Pope Slams Capitalism, Inequality Between Rich and Poor In New Years Message

Fish and Bread

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Link:

Pope Slams Capitalism, Inequality Between Rich And Poor In New Years Message

(Note that this is a Reuters wire service article, despite the website hosting it)

Excerpts:

Earlier in his homily, the leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics decried "hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing instances of inequality between rich and poor".

He also denounced "the prevalence of a selfish and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated capitalism, various forms of terrorism and criminality".

[...]In his full message for the peace day, the pope called for a new economic model and ethical regulations for markets, saying the global financial crisis was proof that capitalism does not protect society's weakest members.

Notice how he groups "unregulated capitalism" in with "various forms of criminality and terrorism".

Much better than his Christmas message. :)

So, the next time a conservative Catholic calls complaints about the rising gap between the rich and poor class warfare, or complains about regulations and restrains on capitalism, just remember that they are cafeteria Catholics who are not in line with either the Pope or Church teaching on those subjects. :)

The Church has a preferential option for the poor and believes people have the right to health care and to be looked after in the event of old age or disability (cf Pacem En Terris, John XXIII).
 

Michie

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The Huffington Post interpreting what the Pope says is laughable.
Isn't it though? Here is what he said as posted earlier:

Pope's New Year's Day homily: 'From the contemplation of the face of God are born joy, security, and peace'...



Pope on New Year's Day: find inner peace in God
(Vatican Radio) Pope Benedict celebrated mass in St Peter’s Basilica on New Year’s Day, marking the feast of Mary and the Church’s World Day of Peace. In his homily the Pope urged people to look to God and to his son Jesus for true peace in a world fraught with problems, darkness and anxieties.

Listen to the report by Susy Hodges:


Below, please find the English translation of the text of Pope Benedict's homily:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

“May God bless us and make his face to shine upon us.” We proclaimed these words from Psalm 66 after hearing in the first reading the ancient priestly blessing upon the people of the covenant. It is especially significant that at the start of every new year God sheds upon us, his people, the light of his Holy Name, the Name pronounced three times in the solemn form of biblical blessing. Nor is it less significant that to the Word of God – who “became flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14) as “the true light that enlightens every man” (1:9) – is given, as today’s Gospel tells us, the Name of Jesus eight days after his birth (cf. Lk 2:21).

It is in this Name that we are gathered here today. I cordially greet all present, beginning with the Ambassadors of the Diplomatic Corps accredited to the Holy See. I greet with affection Cardinal Bertone, my Secretary of State, and Cardinal Turkson, with all the officials of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace; I am particularly grateful to them for their effort to spread the Message for the World Day of Peace, which this year has as its theme “Blessed are the Peacemakers”.

Although the world is sadly marked by “hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing instances of inequality between rich and poor, by the prevalence of a selfish and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated financial capitalism,” as well as by various forms of terrorism and crime, I am convinced that “the many different efforts at peacemaking which abound in our world testify to mankind’s innate vocation to peace. In every person the desire for peace is an essential aspiration which coincides in a certain way with the desire for a full, happy and successful human life. In other words, the desire for peace corresponds to a fundamental moral principle, namely, the duty and right to an integral social and communitarian development, which is part of God’s plan for mankind. Man is made for the peace which is God’s gift. All of this led me to draw inspiration for this Message from the words of Jesus Christ: ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God’ (Mt 5:9)” (Message, 1). This beatitude “tells us that peace is both a messianic gift and the fruit of human effort … It is peace with God through a life lived according to his will. It is interior peace with oneself, and exterior peace with our neighbours and all creation” (ibid., 2, 3). Indeed, peace is the supreme good to ask as a gift from God and, at the same time, that which is to be built with our every effort.

We may ask ourselves: what is the basis, the origin, the root of peace? How can we experience that peace within ourselves, in spite of problems, darkness and anxieties? The reply is given to us by the readings of today’s liturgy. The biblical texts, especially the one just read from the Gospel of Luke, ask us to contemplate the interior peace of Mary, the Mother of Jesus. During the days in which “she gave birth to her first-born son” (Lk 2:7), many unexpected things occurred: not only the birth of the Son but, even before, the tiring journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem, not finding room at the inn, the search for a chance place to stay for the night; then the song of the angels and the unexpected visit of the shepherds. In all this, however, Mary remains even tempered, she does not get agitated, she is not overcome by events greater than herself; in silence she considers what happens, keeping it in her mind and heart, and pondering it calmly and serenely. This is the interior peace which we ought to have amid the sometimes tumultuous and confusing events of history, events whose meaning we often do not grasp and which disconcert us.

The Gospel passage finishes with a mention of the circumcision of Jesus. According to the Law of Moses, eight days after birth, baby boys were to be circumcised and then given their name. Through his messenger, God himself had said to Mary – as well as to Joseph – that the Name to be given to the child was “Jesus” (cf. Mt 1:21; Lk 1:31); and so it came to be. The Name which God had already chosen, even before the child had been conceived, is now officially conferred upon him at the moment of circumcision. This also changes Mary’s identity once and for all: she becomes “the mother of Jesus”, that is the mother of the Saviour, of Christ, of the Lord. Jesus is not a man like any other, but the Word of God, one of the Divine Persons, the Son of God: therefore the Church has given Mary the title Theotokos or Mother of God.

