Taxes and Welfare are not Charity

Taxation and welfare can never be substitutes for charity.

Taxation is a destruction of money (or reserves). Government spending is a creation of money (or reserves). Government welfare programs such as TANF, Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, etc. reallocate or redistribute resources by destroying financial assets of the taxed and creating financial assets of the receivers of welfare.

This is the nature of government taxation and spending. Your taxes are not someone else's welfare and therefore are not a gift of charity. This 'redistribution' can achieve socially desirable goals, but cannot replace a true act of charity which requires a person or persons giving and a person or persons receiving:

Charity is love received and given. It is “grace” (cháris). Its source is the wellspring of the Father's love for the Son, in the Holy Spirit. Love comes down to us from the Son. -- Caritas in Veritate pp. 5

What persons need above all is love or charity, not material goods. Giving of material goods is an act of charity, but the charity is needed more than the material goods.

The government is not capable of charity because it is not a person capable of love. There is no relationship established, it is not a true gift and it isn't a true sacrifice.

So you can't rely on the government to be charitable for you. This does not mean that welfare programs should not exist, but it does mean that they don't replace man's inherent need for charity. You cannot defer your responsibility to both give and receive charity to the government.

Nor can you give out of charity if justice is not met:

Charity goes beyond justice, because to love is to give, to offer what is “mine” to the other; but it never lacks justice, which prompts us to give the other what is “his”, what is due to him by reason of his being or his acting. I cannot “give” what is mine to the other, without first giving him what pertains to him in justice.

If we love others with charity, then first of all we are just towards them. Not only is justice not extraneous to charity, not only is it not an alternative or parallel path to charity: justice is inseparable from charity, and intrinsic to it. Justice is the primary way of charity or, in Paul VI's words, “the minimum measure” of it, an integral part of the love “in deed and in truth” (1 Jn 3:18), to which Saint John exhorts us.

On the one hand, charity demands justice: recognition and respect for the legitimate rights of individuals and peoples. It strives to build the earthly city according to law and justice. On the other hand, charity transcends justice and completes it in the logic of giving and forgiving. The earthly city is promoted not merely by relationships of rights and duties, but to an even greater and more fundamental extent by relationships of gratuitousness, mercy and communion. Charity always manifests God's love in human relationships as well, it gives theological and salvific value to all commitment for justice in the world. -- Caritas in Veritate pp. 6

In summary, the government cannot replace charity and therefore cannot solve all of society's problems which are rooted in an absence of charity and justice nor can we give out of charity if justice is not first met. To rely on the government to solve all our problems for us or to say that 'government is taxing me and giving it to the poor so I don't need to give' is to misunderstand true charity and a person's need for love.

Examining CV, Part 6

In Chapter 3 of CV, Pope Benedict XVI delves into fraternity, economic development, and civil society.

He first affirms that we, as humans, are made for gift and that we are often wrongly convinced that we are the sole authors of ourselves, our lives, and all of society. He reminds us that we have a wounded nature born out of original sin and that the economy has felt the pernicious effects of this sin.

Happiness is not material prosperity and economics is not autonomous from morality:

The conviction that man is self-sufficient and can successfully eliminate the evil present in history by his own action alone has led him to confuse happiness and salvation with immanent forms of material prosperity and social action. Then, the conviction that the economy must be autonomous, that it must be shielded from “influences” of a moral character, has led man to abuse the economic process in a thoroughly destructive way. In the long term, these convictions have led to economic, social and political systems that trample upon personal and social freedom, and are therefore unable to deliver the justice that they promise.

Charity, hope, truth...these things are greater than we are. Charity in truth builds an authentic human community that we alone cannot build by ourselves. Gratuitousness must be evident in society if economic, social and political development is to be authentically human.

The Pope then goes on to make very key statements regarding markets and justice that "free marketers" often ignore or reject:

In a climate of mutual trust, the market is the economic institution that permits encounter between persons, inasmuch as they are economic subjects who make use of contracts to regulate their relations as they exchange goods and services of equivalent value between them, in order to satisfy their needs and desires. The market is subject to the principles of so-called commutative justice, which regulates the relations of giving and receiving between parties to a transaction. But the social doctrine of the Church has unceasingly highlighted the importance of distributive justice and social justice for the market economy, not only because it belongs within a broader social and political context, but also because of the wider network of relations within which it operates. In fact, if the market is governed solely by the principle of the equivalence in value of exchanged goods, it cannot produce the social cohesion that it requires in order to function well.

