The Church in England and the Social Question

Extract

Has the Catholic Church in England any message save to the individual soul? Has she a real and constructive contribution to make to .the social problem of this country? It is no doubt a dreadful thing that I should even ask such a question, but it is high time that the question were asked.

That the Church has solicitude for the material needs for her children is an article of Faith, but whether that solicitude moves the hearts of the Faithful in this country to such a degree that it will be of any practical effect is another matter. Yet if it goes no further than pious aspiration and is not likely to go further, if it does no more than proclaim ends on the majority of which all men are to-day in agreement and fails wholly to regard the problem of means, it -would be better for us to confess failure and retire into the desert to pray. To proclaim that we have a body of social teaching and then declare ourselves bankrupt when it comes to seeking ways of applying it or even of showing how it might be applied is to court ridicule. The multitude is hungry. We have no right to give them generalities instead of food. I say in all seriousness that if we cannot do better than that, it would be far better to do nothing at all.

True, we have consolidated certain defensive positions. We have asserted the priority of the family over the State, the natural authority of parents over children, the right of free association and the dignity of human personality.