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A SPIRITUALITY OF SOCIAL JUSTICE
Mary Boyd
A theologian once described the Spirituality of
Social Justice as ‘Theology walking on both
feet’. There is definitely a spirituality of social
justice and it calls us to integrate our faith and
actions. ‘Faith without actions is dead’, we read
in 1 James 2:17. James continues, ‘I will show
you my faith by my actions’ (2:18). There is a
similar theme running through Justice in the
World, the great 1971 statement from the Synod
of Bishops, ‘Action on behalf of justice and
participation in the transformation of the world
fully appear to us as a constitutive dimension of
the preaching of the Gospel’. Preaching of the
Gospel is taken to mean any word or action that
gives witness to faith. The Synod then states that
‘unless the Christian message of love and justice
shows its effectiveness through action in the
cause of justice in the world, it will only with
difficulty gain credibility with the [people] of
our times’.
(Hendrickx, 1). By 1350-1340 BCE, a decree
containing a concern for people in poverty had
been written by Horemheb. His decree had
similarities to the Covenant of Israel.
Spirituality is on the one hand personal, reaching
to the deepest level of our being where God
touches us and speaks to us. But it doesn’t end
there. Spirituality is social and requires a commitment. It has to do with the world and creation
and building the reign of God by transforming
the unjust economic, political and social structures that cause suffering and deny people the
right to have life to the full. This is the practice
of social justice.
There are at least 150 texts on social justice
spread throughout the Bible, present in all the
main sections and in most of the books. A
central theme is liberation from oppression.
‘Yahweh heard our voice, and our misery, our
toil and oppression: and Yahweh brought us out
of Egypt with outstretched arm, with great terror,
and with signs and wonders. He brought us here
and gave us a land, a land flowing with milk and
honey’ (Deut 26:5-9).
In ancient societies
One can trace the concept of social justice to preBiblical times. In Mesopotamia and Egypt, there
were democratic and ordered societies. The
people sang hymns of praise to the King of Ur
proclaiming him a ‘Guardian of justice who
protects the defenseless and favors the worker’
The laws concerning social justice were seen
within the context of the Covenant relationship
between God and Israel. The Israelites had been
a nomadic and semi-nomadic people who had to
cope with the many challenges to their survival
in desert conditions. To manage this, they
formed strong communities in which they took
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In the Hebrew Bible
The link between social justice and JudeoChristian faith goes back to the early days. James
asks, ‘How was our ancestor Abraham put right
with God? It was through his actions, when he
offered his son Isaac on the altar. Can’t you see?
His faith and his actions worked together; his
faith was made perfect through his actions. And
the Scripture came true that said, “Abraham
believed God, and because of his faith God
accepted him as righteousness”. And so
Abraham was called God’s friend. You see, then,
that a [person] is put right with God by what
[he/she] does, and not because of faith alone’
(James 2:20-24).
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care of each other’s needs while at the same time
giving back to the community on an equal
footing. That sense of community remained with
them after settling in Canaan and they made it
part of the Covenant, the embodiment of the Old
Testament laws on social justice. ‘The Covenant
is more than simply a sense of social responsibility. It is as much a religious as a socio-political
reality and, therefore, concerns all aspects of the
life of the people of God’. (Hendrickx, 9-10).
This is key. God’s promises were given to the
people as a whole to be shared equally by all the
community on the condition that they are faithful
to the Covenant. And God promised that ‘there
will be no poor among you (Deut. 15:5) if only
you will obey the Lord your God’. God’s gifts
had a demand; share those gifts with the whole
community. Nobody owned private property and
the land, parceled out in equal portions, could
not be sold. This was one of Israel’s ethical
principles - the owner could not sell the land
(Lev. 23:25). The principle was meant to ensure
that everybody in the society had a degree of
security. Israel was to be a society of equality
with no social class. (Hendrickx, 1-9)
From the very beginning God became known to
the people through great works, setting an example for what is in accord with Biblical faith.
The Israelites called this unity of faith and action
darbar, meaning both ‘word’ and ‘happening’ at
the same time. ‘Yahweh delivered us from
slavery in Egypt’ (Gutierrez, 5). This is a God
who takes sides with the poor; liberating the
person who is in poverty is what God is about.
Faith, then, is transmitted by re-reading a past
event in the light of the present. It requires
honesty and integrity as essential ingredients.
