Another pope calls for "economic justice," i.e. the market's profit motive being useful only as a means to the end of eliminating poverty and various "glaring inequalities." The writer, a fellow at a theological center, makes this interesting point:
Although Benedict's emphasis in the encyclical is on the theological foundations of Catholic social teaching, amid the dense prose there are indications, as shown above, that he is to the left of almost every politician in America. What politician would casually refer to "redistribution of wealth" or talk of international governing bodies to regulate the economy? Who would call for increasing the percentage of GDP devoted to foreign aid? Who would call for the adoption of "new life-styles 'in which the quest for truth, beauty, goodness and communion with others for the sake of common growth are the factors which determine consumer choices, savings and investments'"?
Well, that may have been true once, but I don't think the pope is anywhere near "to the left of" President Obama and the congressional Democratic majority. Obama talks quite casually about the redistribution of wealth, and he has lamented the fact that the Constitution has only negative rights (what the government can't do to us) rather than positive rights (what it owes each of us). And haven't the Washington powers been hitting us over the head with the idea that we have a "global economic crisis" requring a "global solution"? We haven't exactly been urged to "adopt new lifestyles," but the actions taken in Washington might limit our choices to the point where those lifestyles will be imposed on us.