Without internal forms of solidarity and mutual trust, the market cannot completely fulfil its proper economic function. And today it is this trust which has ceased to exist, and the loss of trust is a grave loss.

According to the Pope, it was not just a matter of correcting dysfunctions through assistance. The poor are not to be considered a “burden”, but a resource, even from the purely economic point of view. It is nevertheless erroneous to hold that the market economy has an inbuilt need for a quota of poverty and underdevelopment in order to function at its best.

It is in the interests of the market to promote emancipation, but in order to do so effectively, it cannot rely only on itself, because it is not able to produce by itself something that lies outside its competence. It must draw its moral energies from other subjects that are capable of generating them.

These statements are very strong because they rightly point out that markets alone do NOT bring about a just distribution of goods as many economists would have you believe. The solution lies not just in redistribution, but far more importantly in moral actors within markets. We must all act together toward the common good and not rely on selfish actions within a market to produce the result for us. Pope Benedict XVI continues:

In and of itself, the market is not, and must not become, the place where the strong subdue the weak. Society does not have to protect itself from the market, as if the development of the latter were ipso facto to entail the death of authentically human relations. Admittedly, the market can be a negative force, not because it is so by nature, but because a certain ideology can make it so. It must be remembered that the market does not exist in the pure state. It is shaped by the cultural configurations which define it and give it direction. Economy and finance, as instruments, can be used badly when those at the helm are motivated by purely selfish ends. Instruments that are good in themselves can thereby be transformed into harmful ones. But it is man's darkened reason that produces these consequences, not the instrument per se. Therefore it is not the instrument that must be called to account, but individuals, their moral conscience and their personal and social responsibility.

WE, as economic actors, make up markets and it is WE who are responsible for their goodness or their badness. In other words, Pope Benedict is criticizing the market harshly, not because it isn't efficient or that it is evil, but because our actions within the market aren't directed toward the common good. Those who hold that selfish actions within a market bring about the common good as is often claimed (starting with Adam Smith's "invisible hand") by economists and politicians are wrong! It is clear that this does not bring about the common good, instead we must act always for each other, within and outside the market, so as to bring about a community of charity and fraternity that provides for the welfare of all.

The economic sphere is neither ethically neutral, nor inherently inhuman and opposed to society. It is part and parcel of human activity and precisely because it is human, it must be structured and governed in an ethical manner.

What is needed?:

The great challenge before us, accentuated by the problems of development in this global era and made even more urgent by the economic and financial crisis, is to demonstrate, in thinking and behaviour, not only that traditional principles of social ethics like transparency, honesty and responsibility cannot be ignored or attenuated, but also that in commercial relationships the principle of gratuitousness and the logic of gift as an expression of fraternity can and must find their place within normal economic activity.

Because: "every economic decision has a moral consequence. Justice must be applied to every phase of economic activity, because this is always concerned with man and his needs."

Pope Benedict XVI writes that economic life needs contracts to regulate exchange, just laws and redistribution governed by poltiics, and most importantly works redolent of the spirit of gift. He calls especially for today's market economies to make room for institutions with motives other than profit-oriented enterprises, for civil society to push for greater solidarity and not simply rely on the State to do so, and for the State to redistribute when necessary to take care of the peoples who are not included within the benefits of the market economy.

Examining CV, part 5

As a segway into the next segment of CV, Pope Benedict ties his discussion on food shortages and our basic natural right to food and water to the fundamental right to life:

The right to food, like the right to water, has an important place within the pursuit of other rights, beginning with the fundamental right to life. It is therefore necessary to cultivate a public conscience that considers food and access to water as universal rights of all human beings, without distinction or discrimination.

He then very importantly draws our attention to the center of true development (which is the focus of this encyclical) and the grave evils that are preventing it:

Not only does the situation of poverty still provoke high rates of infant mortality in many regions, but some parts of the world still experience practices of demographic control, on the part of governments that often promote contraception and even go so far as to impose abortion. In economically developed countries, legislation contrary to life is very widespread, and it has already shaped moral attitudes and praxis, contributing to the spread of an anti-birth mentality; frequent attempts are made to export this mentality to other States as if it were a form of cultural progress.