Knowing God is not a theoretical exercise. This
is as true for today as it was for the Israelites.
Our relationship with God today is also expressed in our relationship with those in poverty.
True holiness then, means to be faithful and to
establish justice and right. ‘To mock the poor is
to insult their creator’ (Proverbs 17.5).
Today we ask, what does faith in Jesus Christ
tell us about our social and political responsibilities to these times? The Canadian Bishops
remind us: ‘We stand in the tradition of the Old
Testament prophets of Israel where to know God
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is to seek justice for the disinherited, the poor
and the oppressed (eg, Amos, Jeremiah, Isaiah).
The Christian Gospel and today’s world
The same spirit that came upon the prophets
filled Jesus of Nazareth with the power of the
Holy Spirit. Jesus prayed and healed, all the
while proclaiming that the Reign of God was at
hand. In the light of the Spirit he announced that
he was the message of the prophets come true:
‘the good news to the poor, and ‘liberty to the
oppressed’. This is an ongoing process. The
widening gap between rich and poor illustrates
how far away we are from this goal. The Gospel
calls us to become new women and new men in
service to people and society and to a conversation leading to a change of those structures that
cause human suffering.
We are called to see the reality of everyday life
in a new form. Impoverishment is an action, a
human -made reality caused by unjust policies
and structures. People are trapped in that system
in a world with such discrepancies that many
people go to bed hungry, there is a huge gap
between the life expectancy of the rich and the
poor; and between the wealthier and the poorer
countries. So a spiritual vision of society is one
in which faith promotes justice in all spheres of
life especially in taking sides with those caught
in poverty. Our communities are fractured by the
presence of poverty and inequality among us.
This fracturing is also true of the community of
creation and we are part of that community. We
are not merely spectators in the drama of life.
This is clear in all the documents of the Second
Vatican Council. Church social teaching based
on Christian principles brings a value-added
dimension to public policy debate. One of the
great social encyclicals, Octogesima Adveniens
#48 reminds us:
‘Let us all examine [ourselves] to see what [we]
have done up to now, and what we ought to do.
It is not enough to recall principles, state
intentions, point to crying injustice and utter
prophetic denunciations; for these words will
lack real weight unless they are accompanied,
for each individual, by a livelier awareness
of personal responsibility and by effective
action.’
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A spirituality of social justices is concrete, not
abstract, not neutral but committed, not polite
but prophetic. Faith gives us the courage to
denounce the unjust structures that cause poverty
and suffering and announce the new vision of
society. In the Magnificat, Mary praised God
who scattered the proud, who ‘put down the
mighty from their thrones and exalted the lowly’,
who ‘filled the hungry with good things and sent
the rich away empty’. (Katoppo, 23-24). God is
a God of action.
Father Pete Henriot, SJ, describes this action as
‘not citing authors but lifting up principles,
living and enlivening them’. As Christ said, ‘I
have come that they may have life and have it to
the full’. Yet in the world around us there is a
growing gap between rich and poor and global
warming that threatens the whole planet. How
then we can experience community at all levels
and with the whole of creation when such
inequalities exist? Judeo-Christian faith affirms
that the created world and all it contains are for
everyone.
Living social justice
Living the spirituality of social justice, actually
doing social justice is not an easy task. The
process of action and reflection, of learning by
doing and becoming engaged in issues often
requires a conversion.
Example of unjust trade
Take, for example, the so-called free trade
agreements. With the advent of the World Trade
Organization, we now have an unelected body
making the rules for trade. These rules were
written by the largest corporations in the world
and, as one would expect, they favor the wealthy
elites. They are a Bill of Rights for the large
corporations, who stand to benefit from them to
the detriment of the smaller countries - even
threatening their sovereignty. What is
perplexing is the willingness of politicians to
support these corporations and take their side
against the citizens of their countries. This
alliance is driven by a neo-liberal ideology and
points to a failure of governments to recognize
their responsibilities as enablers and protectors
of the Common Good. There can be no free trade
unless it is fair trade based on justice.
