scholarly journals The Faith that Does Prudence: Contemporary Catholic Social Ethics and the Appropriation of the Ethics of Aquinas

Lumen et Vita ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Michael Reedy, SJ
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Social Evolution ◽  
Practical Reasoning ◽  
Social Ethics ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
The Social ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Theoretical Reasoning

One of the most important contemporary issues within the Society of Jesus is the way in which contemporary evangelization impacts social evolution and social structures.  Under the umbrella term of “social justice” the Society is committed to the analysis of and changing of the social and economic structures that impact human lives, so that the values of the Gospel can be actualized within the human family.  Understanding what Aquinas has to say about the issues involved in social justice is important for two reasons.  First, the theological and ethical language of the Society, and the Catholic Church in general, draws deeply from the Thomistic tradition.  Second, there is a vigorous resurgence of attempts to reappropriate Aquinas’ ethical theory according to contemporary sensibilities.  For all those interested in promoting social justice within a Catholic framework it is important to understand how the issues related to social justice relate to Aquinas’ theological project. Although Aquinas does provide a theoretical framework in which the issues of social justice can be addressed, he provides a different rubric.  The contemporary convictions of radical equality and individual rights belong to the Thomistic domain of theoretical reasoning through wisdom.  The critique and evaluation of social structures according to contemporary economic theories and sensibilities belongs to the Thomistic domain of practical reasoning through prudence.  The commitment to the preferential option for the poor belongs to the Thomistic virtue of charity.  In Aquinas’ language, the faith that does justice is, because it acts in a critical and constructive fashion, more accurately a faith that acts prudently.

scholarly journals The problems of marriage in the social teaching of the Catholic Church

2014 ◽  
pp. 112-122
Author(s):  
S. Prysuhin
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Social Teaching ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Catholic Church

In the article S. Prysukhin “The problems of marriage in the social teaching of the Catholic Church” reveals substantial characteristics of the concept of "Christian marriage", its positive value in overcoming the social structures of sin in modern civilization.

Towards Social Justice Through Arts and Language-Based Learning

2020 ◽  
pp. 101-123
Author(s):  
Rebecca M. Sánchez ◽  
Karla V. Kingsley ◽  
Amy Sweet ◽  
Eileen Waldschmidt ◽  
Carlos A. LópezLeiva ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Education ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Educational Experiences ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Language Diversity ◽  
Education Experience ◽  
Acquisition Strategies ◽  
The Social ◽  
Interdisciplinary Arts ◽  
Definition Of

The Teacher Education Collaborative in Language Diversity and Arts Integration (TECLA) initiative prepares elementary teachers at a Southwest majority-minority university. TECLA emerged from a social justice commitment to prepare teachers to work in linguistically and culturally diverse schools. The program integrates interdisciplinary arts-based approaches and culturally sustaining language acquisition strategies throughout the teacher education experience. TECLA conceptualizes social justice through a sociohistorical lens. Social justice is experienced when all people have equitable access to meaningful opportunities to participate in and (re)shape the social structures in which they live and work. TECLA relies on an expanded definition of social justice that includes building on students' home cultures, languages, and experiences to design rigorous educational experiences.

scholarly journals Intercultural dialogues in times of global pandemics: The Confucian ethics of relations and social organization in Sinic societies

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 206-216
Author(s):  
Jana S. Rošker
Keyword(s):  
East Asian ◽  
Social Ethics ◽  
Global Scale ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Confucian Ethics ◽  
Global Level ◽  
Global Ethics ◽  
Crisis Resolution ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Traditions

Abstract Since COVID-19 is a global-scale pandemic, it can only be solved on the global level. In this context, intercultural dialogues are of utmost importance. Indeed, different models of traditional ethics might be of assistance in constructing a new, global ethics that could help us confront the present predicament and prepare for other possible global crises that might await us in the future. The explosive, pandemic spread of COVID-19 in 2020 clearly demonstrated that in general, one of the most effective tools for containment of the epidemics is precisely human and interpersonal solidarity, which must also be accompanied by a certain degree of autonomous self-discipline. The present paper follows the presumption that these types of personal and interpersonal attitudes are—inter alia— culturally conditioned and hence influenced by different traditional models of social ethics. In light of the fact that East-Asian or Sinic societies were more successful and effective in the process of containing and eliminating the virus compared to the strategies of the Euro-American regions, I will first question the widespread assumption that this effectiveness is linked to the authoritarian political traditions of the Sinic East and Southeast Asian areas. Then, I will critically introduce the Confucian ethics of relations, which in various ways has influenced the social structures of these regions, and clarify the question of whether and in which way the relics of this ethics had an actual effect on the crisis resolution measurements. The crucial aim of this paper is to contribute to the construction of theoretical groundworks for a new, transculturally grounded global ethics, which is more needed today than ever before.

