The World

No surrender to law of the financial jungle

A few minutes after landing in Africa, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a stern warning against the “unconditional surrender to the law of the market or that of finance” in Africa and the rest of the global economy.

His words were immediately seized upon by those wondering where he stood on the recent Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace document proposing a world political authority to regulate financial markets and to rein in the “inequalities and distortions of capitalist development.”

In short, it seemed the Pope was speaking the same language as the document’s authors.

In his own document on the Church in Africa, Africae Munus, unveiled during the November trip to Benin, the Pope asks all members of the Church to “work and speak out in favour of an economy that cares for the poor and is resolutely opposed to an unjust order which, under the pretext of reducing poverty, has often helped to aggravate it.”

He specifically denounces business groups that exploit African resources and leave local populations impoverished.

Such admonitions are nothing new for Pope Benedict. The Pope has consistently taken a critical view of the global economic system and the disparities it has generated.

Above all, he has taken aim at the patterns of consumption that seem to be built into the structures of modern capitalism. He has done so repeatedly, in language that leaves no doubt about where he stands.

In 2007, for example, he deplored materialistic ideologies that tell people: “Take everything we can get in this brief moment of life. Consumerism, selfishness and entertainment alone are worthwhile. This is life. This is how we must live. And once again, it seems absurd, impossible, to oppose this dominant mindset with all its media and propagandist power.”

The same year, he said economic models based on “irresponsible consumption of natural and environmental resources” were jeopardising the well-being of present and future generations.

He has warned that “the consumer race and consequent waste” not only threaten supplies of resources but also tend to generate a spiritual vacuum among people in well-off countries. He views consumerism as an ideology, and the prevailing models of consumption and production as clearly unsustainable.

In his new document on Africa, the Pope cites the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church: “In accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, neither the state nor any larger society should substitute itself for the initiative and responsibility of individuals and intermediary bodies.” But he also has said that current modes of regulating the financial system have failed, and new structures and institutions may be needed.

His language is very much in line with Bl John Paul II, who warned of an “idolatry of the market” and said there was a “social mortgage” on private property, which must serve the common good. – CNS

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