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What are these trade agreements doing to those
in poverty? How are they affecting the environment? Their policies are fatal to the poorest of
the poor and to the environment. The lethal
combination of greed and neo-liberalism has
been severely critiqued in church social teaching. The so-called free market, part of neo-liberal
ideology, comes under criticism because the
market and trade are not free at all. More than
45 years ago, Pope Paul V1 warned in his
encyclical, Populorum Progressio # 58, that ‘the
rule of free trade taken by itself, is no longer able
to govern international relations’. In so saying,
he had in mind the inequality of market systems,
that allows the more powerful nations to
dominate the weaker ones (Canadian Catholic
Bishops). Church social teaching states clearly
that there is a social mortgage on private property, that ownership is limited to the good of the
community. If the Common Good – the right to
life and all that makes life more fully human (eg,
adequate food, clothing, housing, employ-ment,
education, health care and effective participation
in decisions) – is one of the main purposes of
politics, why do politicians hand their power,
given them by the people, to the wealthy elites
and corporations and so allow unjust structures
to continue?
Faith and political action
A spirituality of social justice leads us to
question and challenge this situation. What these
decisions are doing to those in poverty needs to
be faced and become part of the public debate,
because this question lies at the heart of the
ethics of a society based on justice.
Often when people enter the public debate from
a faith perspective, especially as part of a church
movement or institution, they are accused of
involving themselves in politics, an area of
human life that the churches are supposed to
keep away from. When the Canadian bishops
issued the pastoral statement, Ethical Reflections on the Economic Crisis, they were told by
the business community that this was not their
affair. ‘Tell us instead of the eternal truths’, they
advised. Some confuse political action for
justice with party politics. Church social
teaching is not about taking sides with political
parties and allying the church with the state.
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Where this has been done the results have been
disastrous. Political action for justice means
entering the debate by posing ethical questions
and alternative suggestions. Christians believe
that the Gospel is the touchstone of human
realities. Christians and Christian organizations
must certainly participate in public debate on
alternative policies and legislative proposals, but
specific political proposals do not in themselves
constitute the Gospel. Pope Paul V1 stated in A
Call to Action: ‘It is the role of Christian communities to analyze the situation in their own
country, to reflect upon the meaning of the
Gospel and to draw norms for judgments and
plans of action from the teachings of the church
and their own experience’.
So what are those actions that give form to our
relationship with God as they participate in the
transformation of unjust structures?
We can check to see if we fully understand
Christian teachings concerning justice. Perhaps
we have lost track of church social teaching or
haven’t paid much attention to justice lately.
Jesus taught that Christian love of neighbor is
first and foremost expressed in love of those in
need. People in poverty are all around us and,
globally; 70% are women. We all live under
these structures. Most governments make policy
choices, either to free people or continue to keep
them in poverty. The Gospel preferential option
for the poor can be a guideline. We can also help
to educate people about the myths that persist in
our society, such as ‘those in poverty are to
blame for their situation’ or, as Job was once
accused, ‘they are being punished for something
they did’ (Job 34:7-10). This attitude oppresses
people and keeps them in bondage.
In order to more fully understand the plight of
those in poverty and oppression, we need to be
present among them, listening to the stories of
the hungry, the homeless, the unemployed and
immigrants, and becoming involved in their
attempts to receive greater justice. By doing
this, we will learn much about their plight and
we will understand better how we can change the
situation, either by joining active groups or
taking initiatives ourselves, not on behalf of the
victims but standing with them. In the spirit of
the prophets, we are called to denounce injustice
and speak the truth to those in power. When we
remain silent in the face of injustice, we are on
the side of the oppressors.
Surely we can do our part to increase the voices
for justice, so that those in power cannot ignore
our critiques and suggested alternatives. Social
justice is the goal, and political action is the
means, to attain that goal. The Canadian bishops
once described justice as ‘the political arm of
love’. Jesus asks us to read the signs of the times
and to analyze the economic, political and social
structures that cause human suffering.
There are many ways we can live the spirituality
of social justice.
References:
Herman Hendrickx, Social Justice in the Bible, Claretian Publications, 1988.
Gustavo Gutierrez, The Power of the Poor in History, Wipf & Stock Publications, 2004.
Peter Henriot, SJ, The Spirituality of Social Justice, Atlantic School of Theology, Halifax, NS, Canada,
2007.
Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ethical Choices and Political Challenges, Free Trade At What
Cost? Ottawa, 1987.
Marianne Katoppo, Compassionate and Free, an Asian Woman’s Theology, Orbis Books, Maryknoll NY,
1980.
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