scholarly journals A COMPANHIA DE JESUS E O APOSTOLADO SOCIAL (1946-1975)

2010 ◽  
Vol 41 (113) ◽  
pp. 59
Author(s):  
Grimaldo Carneiro Zachariadhes
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
World War ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Second World

O presente artigo pretende abordar a importância que o apostolado social começou a ter para a Companhia de Jesus, especialmente a latino-americana, na conjuntura do Pós-2ª Guerra Mundial. Será analisada a criação dos Centros de Investigação e Ação Social (CIAS) como uma melhor forma de exercer este apostolado. O artigo será finalizado com a promulgação do decreto 4°, em 1975, pela Congregação Geral XXXII, quando a Companhia de Jesus oficializará a luta pela Justiça Social como uma missão de todos os jesuítas.ABSTRACT: This article intends to analyze the importance that the Social apostolate began to have for Society of Jesus, especially in Latin America, in the conjuncture after Second World War. It will be analyzed the creation of the Centers of Investigation and Social Action as a better form of exercising this apostolate. The article will be concluded with the promulgation of the ordinance 4°, in 1975, for the General Congregation XXXII, when Society of Jesus will make official the fight for the Social Justice as a mission of all the Jesuits.

A Jesuit Way of Being Global?

2018 ◽  
pp. 1035-1053
Author(s):  
Frédéric Gugelot
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
The Social ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Third World ◽  
Two Sides

The Jesuits were important actors in the Catholic Church in the 1960s when changes in Catholicism occurred before and after the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). The members of the Society of Jesus were active participants in movements calling for the “inculturation” of Christianity and the “liberation theology” coming from the Third World, two sides of the same process of globalization of Catholicism. It is from this time onward that the center of gravity moved away from Rome to South America, Asia, and Africa. The Jesuits also participated in the transition from a triumphant church to a church based on service to the poor. This is the social, cultural, and theological background in which the future pope Francis, the first Jesuit pope, spent the early years of his ecclesiastical career.

The Oxford Handbook of the Jesuits

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Church History ◽  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
Secular Culture ◽  
Collective Effervescence ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
History Of ◽  
Set Up ◽  
Society Today

The chapters in the Oxford Handbook of the Jesuits deal with close to five hundred years of history of the Society of Jesus, a transnational, polyglot Catholic religious order of men, which rose vertiginously to prominence from the mid-sixteenth century until its suppression in 1773. Following this unprecedented event in Church history was its equally unprecedented Restoration in 1814. What held this corporate Jesuit body together through a series of historically documented successes, adjustments, crises and persecutions, and made it continuously cohere around a set of common ideals, commitments and practices? Was it a sense of a “higher goal” cultivated through methodical self-questioning taught by Spiritual Exercises and by observing the rules written in the Constitutions? Toolkits of subjection and subjectivity, fostering discipline as well as collective effervescence among both the Jesuits and their lay supporters - and their enemies - are analyzed in this volume through major topics, events and institutions. Thorn between private and public, religious and secular, “us” and “them”, the Jesuits perfected the art of introspection and the reflection on strategies and mechanisms on how to link individual to society. Today as in the past, even though the Jesuits were and are under obligation to think and act for the Catholic Church, in executing their tasks they exceeded and widened the strictly ecclesiastical boundaries and made major contributions to the secular culture. In the last forty years, in particular, the problem of social justice and ecologically responsible global order are invoked as the most urgent Jesuit concerns. A comprehensive analysis regarding the manner in which the Jesuits set up, acted on, described and analyzed, and they still do, the intercultural and transnational networks - invigorating projects as questionable as the Inquisition, slavery and conversion, as innovative and experimental as accommodation, inculturation and social justice, as useful as education and scholarship - is offered in this volume by more than forty authors, senior and young experts in the field, three of whom are Jesuits themselves.