Some non-governmental Organizations work actively to spread abortion, at times promoting the practice of sterilization in poor countries, in some cases not even informing the women concerned. Moreover, there is reason to suspect that development aid is sometimes linked to specific health-care policies which de facto involve the imposition of strong birth control measures. Further grounds for concern are laws permitting euthanasia as well as pressure from lobby groups, nationally and internationally, in favour of its juridical recognition.

Openness to life is at the centre of true development. When a society moves towards the denial or suppression of life, it ends up no longer finding the necessary motivation and energy to strive for man's true good.

By cultivating openness to life, wealthy peoples can better understand the needs of poor ones, they can avoid employing huge economic and intellectual resources to satisfy the selfish desires of their own citizens, and instead, they can promote virtuous action within the perspective of production that is morally sound and marked by solidarity, respecting the fundamental right to life of every people and every individual.

Similarly, another aspect tied closely to development is being denied in our time: the right to religious freedom. Both religious fanaticism that takes the form of violence in the name of God and "the deliberate promotion of religious indifference (or practical atheism) obstructs the requirements for the development of peoples, depriving them of spiritual and human resources."

The Pope writes:

Man is not a lost atom in a random universe: he is God's creature, whom God chose to endow with an immortal soul and whom he has always loved. If man were merely the fruit of either chance or necessity, or if he had to lower his aspirations to the limited horizon of the world in which he lives, if all reality were merely history and culture, and man did not possess a nature destined to transcend itself in a supernatural life, then one could speak of growth, or evolution, but not development.

We are also reminded that truth and charity are not to be separated. We cannot develop without charity and faith, as the scientific, human-knowledge-is-sufficient community would have us believe, yet charity and faith are also not without knowledge and human reason:

Charity does not exclude knowledge, but rather requires, promotes, and animates it from within. Knowledge is never purely the work of the intellect. It can certainly be reduced to calculation and experiment, but if it aspires to be wisdom capable of directing man in the light of his first beginnings and his final ends, it must be “seasoned” with the “salt” of charity. Deeds without knowledge are blind, and knowledge without love is sterile.

Charity is not an added extra, like an appendix to work already concluded in each of the various disciplines: it engages them in dialogue from the very beginning. The demands of love do not contradict those of reason. Human knowledge is insufficient and the conclusions of science cannot indicate by themselves the path towards integral human development. There is always a need to push further ahead: this is what is required by charity in truth. Going beyond, however, never means prescinding from the conclusions of reason, nor contradicting its results. Intelligence and love are not in separate compartments: love is rich in intelligence and intelligence is full of love.

An implication of this truth is that "moral evaluation and scientific research must go hand in hand, and that charity must animate them in a harmonious interdisciplinary whole, marked by unity and distinction."

The tendency to prefer short run (sometimes immediate) gains over a longer run view has had drastic consequences, especially for the poor and unemployed.
The Pope specifically draws our attention to the evils of inequality and unemployment:

The dignity of the individual and the demands of justice require, particularly today, that economic choices do not cause disparities in wealth to increase in an excessive and morally unacceptable manner, and that we continue to prioritize the goal of access to steady employment for everyone. All things considered, this is also required by “economic logic”. Through the systemic increase of social inequality, both within a single country and between the populations of different countries (i.e. the massive increase in relative poverty), not only does social cohesion suffer, thereby placing democracy at risk, but so too does the economy, through the progressive erosion of “social capital”: the network of relationships of trust, dependability, and respect for rules, all of which are indispensable for any form of civil coexistence.

In order to improve the conditions we face in our time, new solutions are needed that take into account this broader concept of reason and that above all respect the dignity of the human person.

Examining Caritas in Veritate, Part 2

In Chapter 1 of Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict XVI recalls the main points of Populorum Progressio and their significance. He points out that PP was written immediately after Vatican II and set out to convey two important truths: The Church is engaged in promoting integral human development through all of her proclamation, celebration, works of charity, and educational activities which includes a public role as long as she is able to operate in a climate of freedom. The second truth is that "authentic human development concerns the whole of the person in every single dimension." Pope Benedict goes on to make what I think is an extremely important point regarding this development:

Without the perspective of eternal life, human progress in this world is denied breathing-space. Enclosed within history, it runs the risk of being reduced to the mere accumulation of wealth; humanity thus loses the courage to be at the service of higher goods, at the service of the great and disinterested initiatives called forth by universal charity. Man does not develop through his own powers, nor can development simply be handed to him.

