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1. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Rev. Msgr. Robert J. Batule

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editors' reflections

2. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Joseph A. Varacalli

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3. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Kevin Schmiesing

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4. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Msgr. Robert J. Batule

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symposium

5. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Kenneth L. Grasso

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6. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Kenneth L. Grasso

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Steven D. Smith’s Pagans and Christians in the City takes its place alongside James Davison Hunter’s Culture Wars as one of the two truly indispensable books on today’s Culture Wars. It advances our understanding of today’s conflict by situating it historically and focusing our attention on its religious dimension. Smith argues that today’s conflict is the latest episode in a longstanding conflict between immanent forms of religiosity which locate the sacred in the world of space and time, and transcendent forms of religiosity which locate the divine beyond space and time. As compelling as it is, the volume’s argument would have been strengthened by a more sustained treatment of the nature of the political community and the essential role played within it by the truths held in common by the members concerning God, man, nature, and history.
7. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Ezekiel Loseke

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Steven D. Smith’s Pagans and Christians in the City is an important and unique contribution to the vast literature on the American culture war. Smith’s distinction between immanent and transcendent religion refines and deepens James Davidson Hunter’s famous analysis of this conflict. As illuminating as this volume is, however, it fails to fully appreciate the religious dimension of the American founding. Specifically, Smith does not acknowledge or account for the covenantal nature of the American founding, and thus does not recognize the full degree to which the American experiment was informed by the transcendent religions of the Western world, namely, Judaism and Christianity.
8. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Thomas F. X. Varacalli

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Steven D. Smith persuasively shows that paganism and Christianity are in a culture war that spans two thousand years. Throughout his book, he shows that Christianity is the exceptional religion in three ways. First, Christianity is more authentically open to philosophy than paganism. Second, Christianity does not sacralize the State. Third, Christianity provides a more fulfilling understanding of sexual ethics. Despite the exceptionalism of Christianity, it is currently facing a significant challenge from a renewed and secularized paganism. This secularized paganism is attractive due to the fallibility of human nature. However, Christianity’s theology and intellectual tradition provide meaningful answers and rebuttals to paganism’s more sensual claims.
9. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Paul R. DeHart

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In Pagans & Christians in the City, Steven D. Smith argues that in contrast to ancient Rome, ancient Christianity, following Judaism, located the sacred outside the world, desacralizing the cosmos and everything in it—including the political order. It thereby introduced a political dualism and potentially contending allegiances. Although Smith’s argument is right so far as it goes, it underplays the role of Christianity’s immanent dimension in subverting the Roman empire and the sacral pattern of antiquity. This division of authority not only undermined the Roman empire and antique sacral political order more generally—it also subverts the modern state, which, in the work of Hobbes and Rousseau, sought to remarry what Western Christianity divorced.

articles

10. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Mark Therrien

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In Laborem exercens, Pope St. John Paul II proposes some fundamental “Elements for a Spirituality of Work.” In thinking about the future development of a theologically robust “Spirituality of Work,” this paper explores Augustine’s theology of labor. It frames its examination by setting forth the philosophical evaluation of labor contemporary to Augustine. It then appraises the different facets of Augustine’s teaching on labor in De opere monachorum. Finally, it looks to his De Genesi ad literam for a more developed account of labor, which is grounded (ultimately) in the very being of God, who himself labors in his creation.
11. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Jeff Koloze

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This paper examines three paintings by T. Gerhardt Smith as pro-life responses to the life issues of abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia: Sorrow Without Tears: Post-Abortion Syndrome, Femicidal National Organization Woman’s Planned Parentless Selfish Movement, and Killer Caduceus. After identifying foundational principles of art aesthetics from a Catholic perspective, the paper determines that Smith’s paintings are consistent with ideas enunciated in St. John Paul II’s Letter to Artists (1999).
12. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Chris Lazarski

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This article focuses on a forgotten evolutionary trend of liberalism clearly visible in Lord Acton’s writing. According to him, liberalism has roots not only in the theories of early modern thinkers but also in political practice, as seen in English and American political regimes of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The first—doctrinaire liberalism—aims at changing the political order by appealing to higher principles and resorts to social engineering and coercion. The second rests on the organic growth of existing political institutions, laws and customs. Acton claims that only the latter is truly liberal, while the former is in fact illiberal.
13. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Ryan J. Barilleaux

