[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 133 (Wednesday, September 21, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[Congressional Record: September 21, 1994]
ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS
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SEVENTH COMMANDMENT: THE SOCIAL TEACHINGS OF THE CHURCH ARE MOST
COMPLETELY EXPRESSED
Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, I happen to be affiliated with the
Lutheran Church, and my wife happens to be Roman Catholic. Recently, we
spent a weekend in New York City and, while there, attended St.
Patrick's Cathedral, the great Roman Catholic edifice, and attended
services at St. Peter's Lutheran Church.
While at St. Patrick's Cathedral, I picked up a statement issued by
Cardinal O'Connor on the Seventh Commandment, in connection with the
publication of the New Catechism by the Roman Catholic Church.
It contains insights for people of every faith and persuasion.
For example, he says:
The Seventh Commandment is a negative sounding commandment,
``You shall not steal,'' but it is actually talking about how
we treat one another, how we respect one another, how we
respect one another's time, property, efforts, and labor.
At another point, he quotes the New Catechism saying:
Stealing is not simply the pick-pocket in the subway, or a
robbery at Tiffany's. Stealing is an exercise of injustice
toward anyone else's rights, depriving anyone of that which
is his or her due.
And he has a great quotation from ``Spartacus'': ``The law often
allows what honor forbids.''
At another point in his essay, Cardinal O'Connor states:
We have to keep looking at various of our practices.
Corporate takeovers, for example, may be carried out with
civil justice but not moral justice. Very often today people
don't know who it is that they work for, who actually owns
the company and so this personal touch is lost and makes
lawful negotiations very difficult. We have seen that happen
right here in this city when out-of-town companies own what
seems to be a local corporation. Then when it comes time for
workers to bargain they are bargaining with faceless out-of-
towners in the person of their representatives here.
Is it possible that in some corporate takeovers pension
funds are plundered and people who have worked for a lifetime
find themselves without jobs and without pensions? This is
stealing. This is a gross violation of the Seventh
Commandment.
I ask that the entire essay of Cardinal O'Connor be placed into the
Record at this point.
The essay follows:
[From the Catholic New York, Sept. 15, 1994]
Seventh Commandment--The Social Teachings of the Church Are Most
Completely Expressed
This is the official text of Cardinal O'Connor's 33rd
homily on the new Catechism of the Catholic Church which was
delivered in St. Patrick's Cathedral Sept. 11.
Today we continue our study of the new Catechism of the
Catholic Church. Our session today will focus on the Seventh
Commandment which most completely expresses the social
teaching of the Church particularly in areas of special
concern to labor. And because today we honor labor it is most
appropriate.
First, however, I want to go back to today's second
reading. It is taken from the letter of St. James, written
around the year 45 A.D. To me it synthesizes everything that
could be said, everything that should be said, about what our
relations with one another should be, and in a very special
way what relations between employers and employees, labor and
management should be.
St. James asks the question, ``What good is it to profess
faith without practicing it?'' Our Lord Himself said, ``Lots
of people cry out to me, `Lord, Lord,' but their hearts are
far from me.'' St. James asks:
``What good is it to profess faith without practicing it?
Such faith has no power to save one, has it? If a brother or
sister has nothing to wear and no food for the day, and you
say to them, `Goodbye and good luck! Keep warm and well fed,'
but do not meet their bodily needs, what good is that? So it
is with the faith that does nothing in practice. It is
thoroughly lifeless.'' [Jas. 2:14-16]
This spells out what we call the social gospel, the gospel
of justice and of charity, the gospel of carrying what we
purport to believe into action.
I watch a lot of parades. During those parades I get many
hats and many T-shirts. Frequently, the hats and the T-shirts
will have some poignant message on them, something very clear
and meaningful. This is especially true during the Labor Day
Parade. If I were going to create a T-shirt for this purpose
I would select these words from St. James and put them right
up and down the T-shirt: ``If a brother or sister has nothing
to wear and no food for the day, and you say to them,
`Goodbye and good luck! Keep warm and well fed,' but do not
meet their bodily needs, what good is that?'' What good is
that? This is not simply a Christian teaching, a teaching
merely from the Gospels. This is deeply rooted in the Old
Testament, what we call the Jewish Scriptures, and it is
spelled out quite explicitly in the Ten Commandments from
beginning to end.
The Seventh Commandment is a negative sounding commandment,
``You shall not steal,'' but it is actually talking about how
we treat one another, how we respect one another, how we
respect one another's time, property, efforts, and labor. The
Catechism says:
``The seventh commandment forbids unjustly taking or
keeping the goods of one's neighbor and wronging him in any
way with respect to his goods. It commands justice and
charity in the care of earthly goods and the fruits of men's
labor. For the sake of the common good, it requires respect
for the universal destination of goods and respect for the
right to private property. Christian life strives to order
this world's goods to God and to fraternal charity.''[2401]
The Church has been teaching this kind of thing all through
its history, but it has come into full blossom since 1891 and
the encyclical of Pope Leo XIII called Rerum Novarum or ``Of
New Things.'' We will see in a few moments why it has that
title.
