In 1967, St. Paul VI wrote about integral humanism. What does this term mean, and how does it apply to today’s world?
Too often people in the modern world are considered under only one aspect. The person is a consumer, or a moral being, or a sex object, or a member of a certain class, or a member of a political party, or a spouse, or a worker, or a member of a particular religion or ethnicity or race. The list could go on and on. Each category indicates a person’s function, role or use. To this the Holy Father, says, “no.” The Church teaches that each person is a child of God who is worthy – not of being used, but of having his or her dignity respected and fostered. A person is an integral whole – that is, a moral, social, religious, economic, psychological, individual human being with a transcendent destiny. Each person has both rights and duties, and these rights and duties must be respected by all within the community, the nation and the world.
Over the past 50 years, the Church has come to see that we are related not just to each other, but to all of creation. Thus there is a need for an “integral ecology” – a care for our common home and each person and being within it, both now and in the future. The goal of an integral ecology is three-fold: to protect nature, to restore dignity to the excluded, and to combat all forms of poverty – economic, social, political and spiritual.
In “Charity in Truth,” Pope Benedict XVI writes that “projects for integral human development cannot ignore coming generations, but need to be marked by solidarity and inter-generational justice, while taking into account a variety of contexts: ecological, juridical, economic, political, and cultural” (48). Too often, both our neighbor and creation are misused or ignored. “The deterioration of nature is in fact closely connected to the culture that shapes human coexistence: when ‘human ecology’ is respected within society, environmental ecology also benefits” (51). Unfortunately, selfishness on the part of individuals, corporations and nations too often neither respect nor foster the well-being of the poor, those on the margins, and the areas in which they live.
In a special report for the anniversary of “Laudato Si” for May 24, 2020-May 24, 2021, the Vatican’s Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development writes, “The multiple ‘cracks in the planet that we inhabit’ (LS, 163) from the melting ice caps in the Arctic to the raging wildfires in the Amazon, from extreme weather patterns around the world to unprecedented levels of loss of biodiversity that sustain the very fabric of life, are too evident and detrimental to be ignored any more. Pope Francis’ prophetic words continue to ring in our ears: “What kind of world do we want to leave to those who come after us, to children who are now growing up?” (LS, 160). The poor communities around the world are already the early and disproportionate victims of the current ecological degradation and we cannot remain indifferent any longer to the increasingly desperate ‘cry of the earth and the cry of the poor’ (LS. 49).”
Pope Francis has spoken recently of the connection between the present pandemic, care for the poor and care for the earth during his weekly general audiences. On Aug. 19, he said, “The pandemic has exposed the plight of the poor and the great inequality that reigns in the world.” He said there is a need for a dual response – to find a cure for the virus and to “cure a larger virus, that of social injustice, inequality of opportunity, marginalization, and the lack of protection for the weakest.” A cure for this second virus can only come about through a conversion to the way of Jesus, who as St. Paul points out in Philippians 2, emptied Himself of divinity and privilege to become a servant. He became poor and ministered to the poor, showing them – and all of us – God’s merciful love. Jesus made this preferential option for the poor the criterion of Christian authenticity, for by it we become doers of the Word, not only hearers.
Will the crisis of the pandemic convert us to solidarity with Christ, all peoples and creation? Will we convert a world economy to one that nurtures “an economy of the integral development of the poor,” as Pope Francis said, and counters “social injustice and environmental damage”?
The Holy Father goes on to challenge us to work with Jesus to heal the world by creating an economic system based on solidarity and the universal destination of goods. “The pandemic has exposed and aggravated social problems, above all that of inequality,” he said Aug. 26. “The economy is sick. …It is the fruit of unequal economic growth – this is the illness: the fruit of unequal economic growth – that disregards fundamental human values. In today’s world, a few wealthy people possess more than all the rest of humanity.” These sins of selfishness, power and pride are at the root of social inequality and environmental degradation. “The earth ‘was here before us and it has been given to us,’ it has been given by God ‘for the whole human race’ (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2402). And therefore it is our duty to make sure that its fruit reaches everyone, not just a few people,” he said.
The COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us how interdependent we are. Climate change reminds us how interdependent we are with others and with the earth. We are all in this together. The question is: Will we as individuals, as a local community, as a nation, and as a world made up of many nations, open ourselves up to God’s grace so that an ecological conversion might take place?
“Social problems must be addressed by community networks and not simply by the sum of individual good deeds. …The ecological conversion needed to bring about lasting change is also a community conversion” (LS, 219). This means conversion to solidarity. More than individual acts of charity, it means conversion to an attitude of “gratitude and gratuitousness, a recognition that the world is God’s loving gift, and that we are called quietly to imitate His generosity in self-sacrifice and good works. … It also entails a loving awareness that we are not disconnected from the rest of creatures, but joined in splendid universal communion” (LS, 220).
Pope Francis calls us to open ourselves to that conversion which “inspires the faith of the community united in diversity and solidarity. Diversity and solidarity united in harmony, that is the way,” he said Sept. 2. “Diversity in solidarity also possesses antibodies that heal social structures and processes that have degenerated into systems of injustice, systems of oppression. …Either we go ahead along the road of solidarity, or things will worsen.”
The choice is ours. Will we respond to grace in the midst of the dual crises of climate change and the pandemic? Or will we revert back to a world of selfishness – forgetting the poor, our children and the earth itself?
Jesuit Father John Michalowski is parochial vicar of St. Peter Church in Charlotte. This is the second of a two-part commentary about Catholic teaching on care for creation. Go online to www.vativan.va to find Pope Francis’ Message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, Sept. 1, 2020; Laudato Si’; the texts of his Wednesday general audiences; and his video message for September 2020: “Respect for the Planet’s Resources.” During this Season of Creation (Sept. 1-Oct. 4), also check out the information provided on St. Peter Church’s website at www.stpeterscatholic.org (click on Get Involved, then Justice and Outreach, then Care for Creation).