Your Excellency, Archbishop Weakland, Chairman of this Committee on Catholic Social Teaching and the American Economy; Most Reverend Bishops, members of the Committee; distinguished and learned friends: -- I am not an economist. I am not a businessman, banker, stock market expert’ or international financier.
I am not an expert on international trade, nor an authority on world poverty. I am not a socialist or social democrat, nor a Marxist whether socialist or communist, nor a capitalist a la Rockefeller, Ford, & Carnegie; J. Paul Getty, Daniel K. Ludwig; the Hunt family, the Flick family, the Mellon family, the Rothschilds, the Saudis, or the Aga Khan. Nor am I a wandering intellectual, discovering the heretofore hidden spirit of democratic capitalism. I’m not even sure whether today we are in a Depression with a capital “D” or in a recession with a small “r”.
So, why am I here?
I’m not sure. My only qualification may be that for some 40 years I’ve talked to, argued with, or been taught by many of the most famous world leaders in politics, economics, labor, and industry. Yet from all of them, especially from the economists, I’ve really learned only one important truth: -- none of them has “the” answer to the economic and social needs of modern man. There is no nation where men and women today are fulfilled in all their social, economic, or spiritual needs. And it’s unlikely that any contemporary nation- state can fulfill those needs. That’s what I know from experience and from knowledge of the various competing, modern economic and social theories. None of them answers the needs of human persons. And that’s about all I know for certain.
So I’ve decided that the best service I can render today is simply to outline what I think might be a format for addressing the immense subject you are reflecting upon, -- a structural approach which might avoid a lot of grief, shed a modest amount of light, and perhaps point all of us in a useful direction. In other words, I’m not going to focus on the social encyclicals of the Popes except to say that I wish all Catholics would read them, believe them, and follow them. They contain the closest approach to truth concerning the condition of humankind today and the best proposals for improving that condition.
You have superb authorities on those documents ready to help you to distill the wisdom from those documents and apply it to social conditions in our country. Some of the best of those authorities are in this room and, in this city.
So I shall not dwell on this crucial element of your proposed statement. Secondly, I’m not going to argue whether Milton Friedman or Jim Tobin or Walter Heller, or Paul Volcker or Martin Feldstein or Paul Samuelson is right. Nor will I invoke Alfred Sloan or “Boss” Kettering, or Henry Kaufman or Felix Rohaytn or George Greder or William Buckley. Frankly, I don’t think it would be wise for the NCCB to get involved in their disputations. Leave the theologians of money to their occult tasks. I recommend a different approach.
First of all, I suggest that NCCB’s statement be set forth under the theme or title “Thou shall renew the face of the Earth.” I recommend this over all theme because, first, it acknowledges implicitly that the economists, bankers, politicians, all together, do not know how to manage the American, let alone the world economy, today. No one knows how to direct a modern, industrial state in an interdependent world – not Brezhnev, nor Schmidt, nor Giscard d’Estaing, nor Margaret Thacher, nor Ronald Reagan or Jimmy Carter. Nor can any one person or country hope to do so because no one controls all the important variables. No single President, Prime Minister, General Secretary or King, has all the levers of economic and social power and influence in his or her hands; if one person did have all the power there’s no evidence that any one has the necessary intelligence, the system, or the wisdom.
Secondly, this theme acknowledges explicitly our dependence upon and need for help from the Holy Spirit. Without Him, no one, no Pope, no Council, no empire, is going to be able to renew the face of the Earth, ecologically, socially, economically, politically, or spiritually. To those who will object that acknowledging this fact introduces a “non-scientific” element into economics, social science, and social ethics, I maintain that this element is precisely the essential contribution which the Church can make. If we really believe in the necessity for Divine assistance in all we do, we should start right off by asserting that the Holy Spirit is the essential force without which we are doomed to failure.
After the dedication and an explanation of its relevance I suggest an opening section, or “first movement,” wherein the following main themes would be enunciated: --
First: Thanksgiving.
I believe it would be wise to start off by thanking God for our economic and social freedom in the U.S.A.:
(a) The laws which permit private foundations to flourish and provide tax exemptions for religious and private philanthropy.
(b) The freedom we Catholics enjoy to have our own schools, newspapers, and magazines, TV, seminaries, hospitals, etc.
(c) The freedom which has permitted Catholicism to grow from a tiny minority in 1776 to the largest religious group in America in 1976.