The Catechism goes on:
``* * * The goods of creation are destined for the whole
human race. However, the earth is divided up among men to
assure the security of their lives, endangered by poverty and
threatened by violence. The appropriation of property is
legitimate for guaranteeing the freedom and dignity of
persons, and for helping each of them to meet his basic needs
and the needs of those in his charge. It should allow for a
natural solidarity to develop between men.''[2402]
It can hardly be argued that one of the triggering factors
in the breakdown of the Soviet Union was what the Polish
unions called ``solidarity.''
The Catechism continues:
``In his use of things man should regard the external goods
he legitimately owns not merely as exclusive to himself but
common to others also, in the sense that they can benefit
others as well as himself * * *. [2404]
As St. James said, it is no good to say goodbye and good
luck, keep warm and well fed but not meet peoples' bodily
needs. That is a lifeless faith.
The Catechism says:
``Even if it does not contradict the provisions of civil
law, any form of unjustly taking and keeping the property of
others is against the seventh commandment: thus, business
fraud; paying unjust wages; forcing up prices by taking
advantage of the ignorance or hardship of another * * *''.
[2409]
Civil law may allow a number of these things, but the moral
law does not. We are still suffering, all of us, because of
the manipulations of savings and loans, a major scandal for
which the country, that means all working people, are still
paying.
The Catechism continues:
``* * * The following are also morally illicit: speculation
in which one contrives to manipulate the price of goods
artificially, in order to gain an advantage to the detriment
of others; corruption in which one influences the judgment of
those who must make decisions according to law; appropriation
and use for private purposes of the common goods of an
enterprise; work poorly done; [Work poorly done means taking
money for what hasn't been done. Stealing is not simply the
pick-pocket in the subway, or a robbery at Tiffany's.
Stealing is an exercise of injustice toward anyone else's
rights, depriving anyone of that which is his or here due.];
tax evasion; forgery of checks and invoices; excessive
expenses and waste. Willfully damaging private or public
property is contrary to the moral law and requires
reparation. [Sometimes, unfortunately this is done during
strikes. It is always self-defeating as well as immoral.]
[2409]
Promises must be kept and contracts strictly observed to
the extent that the commitments made in them are orally just.
[It used to be good enough just to shake hands. Now contracts
are very, very complex but to the degree that they are
morally just they must be kept] * * *'' [2410]
In the plays of Shakespeare you find that beyond the law is
honor, a plain, old-fashioned virtue, Or as we read in
``Spartacus,'' ``The law often allows what honor forbids.''
The Catechism continues:
``In virtue of commutative justice, reparation for
injustice committed requires the restitution of stolen goods
to their owner.'' [2412]
It is not enough to be sorry for having stolen, to be sorry
for depriving someone of his or her rights. There must be
restitution.
The Catechism continues:
``The seventh commandment forbids acts or enterprises that
for any reason--selfish or ideological, commercial or
totalitarian--lead to the enslavement of human beings, to
their being bought, sold and exchanged like merchandise, in
disregard for their personal dignity * * *'' [2412]
These are not dead, abstract words in the Catechism. We
have to keep looking at various of our practices. Corporate
takeovers, for example, may be carried out with civil justice
but not moral justice. Very often today people don't know who
it is that they work for, who actually owns the company and
so this personal touch is lost and makes lawful negotiations
very difficult. We have seen that happen right here in this
city when out-of-town companies own what seems to be a local
corporation. Then when it comes time for workers to bargain
they are bargaining with faceless out-of-towners in the
person of their representatives here.
Is it possible that in some corporate takeovers pension
funds are plundered and people who have worked for a lifetime
find themselves without jobs and without pensions? This is
stealing. This is a gross violation of the Seventh
Commandment.
The Catechism talks explicitly about the social doctrine of
the Church. It says:
``* * * The Church receives from the Gospel the full
revelation of the truth about man * * * She teaches him the
demands of justice and peace in conformity with divine
wisdom.'' [2419]
Pope John Paul II is constantly preaching about the dignity
of the human person, of all human persons, with emphasis on
the working person. He gets discredited by so many, he gets
blamed for so much, but so many ignore what he fearlessly
says about our obligations toward one another.
