In this essay I will try to develop a natural law justification of welfare rights. The justification I will undertake is from the perspective of Catholic natural law, that is, the strand of natural law that has been developed theoretically by Roman Catholic canonists, theologians, and philosophers since Aquinas, and affirmed by Catholic teachers as the basis for most moral obligations. Catholic natural law is, therefore, natural law as developed and understood by Catholics or others respecting Catholic traditions of inquiry. It is not, however, primarily or exclusively natural law for Catholics, since the very idea of natural law includes the conviction that it is accessible in principle to anyone.