Paul Hanly Furfey

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas K. Rademacher
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Social Analysis ◽  
Reform Agenda ◽  
Dorothy Day ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
The University

Paul Hanly Furfey (1896-1992) is one of U.S. Catholicism’s greatest champions of peace and social justice. In a career that spanned over five decades, Furfey attempted to compose a coherent and penetrating social reform agenda in theory and practice from the elements available to him at any given time. He attempted to remain as objective as possible by remaining attentive to facts derived from social analysis; the corporate wisdom of the Catholic Church; and best practices in the field, whether from professional social work, the personalism of radical Catholic social justice groups, or the praxis based approach of liberation theology. First and foremost, Furfey viewed his role in terms of an intellectual apostolate. Clearly, Furfey’s pursuit of objectivity in this apostolate did not blunt his criticism. His social analysis, especially as filtered through his reading of the Christian theological tradition, revealed an unwavering and, at times, prophetic preferential option for the poor. He communicated this message through his role as a priest, scholar, and educator. Furfey’s revolutionary view of the university as a center for social transformation is paradigmatic of his contribution. Education of students and scholarship were central to his work. He also encouraged the creation of structures that would empower and transform the communities that surrounded the university. He and his colleagues developed social settlement communities that drew on the latest social scientific research and technique while at the same time incorporating principles that they learned from radical Catholics like Dorothy Day and Catherine de Hueck Doherty.

Preferential Option for the Spirit

2020 ◽  
pp. 392-410
Author(s):  
Brenda Carranza
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Social Impact ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Social ◽  
Physical Healing ◽  
Preferential Option ◽  
The Public Sphere ◽  
Full Swing ◽  
Catholic Charismatic Renewal ◽  
The Church

When the Catholic Charismatic Renewal movement (CCR) arrived in Brazil in the late 1960s, evangelical Pentecostalism was in full swing. The so-called believers looked for lost sheep in the Catholic flock. In the midst of public performances and animated songs, Pentecostals promised a moral life, physical healing, and liberation from the clutches of the Devil. Pentecostalism considered daily afflictions as a spiritual battle and regarded Catholicism as a degradation of authentic Christianity. Public confrontations between Catholics and Pentecostals were frequent. Some Pentecostal attacks were fanatical, with allusions to the Bible; others accused Catholics of idolatry for their devotion to Our Lady and to the saints. As such, the CCR faced enormous resistance to spreading the movement within the Catholic universe; for some, the CCR represented a domestic enemy as well as a gateway to manifest discontent with the Church. This process of Catholic pentecostalization is the focus of this chapter. In particular, this discussion considers how charismatic Catholicism developed through the use of media and a gospel-inspired culture to draw large crowds, as well as to export the movement to other parts of the world. This chapter also discusses how—within the Catholic Church —charismatic spirituality shaped new clergy, reinvented faith-based life among the laity, and renewed pastoral work with the young. Additionally, in Brazil’s national congress, political mechanisms, options, and strategies brought Pentecostals and Charismatics together. Arguably, the CCR brought to Catholicism a discourse of religious modernization—a discourse that has become hegemonic in the Church. Finally, this chapter reflects on the social impact that Christian Pentecostalism has had on the public sphere in Brazil and its unfolding in the religious field.

scholarly journals Transformational Ethics: The Concept of Obedience in Post-Conciliar Jesuit Thinking

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 342
Author(s):  
Antje Schnoor
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Society Of Jesus ◽  
Ethical Values ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Religious Orders ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
Religious Concept ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Definition Of

The paper sheds light on the change in the concept of obedience within the Society of Jesus since the 1960s. In the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, a so-called crisis of authority and obedience took place in the Catholic Church and the religious orders. As a consequence, the notions of responsibility and conscience came to the fore in the Jesuit definition of obedience. The religious concept of obedience, that is the obedience towards God, was reassessed as a service to humanity. The paper analyzes how the change in the concept of obedience gave rise to the promotion of social justice, which the Society of Jesus proclaimed at General Congregation 32 in 1974/75. By including the promotion of social justice into their central mission, Jesuits not only fundamentally transformed their self-conception, but also their ethical values. The paper argues that the pursuit of social justice became a form of religious obedience.

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