The Catechism continues:
``The Church makes a moral judgment about economic and
social matters, `when the fundamental rights of the person or
the salvation of souls requires it.' * * * [2420]
``The social doctrine of the Church developed in the
nineteenth century when the Gospel encountered modern
industrial society with its new structures for the production
of consumer goods, its new concept of society, the state and
authority, and its new forms of labor and ownership. The
development of the doctrine of the Church on economic and
social matters attests the permanent value of the Church's
teaching at the same time as it attests the true meaning of
her Tradition, always living and active.'' [2421]
At the risk of being tedious and sounding abstract let me
spend a moment on this. This passage is talking about the
period in the Church immediately following Karl Marx who
lived from 1818 to 1883. Pope Leo XIII came out with his
encyclical ``Of New Things'' in 1891 precisely because there
had been a revolution in society. Everything had been turned
topsy-turvy. The industrial revolution had taken place and
all sorts of new attitudes had developed.
Karl Marx taught the principle of so-called economic
determinism which argued that the economy determined
everything. By ``the economy'' Karl Marx meant money. Money
was the determinant of everything. Free will meant nothing.
The place of God meant nothing. The dignity of the human
person meant nothing. It sounded as though it was for the
purpose of helping the human person but it was exactly the
opposite. Marx borrowed from the philosopher-historian Hegel
who believed that class struggle, class conflict is
absolutely inevitable. It's in the very nature of things that
the ``have-nots'' will always turn against the ``haves.''
Then there will be a period of equilibrium. Then it starts
all over again as though there were no free will, as though
we couldn't bargain intelligently, in dignified civil human
fashion with one another, respecting one another as made in
the image and likeness of God. This is what Karl Marx was
saying. It was part of his teaching, that only by bloody
revolution could equity and justice be brought about.
It was against this that Pope Leo XIII was speaking in ``Of
New Things.'' This is why he fostered and encouraged the
development of unions, of working peoples' associations, of
voluntarily coming together, of recognizing that we are
social human beings, that we naturally should unite out of
justice, out of charity, out of self-protection. We should do
this voluntarily, not by force and not letting any superior
force--state, management, whoever it might be--prevent us
from negotiating in good faith as human beings.
The Catechism continues:
``Any system in which social relationships are determined
entirely by economic factors is contrary to the nature of the
human person and his acts.'' [2423]
What we have to ask today in our own country is, even
though communism has generally been dissipated, do we have a
mirror image of it, or of economic determinism? Is it still
money that matters most?
The Catechism says:
``A theory that makes profit the exclusive norm and
ultimate end of economic activity is morally unacceptable * *
* It is one of the causes of the many conflicts which disturb
the social order.'' [2424]
The profit motive is a legitimate motive. But do we exist
only for profit, only for money? Does that determine
everything? Are people good or bad in accordance with whether
or not they have money, or don't have money? Are
industrialists good or bad in accordance with how much profit
they make or don't make? Is a union leader good or bad in
proportion to how much more money he or she can get for
workers regardless of how, regardless of whether it is just?
That's the mirror image of economic determinism. It is just
as bad if it is practiced in capitalism as if it is practiced
in communism.
The Catechism continues:
``A system that `subordinates the basic rights of
individuals and of groups to the collective organization of
production' is contrary to human dignity * * * [2424]
``The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheistic
ideologies associated in modern times with `communism' or
`socialism.' She has likewise refused to accept, in the
practice of `capitalism,' individualism and the absolute
primacy of the law of the marketplace over human labor * *
*'' [2425]
We can not permit abstract laws, so-called historical laws
to rob us of free will.
The Catechism goes on to say:
``* * * Economic life is not meant solely to multiply
goods, produce and increase profit or power; it is ordered
first of all to the service persons, of the whole man, and of
the entire human community * * *''[2426]
The Catechism talks about human work in very exalted terms.
``Human work proceeds directly from persons created in the
image of God and called to prolong the work of creation by
subduing the earth, both with and for one another. Hence work
is a duty * * * Work honors the Creator's gifts and the
talents received from him. It can also be redemptive. By
enduring the hardship of work in union with Jesus, the
carpenter of Nazareth and the one crucified on Calvary, [we]
collaborate in a certain fashion with the Son of God in his
redemptive work * * * Work can be a means of sanctification
and a way of animating earthly realities with the Spirit of
Christ. [2427]
``In work, the person exercises and fulfills in part the
potential inscribed in his nature * * * Work is for man, not
man for work.
``Everyone should be able to draw from work the means of
providing for his life and that of his family, and of serving
the human community. [2428]
``Economic life brings into play different interests, often
opposed to one another. This explains why the conflicts that
characterize it arise. Efforts should be made to reduce these
conflicts by negotiation that respects the rights and duties
of each social partner: those responsible for business
enterprises, representatives of wage earners--for example,
trade unions--and public authorities when appropriate.''
[2430]
We have to have the right to negotiate but somehow,
somewhere, in my judgment, we have gone wrong. Sometimes it
appears that we think ourselves back in the early decades of
this century. We want to use the same tools, the same
instruments in negotiation. For example, in 1938 the Supreme
Court of the United States delivered a decision which, in my
judgment, was terribly destructive of the whole concept of
negotiation if not actually immoral--the decision that
authorized permanent replacements for striking laborers.
