Catholic Church And Gov. Welfare Programs

[RezaMikhaeil]

[quote name='Era Might' timestamp='1305468287' post='2241818']
Just because someone needs help doesn't mean they "didn't save their money." Stuff happens. Kids get sick. Cars break down. Rents go up. Food digests and the body requires more food the next day. Fathers get layed off. Mothers have another child.

I was conceived. That earned me the right to what I need to live. The mere fact that I exist means I have a right to what I need to live. That includes the right to work, which is the usual means of providing those things. But sometimes work isn't enough (or isn't available). Am I entitled to help from society? Yes. Not out of charity, but out of justice.[/quote]

That's right you were concieved because your parents made a choice to have children, as many Catholic parents chose to have 11 children and take responsibility for them, so too your parents need to take responsibility for you. Otherwise, please stop having children. You do have a right to life, after conception, but you don't have a right to other people's money, goods or services. That has to be earned from your parents. If they couldn't afford it, they shouldn't have had intercourse and concieved a child [or 11]. I mention Catholic breeding habits, because so many of them that I know boast about being pro-life and following the Catholic model, but can't afford their children and put those responsbilities upon the state entitlements.

Are you entitled to help from society, not unless those individuals choose to help you willingly. It's injustice for your parents to have children and then think that it's justice to take money from other people who earned it in order to help them out in their personal situation.

[quote]Jimmy Santiago Baca has a poem I like called "So Mexicans Are Taking Jobs From Americans." Here's how it ends:
[/quote]

Ironically I'm not and never have complained about "Mexicans are taking our jobs". Mexicans are hard workers, support our apples trade to China, and do jobs that many Americans recieving entitlements do not want to do [it's a fact, do a search on the Take Our Jobs Campaign].

[Winchester]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1305471735' post='2241832']
That's right you were concieved because your parents made a choice to have children, as many Catholic parents chose to have 11 children and take responsibility for them, so too your parents need to take responsibility for you. Otherwise, please stop having children. You do have a right to life, after conception, but you don't have a right to other people's money, goods or services. That has to be earned from your parents. If they couldn't afford it, they shouldn't have had intercourse and concieved a child [or 11]. I mention Catholic breeding habits, because so many of them that I know boast about being pro-life and following the Catholic model, but can't afford their children and put those responsbilities upon the state entitlements.

Are you entitled to help from society, not unless those individuals choose to help you willingly. It's injustice for your parents to have children and then think that it's justice to take money from other people who earned it in order to help them out in their personal situation.



Ironically I'm not and never have complained about "Mexicans are taking our jobs". Mexicans are hard workers, support our apples trade to China, and do jobs that many Americans recieving entitlements do not want to do [it's a fact, do a search on the Take Our Jobs Campaign].
[/quote]
I'm afraid I have no choice but to sell you all for scientific experiments.

[Maggyie]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1305471735' post='2241832']
That's right you were concieved because your parents made a choice to have children, as many Catholic parents chose to have 11 children and take responsibility for them, so too your parents need to take responsibility for you. Otherwise, please stop having children. You do have a right to life, after conception, but you don't have a right to other people's money, goods or services. That has to be earned from your parents. If they couldn't afford it, they shouldn't have had intercourse and concieved a child [or 11]. I mention Catholic breeding habits, because so many of them that I know boast about being pro-life and following the Catholic model, but can't afford their children and put those responsbilities upon the state entitlements.

Are you entitled to help from society, not unless those individuals choose to help you willingly. It's injustice for your parents to have children and then think that it's justice to take money from other people who earned it in order to help them out in their personal situation.
[/quote]

It's fine to believe this way but it's pretty much the opposite of what the Church believes. You can read what our Catechism says about "the universal destination of goods" [url="http://www.christusrex.org/www1/CDHN/seventh.html"]here[/url].

There are so many great documents and so much magisterial teaching is freely available on this issue. Studying with an open-heart can go far to help Christians choose Jesus over "conservative" or "liberal" secular ideologies every time!

