✕

POPE LEO XIV

Pope Leo XIV
A warm welcome to Pope Leo XIV from the Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice Foundation, its members, their families and their stakeholders. We look forward to sharing Pope Leo XIV's contributions to Catholic social teaching.
READ HIS ADDRESS TO THE WORLD READ HIS FIRST ADDRESS TO CAPP
  • ABOUT CST
    • The Three Principles
      • The Three Principles
      • Human Dignity
      • Solidarity
      • Subsidiarity
      • What is Catholic Social Teaching?
    • Major Themes
      • The Common Good
      • Preferential Option for the Poor
      • Right to Private Property
      • Universal Destination of Goods
      • The Dignity of Work
    • Pathologies
      • 4 Dangers to Society
      • Consumerism
      • Environmental Degradation
      • Physical Environment
      • Human Environment
      • Integral Ecology
      • Alienation
    • The Family
      • What is The Family?
      • The Family and the State
      • The Family is Connected to Ecology
    • Contemporary Issues
      • Abortion
      • Climate Change
      • Democratic Socialism
      • Euthanasia
      • Gun Control and Self-Defense
      • Homosexuality
      • Immigration
      • Racism in the United States
      • The Death Penalty
      • The Dignity of Work
      • The COVID-19 Response
      • Transgenderism
      • Universal Healthcare
      • Voting
    • Structures of Society
      • Overview
      • Culture
      • Economics
      • Politics
  • Articles
  • Events
  • Newsletter
  • Donate
  • About CAPP
    • CAPP-USA Introduction
    • CAPP-USA Team
    • Join CAPP
    • Papal Addresses to CAPP
    • Study Center
    • Articles
    • Magisterial Resources
    • Infographics & Videos
    • Announcements
    • Vatican Home
POPE LEO XIV'S FIRST ADDRESS TO CAPP
Join our Articles community
XFacebookLinkedInEmailPrint
Join our Newsletter

 

Quotes about Government

 

by CAPP-USA

 

Here are quotes about government, its purpose and limits, from the Church.

Here are quotes about government from the Church.

Understanding Government Through Catholic Social Teaching


The Catholic Church has a nuanced view of government grounded in her social teaching and theological principles. In essence, the Catholic Church sees government as essential for promoting the common good, justice, and peace.

Just as John Locke (1632–1704) argued peoples’ rights, such as life, liberty, and property, have a foundation independent of the laws of any particular society. The Church insists that government authority must respect:

Moral Principles

  1. To “give democracy an authentic and solid foundation” rights must be recognized, including “the right to life…the right to live in a united family and in a moral environment…the right to develop one’s intelligence and freedom in seeking and knowing the truth; the right to share in the work which makes wise use of the earth’s material resources… and the right freely to establish a family… In a certain sense, the source and synthesis of these rights is religious freedom”. (Pope St. John Paul II, 47)

Human Dignity

  1. “Democracy succeeds only to the extent that it is based on truth and a correct understanding of the human person.” (Pope Benedict XVI)
  2. The State “should never fail in its fundamental task of respecting and fostering the family”. (Pope St. John Paul II, 45)

The Principle of Subsidiarity

  1. Subsidiarity “insists on necessary limits to the State’s intervention…inasmuch as the individual, the family and society are prior to the state and inasmuch as the State exists in order to protect their rights and not stifle them”. (Pope St. John Paul II, 11)
  2. “The State which would provide everything (a welfare state), absorbing everything into itself, would ultimately become a mere bureaucracy incapable of guaranteeing the very thing which the suffering person, every person needs: namely, loving personal concern.” (Pope Benedict XVI, 28)

Also, like John Locke, the Church defends the principle of majority rule and the separation of legislative and executive powers.

  1. “[I]t is preferable that each power be balanced by other powers and by other spheres of responsibility which keep it within proper bounds. This is the principle of the ‘rule of law’, in which the law is sovereign, and not the arbitrary will of individuals.” (Pope St. John Paul II, 44)
  2. ‘Democracy’ is “the most valid historical instrument” for advancing human rights and development, and has proven to be an effective means of “guaranteeing the future in a way worthy of man”. (Pope Benedict XVI)
  3. “[I]n our day when the activity of the state is so vast and decisive, the democratic form of government appears to many as a postulate of nature imposed by reason itself.” (Pope Pius XII, Section I)

The Church also insists on citizen involvement.

  1. “We, Christians, cannot ‘play Pilate’ and wash our hands…We must participate in politics because politics is one of the highest forms of charity because it seeks the common good. And Christian lay people must work in politics.” (Pope Francis)
  2. “Why has [politics] become tainted? Because Christians have not participated in politics with an evangelical spirit? …To work for the common good is a Christian duty”. (Pope Francis)

However, the Catholic Church is not a political institution.

  1. “The church does not have technical solutions to offer and does not claim ‘to interfere in any way in the politics of states’ (Populorum Progressio, 13).” (Pope Benedict XVI, 9)
  2. Rather, the Church “seeks to help form consciences in political life”. (Pope Benedict XVI, 28)
Back to Articles
Three circles containing symbols of the three principles of catholic social teaching: human dignity, subsidiarity, and solidarity.

Three Key Principles

Catholic social teaching is built on three foundational principles - Human Dignity, Solidarity and Subsidiarity. Human Dignity, embodied in a correct understanding of the human person, is the greatest. The others flow from it. Good governments and good economic systems find ways of fostering the three principles.

Human Dignity

This means a correct understanding of the human person and of each person’s unique value. All Catholic social teaching flows from this: the inherent dignity of every person that comes from being made in God’s image. 

Solidarity

Solidarity is not “a feeling of vague compassion or shallow distress at the misfortunes of others. It is a firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good”. (Pope St. John Paul II, 38) Love of God and love of neighbor are, in fact, linked and form one, single commandment.

Subsidiarity

Subsidiarity “is a fundamental principle of social philosophy, fixed and unchangeable, that one should not withdraw from individuals and commit to the community what they can accomplish by their own enterprise and industry. So, too, it is an injustice and at the same time a grave evil and a disturbance of right order to transfer to the larger and higher collectivity functions which can be performed and provided for by the lesser and subordinate bodies”. (Pope Pius XI)

Sign Up For Our Newsletter:

Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice, Inc (CAPP-USA) is the United States affiliate of Fondazione Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice at the Vatican. | Sitemap
  • Follow
  • Follow
  • Follow
  • Follow

[email protected]

Phone: (888) 473-3331
Address: 295 Madison Avenue, 12th Floor, New York, NY, 10017

Join

Join our Articles Community
Bi-weekly insights facing our society.
Join our Articles Community
Bi-weekly insights facing our society.