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Justice Pierce Butler was a devout Catholic who is best remembered for his dissenting vote in Buck v. Bell (1927), in which the Supreme Court upheld Virginia’s eugenic sterilization law. Butler is often misunderstood by critics who look only to the consequences of his opinions and not to the reasoning behind them. An analysis of Butler’s personal faith and opinions provides evidence that his jurisprudence reflects the principles of Catholic social doctrine. Finally, two cases in which Butler’s Catholic Faith likely influenced his votes are reviewed. The article concludes that Butler needs to be better understood.
14. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Msgr. Robert J. Batule

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Two years ago (2018) was the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Humanae Vitae. It was also the year Pope Paul VI was canonized a saint of the Catholic Church. The Pope who was once vilified for writing the encyclical has now become the Pope raised to the altar. We know what has become of the Pope, but what is to become of his encyclical? This article examines what was occurring at the time of the encyclical’s release and what it has been like to live with half a century of the encyclical’s rejection. The prospects are not very good for anything like a cultural conversion any time soon—maybe not for the foreseeable future. But we are encouraged now at this moment in history by what the prophet Habakkuk says in his Old Testament book. “The vision still has its time, presses on to fulfillment and will not disappoint.”
15. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Anne Hetson, Brian M. Saxton, Mariah Webinger

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Environmental sustainability in business has become a highly debated topic as societies decide how best to meet their economic needs and care for the earth. Catholic social teaching (CST) may add theoretical richness to the discussion. We examine solidarity, subsidiarity, and pursuit of the common good as dimensions of a heavy manufacturing, U.S.-based firm’s CST orientation. We find that measures of subsidiarity and common good predict a firm’s environmental performance consistent with CST principles. Results are of interest to academics, policymakers, and citizens who wish to advance the implementation of CST, environmental sustainability, or both.
16. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Fr. Elmar Nass

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Catholic social ethics with its understanding of humanity challenges social and economic science models to uncover the underlying image of man and thus the underlying idea of ethics. It can take on a pioneering role in areas lacking such discussions so far. This is why I question the understanding of the fundamental cohesiveness of ethical and economical thinking that is challenged by behavioral economics. The article seeks to spark the discussion, outlining several essential behavioral-economic challenges in the process. The encounter with Catholic Social Doctrine identifies areas of conflict and opens a new chapter on the ethics of Behavioral Economics.
17. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Guillermo Montes, Fr. Ross Chamberland, O.F.M.

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This article analyzes the leadership of a medieval treatise on leadership written at the request of Saint Fernando III of Castile in the thirteen century. We investigate how the conceptualization of leadership is similar and different from our modern approaches. We find that the medieval leadership source had stronger Catholic ontological and epistemological underpinnings although it remained hostage to prejudices and misconceptions of its time. The analysis raises questions about how modern secular leadership approaches do not clearly disclose their own ontological and epistemological foundations. In addition, the contrast with a medieval leadership source shows our modern leadership approaches also remain captive to the prejudices and misconceptions of our time. Most importantly, modern leadership approaches assume leaders can set final ends, are immune to greed in themselves and others, focus on intelligence rather than will, and technical skill rather than moral virtue. On the other hand, both sources agree leaders should be decisive, sociable, approachable, and create a culture of trust. More research on historical models of leadership is needed.
18. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Randall Woodard

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Two areas of moral theology where many misunderstand Catholic teaching and find themselves deviating from traditional moral norms are conscience and truth. Many find conscience to be a means through which one can reshape ethical judgments, and truth to be derived from one’s own conscience. The model for an authentic understanding of conscience and the reality of universal moral norms is found in the writings and preaching of Saint John Paul II. This essay offers an overview of conscience and truth according to the Pope, and thereby give readers some idea of how a defense of conscience and truth can be made against contemporary challenges.

book reviews

19. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
Randy Lee

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20. Catholic Social Science Review: Volume > 25
John P. Varacalli

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