In reality, institutions by themselves are not enough, because integral human development is primarily a vocation, and therefore it involves a free assumption of responsibility in solidarity on the part of everyone. Moreover, such development requires a transcendent vision of the person, it needs God: without him, development is either denied, or entrusted exclusively to man, who falls into the trap of thinking he can bring about his own salvation, and ends up promoting a dehumanized form of development. Only through an encounter with God are we able to see in the other something more than just another creature, to recognize the divine image in the other, thus truly coming to discover him or her and to mature in a love that “becomes concern and care for the other.”

Despite PP's connection with Vatican II, it did not constitute a break from the teachings that came before PP. The Pope reminds us that the Church's magisterium is "a single teaching, consistent and at the same time ever new."

PP also warned of two opposing utopian ideologies: too much reliance on technology for development, and a complete denial of technology for development:

Idealizing technical progress, or contemplating the utopia of a return to humanity's original natural state, are two contrasting ways of detaching progress from its moral evaluation and hence from our responsibility.

Pope Benedict XVI also noted the strong link between PP and Humanae Vitae, another of Pope Paul VI's encyclicals:

Humanae Vitae indicates the strong links between life ethics and social ethics...The Church forcefully maintains this link between life ethics and social ethics, fully aware that “a society lacks solid foundations when, on the one hand, it asserts values such as the dignity of the person, justice and peace, but then, on the other hand, radically acts to the contrary by allowing or tolerating a variety of ways in which human life is devalued and violated, especially where it is weak or marginalized.”

Later, Pope Bendict XVI teaches us that progess, is first a foremost a vocation:

To regard development as a vocation is to recognize, on the one hand, that it derives from a transcendent call, and on the other hand that it is incapable, on its own, of supplying its ultimate meaning.

Because it is a vocation it requires "a free and responsible answer. Integral human development presupposes the responsible freedom of the individual and of peoples: no structure can guarantee this development over and above human responsibility."

This responsiblity over our own development reminds us that we are "the principal agents of [our] own success or failure."

As development is a vocation, or a responsibility on our part, it requires not only freedom, but truth:

Only when it is free can development be integrally human; only in a climate of responsible freedom can it grow in a satisfactory manner. Besides requiring freedom, integral human development as a vocation also demands respect for its truth. The vocation to progress drives us to “do more, know more and have more in order to be more."

True development also involves every man and the whole man, both natural and supernatural, with the Gospel as fundamental to that development.

And lastly, Pope Benedict XVI recalled the central place of charity within development, especially in aiding the areas of underdevelopment:

Finally, the vision of development as a vocation brings with it the central place of charity within that development. Paul VI, in his Encyclical Letter Populorum Progressio, pointed out that the causes of underdevelopment are not primarily of the material order. He invited us to search for them in other dimensions of the human person: first of all, in the will, which often neglects the duties of solidarity; secondly in thinking, which does not always give proper direction to the will.

Underdevelopment has an even more important cause than lack of deep thought: it is “the lack of brotherhood among individuals and peoples.”

Chapter one thus ends with a reminder of the urgent need for reform "and in the face of great problems of injustice in the development of peoples, it calls for courageous action to be taken without delay."

Two excellent posts from Vox Nova

On loving others, including enemies:

"The only word for love is everybody’s name..."

On the proper role of subsidiarity as a means to achieving the common good:

"The Abuse that comes from Subsidiarity Alone"

Today's Excerpt from CST

From "Caritas in Veritate":

Charity is at the heart of the Church's social doctrine. Every responsibility and every commitment spelt out by that doctrine is derived from charity which, according to the teaching of Jesus, is the synthesis of the entire Law (cf. Mt 22:36- 40). It gives real substance to the personal relationship with God and with neighbour; it is the principle not only of micro-relationships (with friends, with family members or within small groups) but also of macro-relationships (social, economic and political ones). For the Church, instructed by the Gospel, charity is everything because, as Saint John teaches (cf. 1 Jn 4:8, 16) and as I recalled in my first Encyclical Letter, “God is love” (Deus Caritas Est): everything has its origin in God's love, everything is shaped by it, everything is directed towards it. Love is God's greatest gift to humanity, it is his promise and our hope.