After each encyclical from the Holy Father, or other teaching from the Vatican, there are the attempts to shape the reception of it one way or another, rather than referring back to the actual words in the context of the whole.
As the social teaching of the Church played a large role in my conversion to Catholicism, I studied it—and continue to do so—religiously, including the primary documents and analytic and historic material.
The first few books about the teaching that I studied were very biased and rarely quoted the actual teaching extensively, but primarily interpreted it.
I finally found a source that does the opposite, rarely interprets, and uses extensive quote from the material to allow you to actually see the intent of the teaching.
And for those of you following this blog, you will know I speak of the work of Fr. Rodger Charles, S.J., whose two-volume work was published in Great Britain in 1998, Christian Social Witness and Teaching: The Catholic Tradition from Genesis to Centesimus Annus: Volume 1—From Biblical Times to the Late Nineteenth Century & Volume 2— The Modern Social Teaching Contexts: Summaries: Analysis.
An excellent review of the work is at the Acton Institute’s Journal of Markets & Morality.
The best place to find both volumes is either through Abe Books or through the publisher, Gracewing Publishing.
Now, Fr. Charles had a lot to say about the various interpretations of the teaching and here is just a sampling:
“In summary, the presenter of the modern teaching must deal with the whole of it, and must do so in a balanced way so that the left, right and centre can see where their responsibilities lie. This means expounding the texts in such a way that their overall message is clear. The defects of the literature in the field, including my own previous contributions, were apparent to me as I grappled with the problems of teaching the subject in the late 1980s and I decided that I would make a study of the whole Catholic tradition with the hope of providing an exhaustive and balanced treatment of it and providing a coherent analysis which the reader could see was tied to the texts, allowing that teaching to speak for itself so that the reader could make up his or her own mind as to whether I had interpreted it correctly or not.” (p. xv)
Lampstand Foundation website, http://www.lampstandfoundation.org/
"The sinner is at the very heart of Christianity. Nobody is so competent as the sinner in matters of Christianity. Nobody, except the saint." Charles Peguy (1873-1914)
About
- David H. Lukenbill
- I am a California native, married, we have one daughter and live close to the American River with two cats and all the wild critters we can feed. I am a management consultant to nonprofit organizations and have an Associates of Arts degree in Administration of Justice from Sacramento City College, a Bachelor of Science degree in Organizational Behavior from the University of San Francisco and a Master of Public Administration degree, also from the University of San Francisco.