As previously explained, I've enrolled in the University of Notre Dame's Satellite Theological Education Program (STEP) to pursue their Certificate in Doctrine. I've already taken three of the six required courses. I'm currently taking my fourth STEP course Catholic Social Teaching:
This pastoral theology course serves as an introduction to Catholic Social Teaching and to practical methods for participating in social ministry in the Church today. Through participation in the course, students will be able to identify basic principles of Catholic Social Teaching drawn from Scripture and magisterial documents, apply these principles to activity for justice in their parish and local communities, and differentiate between social justice and charitable works.
This course is not one of the six I need to compete my Certificate. As regular readers know, however, I am deeply interested in CST:
I've taught a seminar on Catholic Social Thought and the Law at UCLA School of Law. I'm planning on teaching the seminar again next year (2018-19) and am looking forward to this course giving me more knowledge to share.
My article, Catholic Social Thought and the Corporation, was published in vol. 1, no.2 of the Journal of Catholic Social Thought.
My article, UCLA law professor takes Bishop McElroy to task over unions, which was published by the California Catholic Daily, discusses Catholic Social Teaching with respect to labor unions.
Week 1 is "Introduction to Social Ministry and Catholic Social Teaching." Here are my answers to the discussion questions.
The lecture discusses Jesus's expansive notion of "neighbor." Who within the "neighborhood" of our one human family is easy to love? Who is difficult to love?
In Mere Christianity
When I look into my own mind, I find that I do not love myself by thinking myself a dear old chap or having affectionate feelings. I do not think that I love myself because I am particularly good, but just because I am myself and quite apart from my character. I might detest something which I have done. Nevertheless, I do not cease to love myself. In other words, that definite distinction that Christians make between hating sin and loving the sinner is one that you have been making in your own case since you were born. You dislike what you have done, but you don’t cease to love yourself. You may even think that you ought to be hanged. You may even think that you ought to go to the police and own up and be hanged. Love is not an affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person’s ultimate good as far as it can be obtained.
Are you tempted to avoid suffering when you encounter it in your daily life or in the news? If so, how do you respond to that temptation?
The question of human suffering is one of the profound mysteries with which any religion or philosophy must grapple. For an accessible introduction to the problem, I highly recommend CS Lewis' The Problem of Pain
Only a sadist or masochist would embrace suffering (the former that of others; the latter that of self). As Christians, however, we are called upon not to shrink from suffering even though we should not embrace it.
How should we understand our own suffering?
It is possible that God is using suffering to correct us when we depart from his path and as a form of temporal punishment for our sins. "Do not disdain the discipline of the Lord . . . for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he receives" (Heb. 12:5). Yet, this is far from a complete explanation of suffering. As JP II points out, the story of Job "challenges the truth of the principle that identifies suffering with punishment for sin." "God himself ... recognizes that Job is not guilty. His suffering is the suffering of someone who is innocent ...." Accordingly, it is not true that all suffering is a consequence of a fault and has the nature of a punishment. (Emphasis in original.)
Secondly, suffering can be a way of strengthening our relationship with God. When we suffer, we are to endure, confident that God will not test us beyond our abilities, but rather will use suffering to strengthen our will and faith if we allow him to use it in our lives.
Finally, as JP II wrote, that "each man, in his suffering, can also become a sharer in the redemptive suffering of Christ." As Bishop Rhodes explained, this means that "With faith, we offer our sufferings up to God and He uses them in a mysterious and powerful way for the redemption of the world through the power of love, the love that is the very inner life of God."
As for the suffering of others, is there any clearer example of the proper Christian response than the Parable of the Good Samaritan? Again, JP II wrote:
We are not allowed to "pass by on the other side" indifferently; we must "stop" beside him. Everyone who stops beside the suffering of another person, whatever form it may take, is a Good Samaritan. ... [T]he Good Samaritan of Christ's parable does not stop at sympathy and compassion alone. They become for him an incentive to actions aimed at bringing help to the injured man. In a word, then, a Good Samaritan is one who brings help in suffering, whatever its nature may be. Help which is, as far as possible, effective. He puts his whole heart into it, nor does he spare material means.
What’s one Scripture passage from the Old or New Testament about God’s special love for the poor and marginalized that inspires and/or challenges you?
I am particularly struck by the juxtaposition in Matthew of the Parable of the Talents and the Parable of the Judgment of the Nations (a.k.a. Parable of the Sheep and the Goats).
The basic theological lesson Jesus presumably intended those who heard the former is the obligation of his followers to earnestly labor in service of the Kingdom of God. His followers were not to hide their light under the proverbial bushel, but rather to use their talents (if you will pardon a weak pun) to the fullest extent of their abilities to fulfill the Great Commission. The latter drives home the message by starkly illustrating the fate of those who fail to care for those for whom Jesus had especial regard. As Paul Johnson observed in Jesus: A Biography from a Believer
Jesus immediately passes [from the Parable of the Talents] to the judgment where the unworldly are divided from the worldly: “And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left” (Mt 25:33). He tells the sheep: “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you” (25:34). Jesus goes on to explain that those in this world who feed the hungry and the thirsty, and who take in homeless strangers, and who clothe the naked, and who visit the sick and the imprisoned shall be rewarded, and he makes the striking point that whoever befriends “the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me” (25:40).
The lesson is unmistakeable.
