The term "Catholic social teaching" is often tossed out by experts in explaining why the Church cares about the poor and neglected. Social teaching is a basic part of Catholicism, but many Catholics don't even understand what the term means.

Catholic social teaching refers, in part, to the public policy positions of the Church -- its interest in how economics, politics, law and other policies affect human beings and the earth.

Those positions are founded on the teachings and life of Jesus, the Old and New Testaments, and documents from the Church.

Central to faith

In a 1999 document titled, "Sharing Catholic Social Teaching: Challenges and Directions," the U.S. bishops called Catholic social teaching "a central and essential element of our faith," with roots "in the Hebrew prophets who announced God's special love for the poor and called God's people to a covenant of love and justice."

Jesus also spawned Catholic social teaching when He said, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free..." (Luke 4:18-19). The Church took its social mission from such words as those.

According to the "Catechism of the Catholic Church," "To receive in truth the Body and Blood of Christ given up for us, we must recognize Christ in the poorest, His brethren." That statement echoes Jesus' words when He told His followers that whenever they mistreated "these least ones" -- strangers, the hungry and thirsty, the naked or imprisoned -- they mistreated Him.

Seven themes

In its social teaching, the Church focuses on seven major themes:

• life and dignity of the human person (often under attack by threats like abortion, capital punishment and assisted suicide);
• the call to family, community and participation (seeking the common good of people);
• human rights and responsibilities (for instance, a person's right to life and its necessities);
• concern for the poor and vulnerable;
• the dignity of work and the rights of workers (from a living wage to productive work);
• solidarity (the fact that we are a family of human beings on earth); and
• care for God's creation (for the environment and our fellow creatures).

Papal comments

Pope John Paul II frequently promotes Catholic social teaching in addressing both world leaders and the "people in the pews."

For instance, he once told the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, "I encourage you in your efforts to make the practice of the social teaching of the Church an ever more deeply felt commitment among the faithful."

The Pope has also addressed specific aspects of social teaching. In 1997, on the feast day of St. Joseph -- patron of workers -- he told thousands of Catholics at his general audience in St. Peter's Square that "in the Church's social teaching, work is considered an expression of our human dignity....The Church teaches that labor has primacy over capital, and she is concerned whenever work is organized in ways that do not serve the true well-being of workers."

Bishop's teaching

Bishop Howard J. Hubbard of the Albany Diocese has been an outspoken advocate for the issues outlined in Catholic social teaching.

In a 1997 column in The Evangelist, for example, he outlined three fundamental principles that would allow Catholics to act in accord with Catholic social teaching:

1. Every person has been created by God with a dignity that is unique, sacred and inviolable;

2. from that basic dignity, there flow certain rights; and

3. there is a solidarity within the human family.

Measuring faith

During that year, the Bishop urged Catholics to celebrate the Diocese's 150th anniversary by committing to promoting Catholic social teaching.

"The measure of the economy is not only what it produces, but also how it touches human life, whether it protects or undermines the dignity of the human person and how it promotes the common good," the Bishop stated.

In that column, he blasted those who "welcome our social teaching's emphasis on the right to private property, the limits of the state, the advantages of free markets and the condemnation of communism" but "resist the focus on the poor, the defense of labor unions, the recognition of the moral limits of markets and the responsibilities of government."

Bishop Hubbard also chided Catholics who applaud government's duty to protect the weak and vulnerable, but ignore "the centrality of family, the emphasis on economic initiative and the warnings against bureaucratic excesses of the social welfare state."