And so on. Especially if the Bishops are going to be critical, as they should be, they should start off by enunciating, on behalf of all Catholics, our deep gratitude for the political, social, and economic system which has permitted our freedom and growth.
Second, I think we should ask for Forgiveness. Labor relations within our Catholic institutions are not without fault. This is a thorny problem, but no one could successfully contend that all Catholic institutions or dioceses have been, or even are now, shining examples of perfect labor relations. Monsignor John Ryan, Bishop Sheil and many others have been vociferous about this question for 50 years.
Race relations likewise have not always been exemplary in Catholic institutions and dioceses. They still are bad in many places; and in many Catholic families anti-Semitism, anti-black, and anti-foreigner sentiments are endemic and cancerous. We are in a weak position to pontificate on Catholic social teaching without beating our breasts in shame for our own weakness and derelictions, our own failures to teach our people successfully.
In financial matters our Church likewise suffers from a history of questionable practices. Within the last 20 years here in our own country there have been several “scandals”, coupled with the kind of “stonewalling” we excoriate in a Richard Nixon. Even now financial disclosure is the exception rather than the rule in some church-related organizations and in some dioceses.
It is also true that our beloved Church was not able to accept and encourage legitimate freedoms for the human person until Vatican II endorsed much of John Courtney Murray’s research and writings and the similar research of other eminent Catholics some of whom were “silenced” during their lives. James Cardinal Gibbons had to struggle to save the Knights of Labor from Papal condemnation 75 years ago! So we must confess our mistakes of the past in many matters of political and social policy without in any way implying any mistakes in matters of, faith and dogma. (I won’t even discuss the serious question of the place and role of women within the Church, though this, too, is in an area of “social teaching” where we American Catholics might well play a, leading part in reformulating Catholic Social Policy.)
Third: Reconciliation, I suggest, should be an important theme of the opening section of your proposed statement. By reconciliation I mean we should first admit our own dependence on one another. The American illusion of the self-made man, the “tall in the saddle” horseman should be exorcised from our mythology. We are all dependent, not independent. We depend first on God who gives us our life, our energy, our capacity for thinking, our bodies, our health, our fortunes, everything. We depend on one another -- on our wives, children, employees, bosses, public servants, doctors, teachers, priests., etc.. None of us could “go it alone” for a week without failure. Capital depends on labor and both depend on just public policies. Catholics need to work cooperatively with Protestants, Jews, Muslims, and atheists in this society, and they have to work cooperatively with us. The rich need the poor! The strong need the weak! The smart need the retarded. Without all of these we would all be less human. And bored. I spent 3-1/2 years on submarines in WW II.
Everyone on board was a Volunteer and everyone had to meet rigorous, identical, psychological, physical, and intelligence tests. So we were all males; all less than 6 feet 3 inches tall; all 215 lbs. or less; all with 20-20 vision; all with low “boiling points"; all unflappable under pressure; all healthy; all “normal’ -- and all bored! Except when actually in life-and-death action, we came to realize that a world made up of people all like us would be an incredibly dull place. So, let’s thank God for making us all different, and pray that we don’t ruin His works by egotistic stupidity, -- trying “create” a new Soviet man, or a new Aryan man, or a new American model for the world ... Yankee know-how with all its attendant hubris and naiveté.
Fourth: I would emphasize the need for “Union Now”. Not just a more perfect union of states or of politics or economics. I mean Union Now for people, for individual human beings.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. told me ten years ago that loneliness was the worst problem in America ... worse than cancer, heart disease, or poverty. More people suffer from loneliness than any other affliction, he told me. I’ve come to believe he may well have been right.
For me, for Catholics, Union Now should start, I believe, with an emphasis on our need, psychological as well as spiritual, for union now with God. We must learn how to live in union with Him, now, on this earth, at this minute. Living in union with Him means we must learn to live in union with our wives, our children, our parents, our neighbors, our community. We should demand that our so-called “leaders”, demonstrate that they are experts in creating unity: -- between races, regions, economic groups. The free market as the determinative of value must be denounced. As the saying goes - - many people know the price of everything and the value of nothing. “Enemies lists”, violent abrasive language, negative TV Commercials, guilt by association arguments, must be seen to disqualify such persons from positions of public trust. Our Church could take a lead in showing how our Lord never cast any stones, let alone, the first one, never sought revenge, never attacked those who sought to do Him harm. And always ought to unify everyone under the Fatherhood of God: -- sinners, prostitutes, moneychangers, army officers, tax gatherers, Samaritans, Gentiles, Jews, and even lawyers.
