Sollicitudo rei socialis
Sollicitudo rei socialis ("concern about social issues") is a social encyclical of Pope John Paul II from 1987 . In it the Pope developed the Catholic social doctrine further and turned to problems of the North-South conflict .
20 years of Populorum progressio
The second social encyclical of the Pope is dated December 30, 1987, although it could not be published until February 20, 1988, in order to do justice to its subtitle "twenty years after the encyclical Populorum progressio ". To commemorate this anniversary of the encyclical Populorum Progressio , which Pope Paul VI. had published on March 26, 1967 under the motto "worldwide dimensions of the social question", the topic of the solidarity development of people and peoples should again be brought into public awareness.
On the situation in developing countries
The comprehensive development of human beings and the building of just societies are further focal points in the thought and preaching of John Paul II. On his pastoral trips - and these experiences he incorporates into this social encyclical - which took him all over the world, he was always new confronted with the economic, social, cultural and political conditions under which people and peoples live. He has an eye for the many poor and needy in developing countries , also for all those people who are denied their rights and who often have to live and work in inhumane conditions, especially for the precarious situation of families in which the Mothers, often left to their own devices, have to look after their children. The Pope reminds and exhorts - this is tantamount to an exhortation - the rich peoples of their responsibility to provide effective aid, at the same time he advocates far-reaching reforms of social structures in the developing countries.
About the definition development
In particular, the Pope wants to counteract the narrowing of the concept of development, as if it were essentially about economic, social and political development. With regard to some one-sided positions, it is said that economic development cannot liberate man; on the contrary, it ultimately enslaves people even more. Concerning the “current state of development” in the world, the Pope deplores the “gap between wealth and poverty, both between the countries of the north and the south and within many developing and industrialized countries ”. The main obstacle is seen as the political contrast between the “blocs” and their ideological roots, which can be found in the “principles of liberalist capitalism ” and “Marxist collectivism ”. With these statements, the Pope remains within the framework of the traditional delimitations as drawn up in the social proclamation of the Church since Rerum novarum and Quadragesimo anno . However, he set new accents when he demanded that the “right to economic initiative” should not be suppressed. Experience teaches that the denial of such a right or its limitation in the name of an alleged equality paralyzes or even destroys it. The result is not so much a real equality as a "leveling down". Finally, the Pope drafted the model of a "solidary society".
The Pope recognizes the positive achievements of science , technology , economy and politics , but insists on shaping progress according to basic moral convictions.
Against misinterpretations in social teaching
The Pope was obviously aware of the fact that there are misunderstandings and misinterpretations both within and outside the church with regard to social teaching . In several places he addresses these dangers and tried not to overstep the church's authority. But he was also aware that neither the church nor the Christians and the believers could solve the problems alone.
Ecological issues
Sollicitudo rei socialis discusses the problems of progress and development also with a view to the ecological question . John Paul sees the crisis in development thinking not only in the underdevelopment of many regions around the world, but also in the "overdevelopment" of individual states, whose general lifestyles "involve so much 'waste' and" waste "" (Zf Encyclical ). Man should not base his relationship with the environment solely on economic criteria; rather, it must "take into account the nature of every being and its interrelationship in an ordered system such as the cosmos." A sharper awareness of the "limitations of natural resources, some of which [...] do not regenerate" (Zf. 34.2 ff.) Is also required. In referring to the responsibility for future generations, the Pope takes up individual motifs of the sustainability principle without explicitly mentioning it.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Further: Thorsten Philipp, Green Zones of a Learning Community: Environmental Protection as a Place of Action, Effect and Experience of the Church. Munich (oekom) Munich 2009. ISBN 978-3-86581-177-6 , pp. 102-104.
literature
- Federal Association of the Catholic Workers' Movement - KAB (Ed.), Texts on Catholic Social Doctrine - The social circulars of the Popes and other church documents , Ketteler Verlag, Bornheim, ISBN 3-927494-01-1 and Verlag Butzon & Bercker, Kevelaer, ISBN 3-7666-9789-7 , both 1992
- Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace (ed.), Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church , Herder Verlag, Freiburg im Breisgau, 2006, ISBN 3-451-29078-2
- Karl Gabriel / Wolfgang Klein / Werner Krämer (eds.), The social responsibility of the church: On the encyclical Sollicitudo rei socialis. Düsseldorf 1988. ISBN 978-3-491-77702-6 .
- Johannes Paul II / Wilhelm Korff / Alois Baumgarner, Solidarity - the answer to the misery in today's world. Encyclical SOLLICITUDO REI SOCIALIS Pope John Paul II. Freiburg 1988. ISBN 3-451-21310-9 .
- Thorsten Philipp, green areas of a learning community: environmental protection as a place of action, effect and experience of the church. Munich (oekom) Munich 2009. ISBN 978-3-86581-177-6 .
Web links