The first reading reminds us that peace is a gift from God and is linked to the splendour of the face of God, according to the text from the Book of Numbers, which hands down the blessing used by the priests of the People of Israel in their liturgical assemblies. This blessing repeats three times the Holy Name of God, a Name not to be spoken, and each time it is linked to two words indicating an action in favour of man: “The Lord bless you and keep you: the Lord make his face to shine upon you: the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace” (6:24-26). So peace is the summit of these six actions of God in our favour, in which he turns towards us the splendour of his face.

For sacred Scripture, contemplating the face of God is the greatest happiness: “You gladden him with the joy of your face” (Ps 21:7). From the contemplation of the face of God are born joy, security and peace. But what does it mean concretely to contemplate the face of the Lord, as understood in the New Testament? It means knowing him directly, in so far as is possible in this life, through Jesus Christ in whom he is revealed. To rejoice in the splendour of God’s face means penetrating the mystery of his Name made known to us in Jesus, understanding something of his interior life and of his will, so that we can live according to his plan of love for humanity. In the second reading, taken from the Letter to the Galatians (4:4-7), Saint Paul says as much as he describes the Spirit who, in our inmost hearts, cries: “Abba! Father!” It is the cry that rises from the contemplation of the true face of God, from the revelation of the mystery of his Name. Jesus declares, “I have manifested thy name to men” (Jn 17:6). God’s Son made man has let us know the Father, he has let us know the hidden face of the Father through his visible human face; by the gift of the Holy Spirit poured into our hearts, he has led us to understand that, in him, we too are children of God, as Saint Paul says in the passage we have just heard: “The proof that you are sons is that God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts: the Spirit that cries, ‘Abba, Father’” (Gal 4:6).

Here, dear brothers and sisters, is the foundation of our peace: the certainty of contemplating in Jesus Christ the splendour of the face of God the Father, of being sons in the Son, and thus of having, on life’s journey, the same security that a child feels in the arms of a loving and all-powerful Father. The splendour of the face of God, shining upon us and granting us peace, is the manifestation of his fatherhood: the Lord turns his face to us, he reveals himself as our Father and grants us peace. Here is the principle of that profound peace – “peace with God” – which is firmly linked to faith and grace, as Saint Paul tells the Christians of Rome (cf. Rom 5:2). Nothing can take this peace from believers, not even the difficulties and sufferings of life.

Indeed, sufferings, trials and darkness do not undermine but build up our hope, a hope which does not deceive because “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us” (5:5).

May the Virgin Mary, whom today we venerate with the title of Mother of God, help us to contemplate the face of Jesus, the Prince of Peace. May she sustain us and accompany us in this New Year: and may she obtain for us and for the whole world the gift of peace. Amen!

Pope's New Year's Day homily: 'From the contemplation of the face of God are born joy, security, and peace'...
 
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AvilaSurfer

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God bless the Pope.

Pray for the unfaithful Catholics who refuse to accept these wise words (or pretend he didn't say them).
All prayers are welcome, even from the misguided.
 
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KatherineS

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"the world is sadly marked by hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing instances of inequality between rich and poor, by the prevalence of a selfish and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated financial capitalism, as well as by various forms of terrorism and crime"

H.H, Benedict XVI, Roman Pontiff, Successor of St. Peter, and Universal Pastor

"Right back atcha, your Holiness"

Katherine, humble laywoman
 
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QuantaCura

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This is nothing new. A completely unregulated capitalism destroys the market just as much as Socialism.

Pius XI said:
103. But, with the diffusion of modern industry throughout the whole world, the "capitalist" economic regime has spread everywhere to such a degree, particularly since the publication of Leo XIII's Encyclical, that it has invaded and pervaded the economic and social life of even those outside its orbit and is unquestionably impressing on it its advantages, disadvantages and vices, and, in a sense, is giving it its own shape and form.​

104. Accordingly, when directing Our special attention to the changes which the capitalist economic system has undergone since Leo's time, We have in mind the good not only of those who dwell in regions given over to "capital" and industry, but of all mankind.​

105. In the first place, it is obvious that not only is wealth concentrated in our times but an immense power and despotic economic dictatorship is consolidated in the hands of a few, who often are not owners but only the trustees and managing directors of invested funds which they administer according to their own arbitrary will and pleasure.​

106. This dictatorship is being most forcibly exercised by those who, since they hold the money and completely control it, control credit also and rule the lending of money. Hence they regulate the flow, so to speak, of the life-blood whereby the entire economic system lives, and have so firmly in their grasp the soul, as it were, of economic life that no one can breathe against their will.​

107. This concentration of power and might, the characteristic mark, as it were, of contemporary economic life, is the fruit that the unlimited freedom of struggle among competitors has of its own nature produced, and which lets only the strongest survive; and this is often the same as saying, those who fight the most violently, those who give least heed to their conscience.​

