Thanks for your patience… we encountered a technical problem publishing this TMC newsletter.
Perhaps it was meant to be as this is our 70th edition of the TMC Newsletter and now coincides with the election of Pope Leo XIV.
The new pope, formerly Cardinal Robert Francis Prevost born in Chicago in 1955 is a relatively young pontiff and he holds dual citizenship in both the USA and Peru. He has lived most of his life serving as a missionary and leader in the Augustinian Order based in Peru and then on the Dicastery for Bishops. He was not widely touted to be papabile so no doubt the world’s bookies have made a killing!
We will discover more about the new Pope as the weeks roll on but there are two providential features of his first appearance for our work at Thomas More.
The first is that that he has adopted the name: Pope Leo XIV, the first 21st century Pope to refer back to the papal father of modern Catholic Social Teaching, Pope Leo XIII (1810-1903) with groundbreaking encyclical on social principles: Rerum Novarum ( 25th May,1891)
The second theme that is promising is his assurance that he comes to build peace not only in the world but in the Church. Our article today is about the united efforts of Bishops, priests and laypeople in working to produce an original and hope giving blueprint for Australia after the Second World War in the early 1940s. Let us pray that Pope Leo XIV can spearhead this promise.
Much of the digital globe has eyes on the Church. This week in Australia, in the wake of the recent Federal elections, we are also asking about the future and the essence of our own country.
Christianity has always lived in tension with the ruling elites, cultural trends, the living of charity and the kerygma, that is, the proclaiming and living out of the core truths about the redemption wrought by Jesus Christ.
Over the last two centuries, Christians—lay, clerical and consecrated—have realised that in the face of many radical changes in society, work, family and technology, they would need to become spiritually and intellectually intentional about the implications of their faith.
In the Catholic tradition this awareness gave rise to movements which attempted to respond to these challenges in personal development, action and in concrete proposals.
The broad heading for this response was “Catholic Action” but it was not without controversy. All the groups saw their work as essentially transformative but the emphases were often very different.
It is a notoriously difficult area, to define the scope of social teaching and to understand precisely how the principles arise and are given authority. The Catholic Church’s Compendium on Social Doctrine acknowledges this:
Catholic Social Teaching “… is the expression of the way that the Church understands society and of her position regarding social structures and changes. The whole of the Church community—priests, religious and laity—participates in the formulation of this social doctrine, each according to the different tasks, charisms and ministries found within her.” (n.79).
It is not surprising that even in Australia, there was sometimes great tension between various members of the hierarchy and rival groups differently interpreting both society and the principles of this teaching.
There were some highlights of cooperation.
Over 85 years ago this month, the Australian Catholic Bishops declared that the third Sunday of Easter would be consecrated as: “Social Justice Sunday.”
It was initially planned that this Sunday would fall within the Octave of a Solemnity called at that time “The Patronage of St Joseph” which was established by Pope Saint Pius X as the Wednesday before the third Sunday of Eastertide (in 1955 this dedication was changed to “St Joseph the Worker” for the purpose of encouraging Christian lay involvement in their professions, trade unions and workshops).
The Patronage of St Joseph acknowledged that the Christian faith was being challenged by many hostile ideologies and forces and that the faithful could rely on the “protection of St Joseph” as did the Holy Family in the Gospels, who was prefigured by Joseph in the Old Testament.
Leading the thinking and formulation of documents relating to social justice was the uniquely influential and long-lived Irish-Australian Dr Daniel Mannix (1864-1963), the Archbishop of Melbourne who had founded the National Catholic Secretariat for Catholic Action (1937) and was Chair of the Episcopal Council for Catholic Action.
To produce what would come to be known as ‘Social Justice Statements’ Dr Mannix recruited outstanding lay people to work as researchers and authors. One such person was a rising intellectual and public speaker by the name of B.A. Santamaria, who in 1941 was encouraged by Mannix to found and direct the Catholic Social Studies Movement— known popularly as “The Movement”.
The Social Justice Statements obviously struck a chord at this time, with many parishes, priests and lay men and women around Australia purchasing them.
The sales were very rewarding: “Justice Now” (1941) sold 100,000 copies, “For Freedom” (1942) sold 120,000 copies, and “Pattern for Peace” (1943) sold 150,000 copies.
“Pattern for Peace” was a summary of a larger 72-page document entitled ‘A Statement for Reconstruction’ which Santamaria and others had written to promote and explain “the principles and application” of Catholic social principles in wartime Australia, and which Dr Mannix went in a delegation to present to the Prime Minister Ben Chifley and the Parliament.
The topics covered a fascinating array of imaginative proposals including Chapters: “Measures Aiming at an Adequate Population of Australia: The Framework of Industrial Control — the Industrial Council; The Public Control of Monopolies and the Regulation of Big Business; The Status of the Worker in Industry; Women and Industrial Life; Regionalism; The Self-Government of Agriculture; Education for the Land and the Organisation of the Credit Structure.”
The document identified the growth of bureaucracies as contributing to the loss of individual liberty and proposed “[to] aim at solving the problem of economic security to avoid unemployment, to give a definite status to every man and woman in Australia, and to preserve essential liberty by limiting the spheres in which State authority and capitalist monopoly can operate”.
Also remarkable for the time was the ecumenical note struck by the authors of the Social Justice document. As the Southern Cross in Adelaide reported at the time: “there is satisfaction that the document gives expression to views which are completely in accord with the twenty points of agreement reached by the Melbourne committee comprising the Anglican, Catholic, Presbyterian, Methodist and other Nonconformist representatives, appointed to draw up a common programme on the social question.” (Southern Cross May 21, 1943).
There is so much to learn from the originality and promise of this close collaboration of Bishops, lay people and different minds and talents.
The Thomas More Centre today has grown out of this heritage and strives to reinvigorate this engagement and motivation. We are currently working on a social interview project, short courses and seminars which will help concerned Christians and others to rediscover the roots of applied values and virtues.
More news about this in the weeks to come.
Anna Krohn
Executive Director
Thomas More Centre