We are still using that today. It was used in the newspaper
strike here in New York quite recently. The threat of
permanent replacements makes it a charade to say that working
people have the right to negotiate and the right to strike.
The right to strike should be exercised only after all
negotiations in good faith have been exhausted.
Is the move to strike the first step taken? Is it used as
an instrument of threat? Do we believe that management
negotiates with labor instead of human persons negotiating
with human persons? Have we lost something or are we losing
something, something that must be restored, something vital
to true, honest, effective, productive and fruitful
negotiations between persons in management and persons who
constitute the labor force? Management is not negotiating
with unions; persons in management are negotiating with
persons in unions.
Pope John Paul II said, ``The primacy of man over the
instrument of capital, the primacy of the person over things,
the priority of human labor over capital. Upon this we must
insist.'' Then we will get rid of the potential of violence.
Then we will get rid of the strike as the first approach
rather than the last. Then we will get rid of the arrogant
use of power.
Something has gone wrong. I can say that as an employer
myself and on behalf of everyone in a position in the Church
who must exercise equity, justice and charity for those who
work for the Church, with the Church, to those who build for
the Church, to those who work in Church offices. Each is a
person as I am supposed to be a person. We have to right
whatever it is that is wrong. We can not start out from the
principle how can I get more, how can I give less. This to me
is enormously important.
The Catechism takes up justice and solidarity among nations
and reminds us of the almost singular voice of our Holy
Father in Cairo trying to bring about justice and charity for
all the peoples of the world rather than an obsession with
population control. it seems to me that labor should be on
this side rather than on the side of those obsessed with
reducing the number of people in the world. Labor should be
on the side of those who opt for development rather than the
side of those intent on reducing the numbers of black peoples
and Hispanic peoples and other peoples who are non-white
labor. Pragmatically that is where the jobs are: to build
dams in the Third World, to provide engineers and
agriculturalists for the Third World, to help develop the
enormous resources in the Third World and throughout the
world.
The Catechism says:
``God blesses those who come to the aid of the poor and
rebukes those who turn away from them * * * [2443]
``The Church's love for the poor * * * is a part of her
constant tradition * * * Love for the poor is even one of the
motives for the duty of working so as to `be able to give to
those in need.' [Eph. 4:28] It extends not only to material
poverty but also to the many forms of cultural and religious
poverty. [2444]
``The works of mercy are charitable actions by which we
come to the aid of our neighbor in his spiritual and bodily
necessities. Instructing, advising, consoling, comforting,
are spiritual works of mercy, as are forgiving and bearing
wrongs patiently. The corporal works of mercy consist
especially in feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless,
clothing the naked, visiting the sick and imprisoned, and
burying the dead * * * [2447]
``In its various forms--material deprivation, unjust
oppression, physical and psychological illness and death--
human misery is the obvious sign of the inherited condition
of frailty and need for salvation in which man finds himself
as a consequence of original sin * * * '' [2448]
It has been clearly demonstrated for any who are willing to
listen with an open mind that there can be more than enough
food for any one who could be born. But we have to work. Work
is a great gift and a great privilege.
I can never preach in this cathedral about work without
being again reminded of the beauty of the cathedral itself. I
didn't build it. It was built by management. Archbishop John
Hughes had to take the risks of management. It was built
physically by the hands of working people, by the hands of
artists, as is everything done by human beings: a beautiful
piece of music, a beautiful work of art, the molding of
bricks, the digging of sewers, the emptying of bed pans, the
administration of medicines, the practice of surgery, the
typing of letters, all of these are the work of human hands.
Even if the work is done by machines, they are machines
created by the human mind. How we must respect this! And how
I, who profit so much as do we all by the work of others,
must respect everyone who contributes to society. Everything
that we wear, everything that we eat is the result of the
work of human hands.
In this Mass, when we offer the bread to Almighty God that
we believe becomes the Body of His Son, we call it ``the work
of human hands.'' We offer the wine, the ``fruit of the vine,
and the work of human hands'' to become the Blood of the Son
of God. What reverence and what respect we must have!
Not too long ago I was criticized for saying at a union
rally that I am proud to be the son of a union man. Let me
tell you I am proud to have my responsibilities in
management. I am proud of all of the wonderful people in the
Archdiocese of New York in management who help the
archdiocese, who help the poor, who help keep kids in our
schools, who help keep our hospitals open, people in
corporate management in the corporate structure. I am proud
of all of them. I am proud and humbled to be the Cardinal
Archbishop of New York. But the title of which I am as proud
as any that I could ever have is the title of being the son
of a union man! God bless you.
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