My "Talk" on Catholic Social Teaching

In my brief talk, I would talk about some basic ideas from Catholic Social Teaching and how they could possibly be used in their church. One of these ideas is that of human dignity. This is the focal point as explained in Himes chapter three. Christians need to know that we are made in the image of God and he is the creator of all. Human beings are creatures of dignity and worth not because of anything that we have done. Another idea from Catholic Social Teaching is the communal aspect of Catholicism. I think that every church needs to work on this as well on their individual relationship with Christ. I do not think that a religious community should be limited to Catholicism, even though they are most known for it and other religions are more personal. If the church works on their religious community, they can help each other grow in their faith, and they can hold help other accountable. There are a couple other main topics discussed in Himes book on CST and they are human rights, justice, common good and social life. Human rights are ever changing according to Himes. I would talk about the human rights in place today and where they could find those. Justice would then be defined for them according to the church. CST develops an understanding of justice that serves human dignity. A lot of these main concepts seem to tie together so this could lead to more discussion. A discussion on common good would be next and I would probably read question 34 from Himes text and then read his response. I think this fits well into what their church is doing with the open closet.

There are many ideas from Catholic Social Teaching and general questions that people might have are answered in the book by Himes. I think that if I was going to give a brief talk on Catholic Social teaching to my service site, I would make them read Himes chapter three so that some basic questions that they might have could be answered, and they can learn more about the basic concepts. It is a great starting point. Before this class I really did not know anything about CST and this book is easy to read and it is helping me understand more and more about CST.

I think it would also be beneficial for them to read the section entitled Application of Social Teaching of part IV of Mater et Magistra because it talks about applications of social teaching. There is a lot in part II about economics. I would have them read that just to understand their responsibility and all the good that they are doing in helping the poor in their community (as if they do not already know!). One thing that struck me in part II says: “…they will perform their work not merely with the objective of deriving an income, but also carrying out the role assigned them and of performing a service that results in benefit to others.” This seems like common sense but I believe that not a lot of people understand this. Obviously volunteers do because they do not get paid. Most people volunteer because they truly enjoy it. This would apply to their social progress, so I would emphasis this just as a gracious reminder.

I would not break them into groups but more have an open discussion with them on things they think they could improve in their church community with some ideas from Catholic Social Teaching. Some ideas are common sense, but human beings are forgetful and even if they do implement some of these ideas already, they might need a friendly reminder. I would also ask them how they can increase community involvement in their church based on CST and also how they can make their church community more communal. I think this would draw more people to the church. This is one area in which I think they are lacking just from being around the church and activities such as working at the open closet.