108. This accumulation of might and of power generates in turn three kinds of conflict. First, there is the struggle for economic supremacy itself; then there is the bitter fight to gain supremacy over the State in order to use in economic struggles its resources and authority; finally there is conflict between States themselves, not only because countries employ their power and shape their policies to promote every economic advantage of their citizens, but also because they seek to decide political controversies that arise among nations through the use of their economic supremacy and strength.​

109. The ultimate consequences of the individualist spirit in economic life are those which you yourselves, Venerable Brethren and Beloved Children, see and deplore: Free competition has destroyed itself; economic dictatorship has supplanted the free market; unbridled ambition for power has likewise succeeded greed for gain; all economic life has become tragically hard, inexorable, and cruel. To these are to be added the grave evils that have resulted from an intermingling and shameful confusion of the functions and duties of public authority with those of the economic sphere - such as, one of the worst, the virtual degradation of the majesty of the State, which although it ought to sit on high like a queen and supreme arbitress, free from all partiality and intent upon the one common good and justice, is become a slave, surrendered and delivered to the passions and greed of men. And as to international relations, two different streams have issued from the one fountain-head: On the one hand, economic nationalism or even economic imperialism; on the other, a no less deadly and accursed internationalism of finance or international imperialism whose country is where profit is.​
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/p...f_p-xi_enc_19310515_quadragesimo-anno_en.html
 
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ZaidaBoBaida

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"the world is sadly marked by hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing instances of inequality between rich and poor, by the prevalence of a selfish and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated financial capitalism, as well as by various forms of terrorism and crime"

I might add that to my sig line I like it so much. :D
 
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ZaidaBoBaida

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Careful, you might frighten your co-religionists by having a quote from the pope in your sig. Lol.

I would almost be willing to bet that I'm the only Quaker on the board anyway.
 
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Link:

Pope Slams Capitalism, Inequality Between Rich And Poor In New Years Message

(Note that this is a Reuters wire service article, despite the website hosting it)

Excerpts:



Notice how he groups "unregulated capitalism" in with "various forms of criminality and terrorism".

Much better than his Christmas message. :)

So, the next time a conservative Catholic calls complaints about the rising gap between the rich and poor class warfare, or complains about regulations and restrains on capitalism, just remember that they are cafeteria Catholics who are not in line with either the Pope or Church teaching on those subjects. :)

The Church has a preferential option for the poor and believes people have the right to health care and to be looked after in the event of old age or disability (cf Pacem En Terris, John XXIII).

First off, the pope did not "slam" capitalism. Secondly, while he is a spiritual leader for Catholics, he is not an economist and has never run a business.

From an historical perspective, capitalism has been the greatest method of poverty reduction the world has ever known. Today, we see the poorest countries are run by totalitarian/communist governments or Islamic fundamentalism. China has been experiencing an economic surge only becaused it has allowed free enterprise. When you look back thousands of years prior to the founding of the United States, you see feudalism and oppression. Everybody except the ruling class and elites were poor.

When the founders of this country came to these shores, they were able to own their land and profits. Our capitalist economic system produced more wealth for more people (who were not born into it) than any system in history. We all know of those famous Horatio Alger stories of "Rags to Riches". Those rich were then able to create jobs, found hospitals, schools, museums and charitable organizations that have done so much for so many. The drive to be successful under a capitalist system has led to more advancement, creativity, invention and processess to help the human condition than any other. Americans hold more patents for invention over the course of just a few hundred years than the rest of the world combined.

I thank God for capitalism. Because of it, more people lead better lives than they otherwise would have. Our society is more full opportunities than oppressive ones and the freedom we experience allows us to best express our God-given talents. With those, we can share our time and treasure. As a result, American's give more of what they have than almost anybody else.

I am greatful to be both an American and a Capitalist. They meld beautifully with our Catholic faith.
 
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S.ilvio

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First off, the pope did not "slam" capitalism. Secondly, while he is a spiritual leader for Catholics, he is not an economist and has never run a business.

From an historical perspective, capitalism has been the greatest method of poverty reduction the world has ever known. Today, we see the poorest countries are run by totalitarian/communist governments or Islamic fundamentalism. China has been experiencing an economic surge only becaused it has allowed free enterprise. When you look back thousands of years prior to the founding of the United States, you see feudalism and oppression. Everybody except the ruling class and elites were poor.

When the founders of this country came to these shores, they were able to own their land and profits. Our capitalist economic system produced more wealth for more people (who were not born into it) than any system in history. We all know of those famous Horatio Alger stories of "Rags to Riches". Those rich were then able to create jobs, found hospitals, schools, museums and charitable organizations that have done so much for so many. The drive to be successful under a capitalist system has led to more advancement, creativity, invention and processess to help the human condition than any other. Americans hold more patents for invention over the course of just a few hundred years than the rest of the world combined.

I thank God for capitalism. Because of it, more people lead better lives than they otherwise would have. Our society is more full opportunities than oppressive ones and the freedom we experience allows us to best express our God-given talents. With those, we can share our time and treasure. As a result, American's give more of what they have than almost anybody else.

I am greatful to be both an American and a Capitalist. They meld beautifully with our Catholic faith.


Cafertria Catholicism, Capitalist style...:D
 
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