A call and challenge, especially to Catholic politicians. Do you think it relevant in today’s United States? Let’s read:
507. Let us consider how necessary is moral integrity in politicians. Many of the Latin American and Caribbean peoples, but in other continents as well, live in poverty because of endemic problems of corruption. How much discipline of moral integrity we need, understood in the Christian sense as self-control for doing good, for being a servant of truth and of doing our work without letting ourselves be corrupted by favors, interests, or advantages. A great deal of strength and perseverance is needed to preserve the honesty that ought to emerge from a new education to break the vicious cycle of the prevailing corruption. We really need a great deal of effort to advance toward creating a true moral wealth that will allow us to provide for our own future.
508. We bishops gathered in the Fifth Conference want to be present to those who build society, for it is the Church’s fundamental vocation in this sector …
- Note the three aspects of this vocation, according to the pope emeritus:
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to shape consciences, and
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to be an advocate of justice and truth and
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to educate in the individual and political virtues.(Cf. Benedict XVI, Introductory Address 4)
We want to issue a call to the sense of responsibility of those lay people who are present in public life, and more specifically “in the formation of the necessary consensus and in opposition to injustice.”(Ibid.)
For deeper examination, an English translation of the 2007 document from the Aparecida Conference.
Catholic Sensibility 