[Era Might]

[quote name='RezaMikhaeil' timestamp='1305471735' post='2241832']Are you entitled to help from society, not unless those individuals choose to help you willingly.[/quote]
What you are essentially arguing for is a radical individualism which, if taken to its logical conclusion, would not entitle anyone to anything. The US Constitution allows the government to raise taxes. That means taking money from people unwillingly.

But let's apply your argument to other things. Did you fight in the Civil War? No. Therefore you are not entitled to be a part of the Union. Did you pay taxes to build the streets around your house? No. Therefore you are not entitled to use them.

Society cannot exist unless people are entitled to benefit from what others have earned.

The very existence of government assumes that we ARE entitled to things from society. If we are not entitled to anything, then we are all just ravenous dogs in a kill or be killed world. Why was the US Constitution written? Here's its explanation:

[quote]We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.[/quote]
There's those words "Justice" and "Welfare." I am entitled to those things, not because you want to give them, but because I have a right to them. Even St. Thomas Aquinas says in the Summa:

[quote]Reply to Objection 2. It is not theft, properly speaking, to take secretly and use another's property in a case of extreme need: because that which he takes for the support of his life becomes his own property by reason of that need.

Reply to Objection 3. In a case of a like need a man may also take secretly another's property in order to succor his neighbor in need.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/3066.htm[/quote]
Society used to have "commons" which were not private property, but were not owned by the government either. The commons belonged to everyone. For example, you could bring your cattle there to graze. But the commons have disappeared from our social tradition. Conservatives would have the commons turned into private property, and liberals would have the commons turned into government property. But the commons were not anyone's property. The commons were there for everyone, and everyone was entitled to use them. The radical individualism you are arguing for leaves no room for the commons, since nobody is entitled to anything.

[quote]Ironically I'm not and never have complained about "Mexicans are taking our jobs".[/quote]
You missed the point.

Edited May 15, 2011 by Era Might

[CatherineM]

One of the theories for the extinction of the Neanderthals is that they didn't socialize the same as Cro Magnum Man did. When times were bad for one clan, they didn't have the ability to turn to other clans for assistance, and slowly died off because hard times come to everyone at some time. We are able to help each other, trade with each other, learn from each other. While I couldn't work, I still tried to be a productive member of society. I volunteered, I raised foster kids, I watched out for a dozen latch key kids since I was the only adult around after school was out and before their parents came home from work.

I have really found some of the replies here upsetting. Actually lost sleep over it. I just don't understand the animosity being shown towards the less fortunate.

[Winchester]

The animosity is toward the use of force to allocate resources to help the groups the government has deemed less fortunate.

[Era Might]

[quote name='Winchester' timestamp='1305478334' post='2241881']
The animosity is toward the use of force to allocate resources to help the groups the government has deemed less fortunate.
[/quote]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CVbku6nxhU[/youtube]

[Winchester]

Elaine is so hot.

[Maggyie]

[quote name='CatherineM' timestamp='1305478079' post='2241880']

I have really found some of the replies here upsetting. Actually lost sleep over it. I just don't understand the animosity being shown towards the less fortunate.
[/quote]

A lot of it comes from the attitude that "good" people don't become poor, that the poor must be lazy, drunks, addicts, etc. These attitudes can only flourish among Christians when they don't spend enough time ministering to poor people, which puts them at risk spiritually. When you minister to someone and try to be Jesus to them, you start to see them as a human being worthy of the community's investment, and not as a "drain" or a statistic. For a lot of folks the poor are an abstraction. They exist only as a category in ideological arguments or a line item on a budget. When you are face to face with them, poverty suddenly becomes a concrete reality. In this way, practicing charity often leads to a desire to practice social justice.

God has a preferential love both for those who are poor spiritually and those who are poor physically. At the end of the day we will be judged by love. I suspect Heaven will be surprising for a lot of folks - I think the homeless addicts, the prostitutes on Medicaid and the working people on food stamps will win more crowns than the "good" people who griped about a mandatory percentage of their money going to help the least of these obtain basic human rights - a percentage that in most cases in no significant way affects their own lifestyle. Who really knows if that will be the case. But we do know that God hears the cry of the poor.

