scholarly journals Integralist Social Science and Catholic Social Thought

2001 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. 11-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph A. Varacalli ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Shannon

This chapter argues that the best early twentieth-century Catholic social thinkers engaged the broader culture but were never assimilated by it. Their sacramental imaginations and openness to supernatural intervention represented a sign of contradiction against the faith-free academic social science in rapid ascent at the time. This prophetic option was especially appealing to converts, anti-modernists, and ex-radicals, but in the 1930s and 1940s it slowly found favor among a cohort of young ethnic Catholics, particularly those exposed to the Catholic Worker movement. The chapter further argues that sporadic attempts by prophetic Catholics to influence secular culture undermined the movement's spiritual foundation.


Author(s):  
Mary L. Hirschfeld

There are two ways to answer the question, What can Catholic social thought learn from the social sciences about the common good? A more modern form of Catholic social thought, which primarily thinks of the common good in terms of the equitable distribution of goods like health, education, and opportunity, could benefit from the extensive literature in public policy, economics, and political science, which study the role of institutions and policies in generating desirable social outcomes. A second approach, rooted in pre-Machiavellian Catholic thought, would expand on this modern notion to include concerns about the way the culture shapes our understanding of what genuine human flourishing entails. On that account, the social sciences offer a valuable description of human life; but because they underestimate how human behavior is shaped by institutions, policies, and the discourse of social science itself, their insights need to be treated with caution.


1950 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 117
Author(s):  
Eva J. Ross ◽  
Melvin J. Williams ◽  
Rev. Paul Hanly Furfey

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