American bishops in 1982, when expounding upon the social doctrine of John Paul II’s encyclical of the preceding year Laborem Exercens, referenced a statement of the French bishops from the 1930s concerning the teaching of Pius XI’s encyclical Quadragesimo Anno (1931):
“… In Quadragesimo Anno Pope Pius XI referred to the liberal economic theory of uncontrolled competition as a ‘poisoned spring’ from which have originated all the errors of individualism. The French hierarchy, commenting upon the same pope’s letter on communism, stated: 'By condemning the actions of communist parties, the Church does not support the capitalist regime. It is most necessary that it be realized that in the very essence of capitalism that is to say, in the absolute value that it gives to property without reference to the common good or to the dignity of labor there is a materialism rejected by Christian teaching … ”
- U.S. Bishops, Pastoral Letter (1980) 62.
- U.S. Bishops, Pastoral Letter (1980) 62.
And when the Magisterium brings such social and economic matters within her supreme jurisdiction, as she is at full licence by the deposit of faith entrusted to her to do, her judgments are authoritative and binding on the faithful because they fall within faith and morals as Pope Pius XI explained very clearly in his 1931 Encyclical.
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Quiddity
UndertheInfluenceofGiants
So where do you think we disagree exactly?
Your original statement, which seemed to imply to me that the social doctrine teachings I had cited immediately prior to your post from the Papal Magisterium pertaining to social and economic matters were private opinions expressed in public that were of little weight:
Among the interested and learned in the Catholic faith, they know the Pope or any clergy for that matter have their private opinions that are made public. They carry little weight to them. As much weight as those that without angst or pang can't help themselves and say the usual in vogue commentary about anything catholic.
This is factually wrong as phrased, if I've correctly understood what you were referring to.
Nothing I cited - save the final article - falls under private opinions stated outside the Pope's teaching authority. They are all from magisterial texts expounding the social doctrine. Even the first OP article, has the pope referencing important magisterial texts from his papacy as authority for the remarks he is making. It's largely a summary of things he's stated in encyclicals and exhortations.
If these statements carry "little wait to you" then I would suggest in all sincerity and respect that you re-consider the source from which they are emanating and the kind of documents they are presented in.
That is all. Also, I disagreed with your statement: "deep into the woods with socio-economic systems" which is in contradiction to the social doctrine which does do precisely this.
If I have misunderstood the import of your words, then due apologies to you.
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Quiddity
UndertheInfluenceofGiants
I never quoted you directly. And my comment is most certainly accurate, save noting authoritative documents. I already know the Church doesn't support either Marxism or Capitalism. Comments about specific policies and it's effects are more of what I had in mind. The Church as I alluded to earlier goes after the overarching philosophy and underpinnings of a thing.
If your meaning is that, magisterially, the church doesn't recommend binding technical proposals in policy, except as "suggestions" on how to implement the social doctrine, then I quite agree.
But if you mean to say that the church doesn't condemn certain specific policies, laws etc. and their social effects as violating church teaching (for instance on the common good, solidarity, subsidiarity, the universal destination of goods, Pope St. John Paul II's magisterial teaching on the structures of sin etc.) then I would have to disagree.
She does weigh into such matters. I could cite many examples from the social encyclicals, for example in the 2013 apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium that I quoted immediately before your post, Pope Francis condemns "trickle-down theories of economic growth" and their grave social effects as violating the common good.
The definition of trickle-down economics:
Trickle-Down Theory
Trickle-down economics, or “trickle-down theory,” states that tax breaks and benefits for corporations and the wealthy will trickle down to everyone else.
It argues for income and capital gains tax breaks or other financial benefits to large businesses, investors, and entrepreneurs to stimulate economic growth
It argues for income and capital gains tax breaks or other financial benefits to large businesses, investors, and entrepreneurs to stimulate economic growth
So, this is condemned magisterially.
In Laborem Excercens, John Paul II condemned a range of actual policies implemented by various regimes based upon liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism, respectively.
As St. Thomas Aquinas taught in his Summa, an unjust law is no true law and the church is within rights to identify specific ones which violate her teaching just as much as she is in condemning the epistemological or anthropological errors at the roots of these systems.
Fruit and tree, so to speak.
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