> Why is the argument that we have to be better than our nature not applicable in the context of economics?
This is an extremely common theme across the Catholic Church, though?? It’s one of the primary reasons the church is against Socialism - it reduces people to their economic status and strips them of their inherent human dignity through that process. Agree with it or not, it’s absolutely ignorant to imply the Church doesn’t apply its moral teachings to economic scenarios.
This is because dignity is somehow naturally aligned with property, indirectly power? I give an example where it does apply moral teachings to economic scenarios myself, e.g. monastic life. If you mean that the natural property argument is to be considered a moral teaching then I don’t see how morals and not mere power dynamics are required for this model. Can you give an example so that I can assess if my implied ignorance refers to other scenarios?
I would argue that any economic system concerns itself with human as an economic agent, capitalism and socialism alike. Is church against capitalism too? If yes, that’s not what this circular reads like.
The claim was that the Church holds much property of value, which is true although what price do you put on the Vatican?
Catholic Chuch property holdings in Australia come to approx $30 billion (AU) and includes many rentals.
Globally there are at least 5,000 properties recently listed in a partial Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See report on real estate holdings (see Reuters and other outlets for that report).
"Trillions" in the GP comment is hypothetical value .. again, how can the many cathedrals be realistically valued .. they are more or less 'priceless' artifacts of cultural heritage .. although the fire at Notre Dame certainly gave us a ballpark on how much rennovations can cost and what will be put up in donations towards that work.
You’re absolutely right that I misread his comment, thanks
Still, my larger point is that while they all follow the pope, they also are all individual groups with their own finances, problems, and goals. The idea that the pope might sell one church to support another, for instance, is not how it could work in reality.
How it has worked, until recently at least, is opaquely with little real oversight into various national chapters or into the more octopus like tendrils of the central body.
It's been only a decade since any real effort has been applied to financial transperancy in the Catholic Church affairs:
Whatever that was or may still be under a new Pope was likely disrupted by the court room adventures of Cardinal George Pell.
> The idea that the pope might sell one church to support another
My read, admittedly a skim some years back, of Catholic Church real estate reports is that church property ownerships are a small part of a larger, much larger, real estate portfolio that includes mueseums, schools, apratment complexes, large historic multi-million dollar houses with spectacular views in Sydney, commercial office complexes for rent, etc.
I’m not here to argue if you agree with their assessment of socialism, I’m pointing out that it was ignorant and incorrect to say that they don’t put emphasis on the idea that you must apply your better nature to economics. There is absolutely no reason to believe this - it comes across as a weird lie because it’s so obviously incorrect.
Do you have some basis for this belief? It’s so out of left field and counter to everything I’ve ever seen in the Church that I’m not sure where it could’ve originated from. It’s like saying the Church supports abortion or something.
Where is it left field I struggle to see, in the context of the document we discuss this is. E.g I read paragraph 5 and I would struggle to say whether this is written by a Pope or a cheap Adam Smith knock off. Adam Smith had more moral sensitivity than this.
“5. It is surely undeniable that, when a man engages in remunerative labor, the impelling reason and motive of his work is to obtain property, and thereafter to hold it as his very own. If one man hires out to another his strength or skill, he does so for the purpose of receiving in return what is necessary for the satisfaction of his needs; he therefore expressly intends to acquire a right full and real, not only to the remuneration, but also to the disposal of such remuneration, just as he pleases. Thus, if he lives sparingly, saves money, and, for greater security, invests his savings in land, the land, in such case, is only his wages under another form; and, consequently, a working man's little estate thus purchased should be as completely at his full disposal as are the wages he receives for his labor. But it is precisely in such power of disposal that ownership obtains, whether the property consist of land or chattels.
8. The fact that God has given the earth for the use and enjoyment of the whole human race can in no way be a bar to the owning of private property. For God has granted the earth to mankind in general, not in the sense that all without distinction can deal with it as they like, but rather that no part of it was assigned to any one in particular, and that the limits of private possession have been left to be fixed by man's own industry, and by the laws of individual races. Moreover, the earth, even though apportioned among private owners, ceases not thereby to minister to the needs of all, inasmuch as there is not one who does not sustain life from what the land produces. Those who do not possess the soil contribute their labor; hence, it may truly be said that all human subsistence is derived either from labor on one's own land, or from some toil, some calling, which is paid for either in the produce of the land itself, or in that which is exchanged for what the land brings forth.
”
I think you confuse my critique of a document as criticism of a body of Church that is expressed in much more than a papal opinion.
This is an extremely common theme across the Catholic Church, though?? It’s one of the primary reasons the church is against Socialism - it reduces people to their economic status and strips them of their inherent human dignity through that process. Agree with it or not, it’s absolutely ignorant to imply the Church doesn’t apply its moral teachings to economic scenarios.