Edited May 15, 2011 by Maggie

[Winchester]

[quote name='Maggie' timestamp='1305484855' post='2241900']
A lot of it comes from the attitude that "good" people don't become poor, that the poor must be lazy, drunks, addicts, etc. These attitudes can only flourish among Christians when they don't spend enough time ministering to poor people, which puts them at risk spiritually. When you minister to someone and try to be Jesus to them, you start to see them as a human being worthy of the community's investment, and not as a "drain" or a statistic. For a lot of folks the poor are an abstraction. They exist only as a category in ideological arguments or a line item on a budget. When you are face to face with them, poverty suddenly becomes a concrete reality. In this way, practicing charity often leads to a desire to practice social justice.

God has a preferential love both for those who are poor spiritually and those who are poor physically. At the end of the day we will be judged by love. I suspect Heaven will be surprising for a lot of folks - I think the homeless addicts, the prostitutes on Medicaid and the working people on food stamps will win more crowns than the "good" people who griped about a mandatory percentage of their money going to help the least of these obtain basic human rights - a percentage that in most cases in no significant way affects their own lifestyle. Who really knows if that will be the case. But we do know that God hears the cry of the poor.
[/quote]
Your sanctimony could power the United States indefinitely.

[Maggyie]

[quote name='Winchester' timestamp='1305487192' post='2241904']
Your sanctimony could power the United States indefinitely.
[/quote]

Finally, a solution for our dependence on foreign oil.

[Winchester]

[quote name='Maggie' timestamp='1305487797' post='2241906']
Finally, a solution for our dependence on foreign oil.
[/quote]
It would require superconductor technology to transmit the power. My statement is purely theoretical.

[Maggyie]

[quote name='Winchester' timestamp='1305487924' post='2241907']
It would require superconductor technology to transmit the power. My statement is purely theoretical.
[/quote]

Don't worry, President Obama promised me he's going to "create" some high-paying green "jobs" to develop the superconductor technology. As soon as he comes home from his latest vacation, he'll get to "work" right away on it.

[Winchester]

[quote name='Maggie' timestamp='1305488369' post='2241910']
Don't worry, President Obama promised me he's going to "create" some high-paying green "jobs" to develop the superconductor technology. As soon as he comes home from his latest vacation, he'll get to "work" right away on it.
[/quote]
I reject Corporatism and so cannot rejoice in this news.

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='Maggie' timestamp='1305484855' post='2241900']
A lot of it comes from the attitude that "good" people don't become poor, that the poor must be lazy, drunks, addicts, etc. These attitudes can only flourish among Christians when they don't spend enough time ministering to poor people, which puts them at risk spiritually. When you minister to someone and try to be Jesus to them, you start to see them as a human being worthy of the community's investment, and not as a "drain" or a statistic. For a lot of folks the poor are an abstraction. They exist only as a category in ideological arguments or a line item on a budget. When you are face to face with them, poverty suddenly becomes a concrete reality. In this way, practicing charity often leads to a desire to practice social justice.

God has a preferential love both for those who are poor spiritually and those who are poor physically. At the end of the day we will be judged by love. I suspect Heaven will be surprising for a lot of folks - I think the homeless addicts, the prostitutes on Medicaid and the working people on food stamps will win more crowns than the "good" people who griped about a mandatory percentage of their money going to help the least of these obtain basic human rights - a percentage that in most cases in no significant way affects their own lifestyle. Who really knows if that will be the case. But we do know that God hears the cry of the poor.
[/quote]


I just love it when people assume that those who oppose such things have ever been poor,or are not poor currently. You know nothng about Winchesters life,you know nothing about my life, you know nothing about the live's of anyone else on here who objects to government cohersion. I assure you, many of us have been truely poor.

I was so poor when I was young that my parents were threatened with tax evasion charges by the IRS. Why?Becuase in the words of the Auditor " it is not possible to live on the amount of money you claim.

My parents were not hiding any income.

Don't act so self rightous, you know nothing about those of whom you are speaking.