John 11, 38-46 + CSDC and CV

John 11, 38-46 + CSDC and CV 

CV 5c Development, social well-being, the search for a satisfactory solution to the grave socio-economic problems besetting humanity, all need this truth. What they need even more is that this truth should be loved and demonstrated. Without truth, without trust and love for what is true, there is no social conscience and responsibility, and social action ends up serving private interests and the logic of power, resulting in social fragmentation, especially in a globalized society at difficult times like the present. 

Environmental protection cannot be assured solely on the basis of financial calculations of costs and benefits

CSDC 470b. An economy respectful of the environment will not have the maximization of profits as its only objective, because environmental protection cannot be assured solely on the basis of financial calculations of costs and benefits. The environment is one of those goods that cannot be adequately safeguarded or promoted by market forces.[993] Every country, in particular developed countries, must be aware of the urgent obligation to reconsider the way that natural goods are being used. Seeking innovative ways to reduce the environmental impact of production and consumption of goods should be effectively encouraged.

Notes: [993] Cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, 40: AAS 83 (1991), 843.

(John 11, 38-46) If you believe you will see the glory of God

[38] So Jesus, perturbed again, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone lay across it. [39] Jesus said, "Take away the stone." Martha, the dead man's sister, said to him, "Lord, by now there will be a stench; he has been dead for four days." [40] Jesus said to her, "Did I not tell you that if you believe you will see the glory of God?" [41] So they took away the stone. And Jesus raised his eyes and said, "Father, I thank you for hearing me. [42] I know that you always hear me; but because of the crowd here I have said this, that they may believe that you sent me." [43] And when he had said this, he cried out in a loud voice, "Lazarus, come out!" [44] The dead man came out, tied hand and foot with burial bands, and his face was wrapped in a cloth. So Jesus said to them, "Untie him and let him go." [45] Now many of the Jews who had come to Mary and seen what he had done began to believe in him. [46] But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.

CSDC 125. The human person may never be thought of only as an absolute individual being, built up by himself and on himself, as if his characteristic traits depended on no one else but himself. Nor can the person be thought of as a mere cell of an organism that is inclined at most to grant it recognition in its functional role within the overall system. Reductionist conceptions of the full truth of men and women have already been the object of the Church's social concern many times, and she has not failed to raise her voice against these, as against other drastically reductive perspectives, taking care to proclaim instead that “individuals do not feel themselves isolated units, like grains of sand, but united by the very force of their nature and by their internal destiny, into an organic, harmonious mutual relationship”[234]. She has affirmed instead that man cannot be understood “simply as an element, a molecule within the social organism”[235], and is therefore attentive that the affirmation of the primacy of the person is not seen as corresponding to an individualistic or mass vision.

Notes: [234] Pius XII, Encyclical Letter Summi Pontificatus: AAS 31 (1939), 463. [235] John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, 13: AAS 83 (1991), 809.

[Initials and Abbreviations.- CSDC: Pontifical Council for Justice And Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church; -  SDC: Social Doctrine of the Church; - CV: Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate (Charity in truth)]