To me these Christian ideas are not just rhetoric, or descriptions of God-like conduct we are not meant really to emulate. I believe that our Lord tells us that we are called to lead that kind of life, now, here on earth.
That’s what He meant, I believe, by “Thy Kingdom Come”. He meant we should pray that His Kingdom come right now, inside of us, and be revealed in our actions, right now, in what we say and how we act with everyone, -- even with the Soviet Union!
These are the principal points I would emphasize in. Part I of your proposed statement. Why? Because these points, or better ones, illustrate the Christian attitude we should take, I believe, to questions of economic life. And they set the stage for an objective evaluation of the American Economy and Catholic Social Teaching. Moreover, Catholic Bishops are the best able, best positioned, most respected group in America to emphasize these spiritual elements, these religious imperatives, without which all the experts in economics are at a loss. As David Stockman said: -- ..."We can run the numbers any way you want...” Or as Bob McNamara has said many times “We can balance the budget at any level. Just tell us what you want...”
Part II of your proposed statement could then focus on a detailed, item-by-item analysis of specific Catholic social teachings as they are rejected, fulfilled, or partially recognized by The American Economy today. To perform this task fully and convincingly is by itself a Herculean endeavor. It can be done; but it will require a task force of experts to succeed. The simplest approach might be to analyze every competing “ism” and show how it fails to fulfill the principles of Section I. “Socialism”, “Communism”, Keynesianism, Libertarianism, Adam Smith-ism, each in turn could be described, as St. Thomas did, by putting the best face on every one of them, making the best arguments for each, and demolishing them one-by-one. At the end there would be only “Christianism” capable, even theoretically, of meeting all the needs of human beings in a just society.
This approach would be too abstract, too philosophical, too theoretical for me. But it would be, if properly done, an immense contribution to clarity of thought in contemporary politics and social theory.
A second alternative approach would be to ground your analysis on natural law. Our Catholic tradition rests on a firm foundation of natural law, beginning with a clear expression of the nature of man, the nature of the family, the purposes of society, the role of governments and rulers, the nature and purposes of work, etc.. Our Catholic tradition and viewpoint about these fundamental realities is denied, explicitly and implicitly, by the two, most popular, competing theories today: -- the socialism of Karl Marx, and the capitalism of Adam Smith. Both of these theories are non-Christian or anti-Christian. Both have their own iron “laws”, the laws of historical necessity or the laws of the market. Both look upon man as materialistic, a creature or being whose destiny and development is bound by “laws”, or verities, which operate regardless of man. Like “the laws of nature”, or the Calvinism exposed in Max Weber’s famous treatise, “The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism’, these systems contain their own idea of man and his destiny. Didn’t Calvin argue that the rich man deserved their riches, that their riches proved they were doing well in God’s sight, etc.? Didn’t Marx say he didn’t really worry about the triumph of the proletariat because the laws of history were absolutely certain to effectuate that triumph? In brief, and too briefly, both these systems (one here in the USA., the other in the USSR) are based on systems of natural law profoundly different from the Catholic tradition.
These differences partly explain why the Social Encyclicals have been so difficult for Americans to understand or accept or follow. We Americans wallow in an Adam Smith world of economic “laws” profoundly different from our Catholic philosophical tradition. The Pope’s in their Social Encyclicals describe and call for a society manifestly different from Marxist Socialism or Adam Smith capitalism; yet with Ronald Reagan espousing Adam Smith and the Politburo following Karl Marx, there is no alternative economic system or philosophical structure to turn to John Paul II condemns both communism and consumerism, and rightly so. But where is the detailed Catholic alternative?
N.C.C.B. has the beginnings of “the Catholic Alternative” to consumerism or communism in the reality of “The Campaign for Human Development,” in the recent Labor Day statement written by Ron Kritelmeyer, in its numerous statements on refugees, on housing, on hunger, in the actual work performed by Catholic Relief Services, in the volunteers working all over our country and abroad, especially in Latin America. There is no scarcity of documents or workers. But these activities are not seen by non-Christians or even by many Catholics as parts of a whole. For too many “The Church,” which is, of course, the whole, is seen primarily under its clerical or hierarchical aspect. We Catholics don’t look or act like a unified group of people following a philosophy of man and of society which is different from mainstream Americanism. We have been so anxious to prove our loyalty to the U.S.A. we have been afraid to put any distance between the followers of Christ and the Armed Services or political leadership of our nation. The era of Cardinal Spellman and J. Edgar Hoover has only recently passed and millions of patriotic Catholics are still living in that frame-of-mind.
