Catholic CommunityFrom the Catholic perspective, human beings are only fully realized in community. To do a quick foray into theology, the Catholic Church maintains that all are created in God’s image, but that God’s nature is trinitarian. That is, God is three persons in one, at the same time entirely distinct from each other and wholly one. If we are made in the image of God, then we too share in this communitarian nature. In Guadium et Spes, the Second Vatican Council stated, “For by his innermost nature man is a social being, and unless he relates himself to others he can neither live nor develop his potential” (no. 12).[13]
The Catholic Church also recognizes that development is contingent upon community. In the papal encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, Pope John Paul II writes explicitly on development, stating, [14] This then is the picture: there are some people––the few who possess much––who do not really succeed in “being” because, through a reversal of the hierarchy of values, they are hindered by the cult of “having”; and there are others––the many who have little or nothing––who do not succeed in realizing their basic human vocation because they are deprived of essential goods… Since John Paul II here equates "being" with development, it becomes clear that community is the end of development because humans can only "be" in relationship with others.
Communities, from the Catholic perspective, are based upon complete agapic love. This is love as self-gift, the very definition of God––”God is love”(1 John 4:8, NRSV)[15]––and forms the foundation of the Catholic ethic while in community. Fabio Ciardi, O.M.I., in his book Koinonia identifies five aspects of this love: serving, welcoming, freely given, universal, and benevolent (Ciardi 327-331).[16] Serving from a basis of humility so that one’s self is purely given to others, even in simple actions. Welcoming so that “the others are welcomed and loved as they are and not as we would like them to be” (Ciardi 328). Freely given so that the love is not a quid pro quo, like some kind of monetary exchange. Universal so all are welcomed. And benevolent so that, “it wishes others well and interests itself as much in others as in itself” (Ciardi 331). By practicing this kind of love, communities are created. (1) Into the ConcreteNow is a fair time to wonder what all this theology has to do with development. To link it back, a brief recap of the argument explored thus far might be helpful:
To continue this list, one might say, "Therefore, community is the end of development, and agapic love is the means." Development has become an ethic of love. Or, development has become love expressed in a certain form. The work of development has not changed much here. Development is still concerned with access to quality education in Honduras because education is a component of fulfillment (i.e., it increases autonomy). The only thing that changes in development practices is that development has now been infused with a system of ethics which places relationship at the center of development.(2) Alasdair MacIntyre makes a useful distinction here, pointing out that relationships can be considered another kind of "good". He writes, "Adam Smith's contrast between self-interested maket behavior on the one hand and altruistic benevolent behavior on the other, obscures from view just those types of activity in whcih the goods to be achieved are neither mine-rather-than-others' nor others'-rather-than-mine, but instead are goods that can only be mine insofar as they are also those of there, that are genuinely common good, as the goods of networks of giving and receiving are" (MacIntyre 199). [17] Within this framework, development as community is a more holistic perspective on development, focusing on developing communal goods, which, as we have seen, increases autonomous capacity and freedom. Under this paradigm of development as community, there are two relationships that are of main concern. The first is the relationship between the developer and the developing. Under the ethic of love, there are some questions that must be asked to ensure a healthy relationship:
The second relationship is between the developing themselves. For since the end of development is community, development should ensure that community is being built in the developing through the micro-finance loans and the food cooperatives. By changing the subject of the questions, one can ask the same questions here as above to check the health of this relationship:
This is the end of the scripted portion of my website. From here, you could look at case studies of Christian communities that practice this kind of development, read my final reflections, or ask me your nagging questions on my contact page. |
(1) One question that arises from this discussion of community is wether or not belief in God or subscription to Catholicism is necessary to practice this kind of community. Although this alone is a subject for a multi-volume book, in this side-bar I will posit an answer of "no". However, there is a caveat. This kind of community can only exist so long as there is complete self-giving love––which is what Catholics call God. So yes, God is necessary for this community, but in the spirit of my first answer, no people do not have to be aware of belief in God. Perhaps what Father Zosima says is true, that, "If you attain to perfect self-forgetfulness in the love of your neighbor, then you will believe without a doubt, and no doubt can possibly enter your soul" (Dostoyevsky 63). [18]
(2) It might be tempting to pat me on the head at this point and say, "Neat idea kid," and then go about business as usual. After all, this can seem like such a minuscule, hair-splitting change to the definition of development. However, this change in conception makes all the difference in the world, and is the difference between the ultimate success or failure of development. For development as usual addresses the symptoms of injustice and not the disease. In my opinion (which I think is right, but is up for discussion), injustice is caused by a deficiency in relationship between two parties. Justice, therefore, is the correcting of these relationships. Without developing community and building relationships, injustice, which is the cause of all the symptoms development tries to fix, will persist and the project of development will never achieve its ends, no matter if its end is freedom or community. |