Cardinal Maradiaga, who is one of the pope's top advisers, went on to say that the free market is "the new idol," lambasting those who adhere to libertarian economic policies in the face of the poor's suffering....
...Williamson, like the arch-libertarians Maradiaga criticizes, presupposes that the production of wealth gives its producers some special entitlement to it, that it belongs rightfully to them in an absolute and fundamental way. Yet, this is the kernel of Maradiaga's argument: When states are assembled in order to protect and enforce ownership to the exclusion of the poor, then a twofold error has been committed (at least from the Catholic perspective).The Week
First, there is no divine right to private property in the eyes of the church. Consider St. Augustine's explanation of the origin of property....
Augustine's point is that property is a de facto creation of the state. It's a fairly simple idea: By creating property laws and then enforcing those laws with force (such as the armed forces and police), the state shapes and maintains property ownership. This legal realist position has been more recently popularized by the early 20th century jurist Robert Hale and by philosopher Thomas Nagel.
This is the second point Williamson on which departs from church wisdom. For the libertarian, Williamson says, government simply has no moral dimension:
...[T]here is an implicit and sometimes explicit belief that the state is a channel for moral expression, whether that expression takes the form of entrenching traditional ideals about family life or or collaborating with the state in the seizure and redistribution of wealth… But the state is in fact no such thing. It is a piece of social software, a technology, a tool with no more moral significance in and of itself than a hammer. [National Review]
But to deny the moral dimension of government is to suggest that there are realms of human life exempt, somehow, from moral judgment, and this is emphatically contrary to the Christian vision.
An adviser to Pope Francis says Catholicism is incompatible with libertarianism. He's right.
Elizabeth Stoker | divinity student at Cambridge University
(h/t Brad DeLong)
2 comments:
Williamson: "[T]here is an implicit and sometimes explicit belief that the state is a channel for moral expression, whether that expression takes the form of entrenching traditional ideals about family life or or collaborating with the state in the seizure and redistribution of wealth… But the state is in fact no such thing. It is a piece of social software, a technology, a tool with no more moral significance in and of itself than a hammer."
OK so Williamson claims this about the govt institution while I think it fair to say that the Pope/Christendom would say the same thing about govt and instead would place "the church" in the position of the institution that is the "channel of moral expression" which is all false...
No where in scripture is there any doctrine that can lead one to think that the establishment of a human institution such as what is commonly termed "the church" today is directed to be established... this whole concept of "the church" institution is a product of human reason and is a complete non-scriptural fabrication ...
"The church" has become extant and challenges/antagonizes the true superior authority of our govt institution ALL THE TIME...
you see this guy Brat from VA-7 (a seminarian) doing this with his "we need to preach the gospel instead of creating laws/regulations... blah blah..." so Brat throws the institution known as "the church" up against the institution of civil govt (which is in truth the superior authority) and the Pope does this all the time with his "church" based "charity", soup kitchens, etc....
Paul: " Let every soul be subject to the superior authorities, for there is no authority except under God ... so that he who is resisting an authority has withstood God's mandate. ...for magistrates are not a fear to the good act, but to the evil. Now you do not want to be fearing the authority."
So until "the church" realizes this about itself as an institution, ie that it has no authority, then we are in a '2 wrongs dont make a right' type of situation...
"the church" has to get out of the "authority business" completely and realize that human authority is to be solely administered via the govt institution ...
These musings by Maradiaga miss all of this... its a step in the right direction but comes up waaaay short...
the Pope and Maradiaga are rightly criticizing these libertarians while at the same time are members of THE MOST visible sect of Christendom that is ALSO constantly antagonistic towards the govt institution that Paul CLEARLY identifies as the 'superior authority'...
"the church" in truth has NO AUTHORITY and needs to stand down also and turn it back over to the govt institution.... "the church" is just as guilty of the things that they criticize the libertarians of doing here... "the church" are hypocrites in this regard.
rsp,
Re: realize that human authority is to be solely administered via the govt institution ...
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Are you out of your mind? What are you, a CIA or CFR employee? An Orwell fan? An essentially naive intellectual "useful idiot"? A communist in the literal sense--the state owns you ideology?
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