So the task is immense. But the time is right. N.C.C.B. has an monumental task if it hopes that this Committee will outline and begin to define a Christian Alternative to consumerism; but if N.C.C.B. does hope for such an outcome, then I believe the Committee should enlist some of the best economists and best political philosophers to help. They exist; they are ready; but for the most part, they have never been asked to participate in the formulation of a Catholic or Christian Alternative.
A third possibility would be to take a more specific, precise objective and use it to illustrate, in practical terms, what a Catholic Alternative would mean. This could be accomplished by drafting and proposing an Ethical Budget, or a Christian Budget, as an alternative to the Existing Budget of the Federal Government?
This can be done. Famous economists are ready to do it. The econometrics people can “crunch out” the numbers, and they are ready and willing to try. They have been ready for several years, but to date no group of ethicists have been ready to provide the economists with the standards, the norms, the values, according to which the available monies and burdens should be raised and allocated.
Maybe now is the time and the N.C.C.B. the organization capable of providing the Christian standards within which the technicians would draft a different Federal Budget.
A proposed title for such a document might be:
“An Ethical Budget for America: A Coordinated, National Economic Policy Document Based on Ethical Standards, Practical Realities, and The Belief That The United States of America Can Be Morally Good, Materially Productive, and Financially Sound.”
The economists willing to work on the project would include: Lester Thurow; Gar Alperovitz; James Tobin; Kenneth Arrow; Washy Leontieff; Robert Lekachman; James Kuhn; Robert Solow; Francis Bator; Alan Ferguson; etc.
The ethicists could be: James Childress; John Raines; Alasdair Maclntyre; John Gunneman; Charles Powers; Baruch Brody; etc.
The time schedule would require some 12 – 14 months of work with publication scheduled for Labor Day Announcement. The program might cover the following points:
I. Analytical Exposition of the Ethical Values Underlying the Existing Budget
II. Critique of Those Values
III. Alternative Ethical Framework
IV. Application of Alternative Ethical Values to Specific Issues: --
a. Welfare
b. Arms Sales
c. Tax Reform
d. Health Policy
e. Jobs
f. Inflation
g. Etc.
V. Publication of the Alternative Ethical (or Christian) Budget
The future can rarely be predicted with assurance, but I have little doubt that if N.C.C.B. published an alternative budget for the Federal Government, and if that budget had been prepared with the skill and competence, in economic terms which have characterized such budgets when promulgated by The Brookings Institution, the impact on national policy would be immense, ... and beneficial.
Although Section Two of the outline I have been discussing would contain the “red meat” of the total statement, I continue to believe that America needs more than economics and politics and social ethics. Our country needs a spiritual vision or orientation capable of stabilizing individual lives, giving individual people a sense of where they come from, where they are going, how they can live happily without owning everything that’s advertised, why they need not fear every new possibility or idea. With money, sex, or fame as primary goals, many of our citizens have little to give them a sense of self-worth or accomplishment, or raison d’etre, as the French express it. And that’s what the nation and the citizens need.
This is precisely what the Church has; exactly what our Lord came to give; exactly what great spiritual writers and thinkers possess.
You, Archbishop Weakland, know better than anyone, what I am awkwardly trying to express. So I hope that you, as an inheritor of the profound Benedictine spiritual tradition, can help us all to understand what’s missing in our lives and why Catholic Social Teaching can reposition us individually and our society as a whole. We’ve got to have an understanding of ourselves and of our common humanity which exceeds and transcends Adam Smith and Karl Marx, and even Thomas Jefferson. My own hope is that we can begin to replace “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” with “life, liberty, and the pursuit of holiness,” – because holiness achieved is happiness complete.
Perhaps one could envision a 51st State, transcending all our existing state geographical boundaries, in which everyone could live a special life, a spiritual life, which would give each person a sense of security, belonging, community, and purpose. Maybe that’s what we really mean by living in the State of Grace. If so, that’s a State for which this Committee is especially qualified to recruit citizens.
