We are pleased to share an excerpt from the introduction of Fr. Brian Mullady’s new book with Sophia Institute Press, “The Roots of Christian Civilization.”
“Man is by nature a social animal.” This quotation from Aristotle’s Politics is one of the oldest statements concerning human nature in Western civilization. The affirmation that human beings can only attain their perfection within a social context is not only a truth which reason teaches through human observation, but has also been constantly affirmed by the Catholic Church. The Lord himself taught that human beings should love one another.
For thousands of years the exact origin and nature of society has been a matter of intense speculation and debate. Questions concerning human freedom, authority, work and business are among the more basic questions human beings discuss. There is a rich literature in the ancient world about the ideal society and the principles of social conduct. These were made more prolix in the discussions in Western society during the Enlightenment which eventually gave rise to the Western democracies as we know them today. The solution to the nature of society has great importance for morals. Should law implement morality or not? Actions like abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, socialized medicine are rampant today and more and more receive the blessing of the civil law, even in countries traditionally considered to be Catholic.
Catholic politicians seem oblivious to the social doctrine of the Church when casting their votes for legislation which destroys the very moral fiber of the nation, especially as it reflects on the promotion of the family. Some of the clergy seem equally fuzzy on just what moral actions they should be catechizing the faithful about. The laity seem even more at sea about what the Church teaches on many social matters. When a pope condemns unrestricted capitalism, this is identified with socialism even though other popes who were great opponents of socialism have taught the same thing. Democracies seem to have adopted the point of view that majority rule creates ethics with no nod made to objective human nature.
C.S. Lewis reflected on this in The Screwtape Letters, when he has a senior tempter in hell say to a junior tempter on earth:
Democracy is the word with which you must lead them by the nose. […] It will never occur to them that Democracy is properly the name of a political system, even a system of voting, and that this has only the most remote and tenuous connection with what you are trying to sell them. Nor, of course, must they ever be allowed to raise Aristotle’s question: whether ‘democratic behaviour’ means the behaviour that will preserve democracy.1
Traditional Catholic thought very clearly teaches basic principles which explain the origin and nature of society. These principles have important applications related to things like the nature of government and its role in the formation of conscience, the development of a just economic climate, the relation of Church and state, the nature and defense of the family and finally the right to life. Countless papal teachings have been employed to explicate and apply these principles to modern society since the original papal encyclical about economics confronting both Marxism and Capitalism, Rerum Novarum, issued by Pope Leo XIII on May 19, 1891.
When I was a young seminarian studying theology in the early 70s, I took a class in history of the Church from a devout Catholic professor from the University of California in Berkeley. He stated that though he read Rerum Novarum in his Catholic high school, it always seemed something which was too little, too late and had no real application to social thought. This attitude is sadly reflected in the general opinion of many Catholics today about all of papal social teaching. If it does not seem radical enough, it simply seems out of touch with the culture. Part of the reason people think this is perhaps that they really do not understand all that is at issue in papal teaching contained in the social encyclicals for the past 125 years. These teachings are the result of a development of many principles which come from both Scripture and Tradition. In many cases they are an application of the Scholastic theologians like Thomas Aquinas or Robert Bellarmine. Contemporary papal teaching is an attempt to apply these valid metaphysical and moral principles to new problems which have arisen from the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution.
In this book, I undertake to give a new compendium of Catholic teachings concerning society. I have chosen a systematic approach both because this is more scientific and because it more clearly illustrates how the practical teachings of the Church of the last hundred years are derived from principles taught by both reason and revelation. In Part One, I will examine the nature of society and theoretical principles of the social order. I will then apply these to distinguish three basic human societies: the family, the state and the Church. In Part Two, I will apply theory to practice and enumerate a Catholic vision of how the most basic human societies, the family and the state, must pursue their goals. In accord with traditional Catholic thought, I will treat economics as an extension of the family and also derive some practical points on business ethics.
This study is then offered to the reader to encourage him to participate in the development of a Christian view of the social order.
Author Bio – Fr. Brian Thomas Becket Mullady, O.P.
Fr. Brian Thomas Becket Mullady, OP entered the Dominican Order in 1966 and was ordained in 1972. He has a Doctorate in Sacred Theology (STD) from the Angelicum University in Rome, Italy and was professor there for six years. He is currently a mission preacher and retreat master for the Western Dominican Province. He is the author of eight books, numerous articles, and writes for Homiletic and Pastoral Review and is the theological consultant for The Institute for Religious Life. He is a Missionary of Mercy appointed by Pope Francis. He also has had many programs on EWTN and currently has a weekly radio show on the EWTN radio network.
