Living Justice: Catholic Social Teaching in Action

Come & See Series

by Thomas Massaro

For over a decade Living Justice has introduced readers to Catholic social teaching. Grounded in scripture, theology, reason, and experience, these faith-based principles for promoting justice and peace in modern society have inspired a remarkable burst of social activism in recent decades. The second classroom edition has been revised and updated throughout while maintaining the book's accessible introduction to both the foundations of Catholic social teaching and social justice in the world today. Living Justice leads readers step-by-step through the building blocks of Catholic social thought, including its central themes, sources, and methods. Along the way readers encounter great heroes of social change and prophets of peace and justice. Key updates to the second classroom edition include further reflection on the use of the just-war theory in light of events in Iraq and Afghanistan, the revival of terrorist threats, the papacy of Benedict XVI, the social encyclical Caritas in Veritate, the recent financial crisis, business ethics today, and ongoing environmental concerns. With its helpful resources, including discussion questions and an annotated list of print and web resources on Catholic social teaching, Living Justice remains a perfect text for courses on social justice.

Genres: Theology, Catholic, Faith, Religion, Social Justice, Christianity, Philosophy

222 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 28, 2000

Reviews

[Chanti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not Catholic, but I love Catholic Social teaching!

[Donald · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a helpful overview of the relationship between Catholic teaching and contemporary politics. It's main strength is that it focuses on a more moderate/liberal version of Catholic teaching which you can then agree with or disagree with as you like. That is to say it is less interested in pushing points of friction with the broader society or particular ideological trends than it is to discuss the overarching themes of recent world history. The drawback of this approach is that it can contribute to a sense of unity and continuity of a moderate Catholic tradition which misses the persistence of far-right and far-left trends on the ground. A related problem is that for many people concerns around social conservatism are a central part of their interaction with the church and a broad approach might seem like diminishing its importance in favour of promoting consensus.

[Conrad Haas · Rating 4 out of 5]

As part of the back cover reads: "Based on the broad tradition of Catholic social teaching, Living Justice, is a fresh and thoughtful look at contemporary issues and our responses to them. .... A wonderful resource for anyone who wants to understand the Church's "best kept secret" - its teachings on social justice.

[Ernest · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does a person become an effective " Good Samaritan"?

This book provides an ethical and historical review of the Catholic philosophy of charity and justice. The author informs and challenges religious individuals who want to put "faith in action" to improve the world. It explains the nine major themes of Catholic social justice and their foundation in doctrine, sacred text, and papal/bishop writings. The great contribution of this book is that it provides a framework for the individual to analyze and create actions based on the religious principle that all creation is sacred and valued.

The value of this book is that it is a well written source for teaching the important but often not taught principles of how to work for social justice in society. This book is great for a high school or college seminar or for an adult that has never been exposed to the Catholic social justice concepts.

[Mary Duda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this for a "lunchtime introduction to Catholic Social Teaching" for faculty and staff at the university where I work. It's a good introduction to the various aspects of CST, with interesting insights.

[Nick Goodenow · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great introduction to Catholicism's best kept secret: Catholic Social Teaching. These are (or, at least, should be) THE guiding pillars of what all religious should look to when discerning how we are live our lives in right relationship with one another.

[Amelia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read for school.

[George Dziuk Jr · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very good book. I found much useful in it.

[Shinemoos · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this book as it’s mandatory in a course I’m taking… I understand this book is written to Catholics who are in line with all the learning and updates from The Vatican, as the reflections such as this one shows: “ do you know anyone who participates in flying tropical activities without any underlying relieve his motivations? How would you character is his or her motivations?” There are deep reflective questions but they are just quite irrelevant to most people. “Pluralism” is mentioned in this book but the ideas in this book doesn’t represent it. Only when he reflected on “the peril of Crusading spirit” that he included all other religions and their own versions of crusades, as it is universal for people to do bad things in the name of god. Modern world is inevitable and if catholicism doesn’t really update itself, the future might not be bright.

Chapter 5, this book is finally making sense to me! Listing all the 9 social teachings, and using scripture and theological documents to prove that to him, Catholic values stand out and are more valid than others, the author is finally talking business. I don’t necessarily agree with him but I do appreciate Catholic scholars’ faithfulness to tradition and scriptures.

[#ReadAllTheBooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was another of the books I had to read for a religious class on Catholicism, but it was my least favorite of all the books. It was just very dull to read at times, to be honest.

It's something I can see appealing to the thinking Catholic, but for the average person? Probably not as much of an appeal.

(If you're a teacher looking to have this for a college course, be aware that this just didn't really teach anything to my fellow classmates and I that couldn't have been summed up elsewhere. Even the Catholics in the class were pretty dismayed by how little this contributed to the course as a whole. If you're teaching an ethics class it might be good, though.)

[Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read the 2012 second edition. I have read other books on Catholic Social Teaching, but what I liked best about this book was the thematic approach. All the basic documents were discussed, but they were discussed by theme and not by individual document. This approach made the broadness and depth of the teaching much more apparent!

[Roger Buck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpful as a primer - a very basic beginning. The author, moreover, displays a very beautiful and human compassion ... I liked this a lot years ago when I knew little of the theme.

For anyone interested, I have a longer review here: http://corjesusacratissimum.org/2012/...

[Haley · Rating 2 out of 5]

interesting insights, and i learned a great deal about catholicism. that said, all of the reasoning and ethics eventually made its way back to "because humanity is in the image of God" which is fundamentally incompatible with my own atheism.

[Andhi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Baca lagi....baca lagi....ada yang lupa sih....

[Evelyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great book for its time but now it is woefully out of date. Glad he wrote a new version. Glad we have Pope Francis

[steds · Rating 4 out of 5]

great textbook and intro to cst