Pope Leo XIV speech on the social doctrine of the Church before the Centesimus Annus Foundation

This May 17, Pope Leo XIV called to overcome global polarizations through the dialogue and social doctrine of the Church.

Next, the full text of his speech to the members of the Foundation CENTERIAN CLOVER FOR PONTIFY:

Dear brothers and sisters, welcome!

I thank the president and the members of the Foundation CENTERIAN CLOVER FOR PONTIFYand greet all those who participate in the International Conference and Annual General Assembly.

The theme of your conference this year – “Overcome polarizations and rebuild global governance: ethical bases” – It plays the heart of the meaning and role of the social doctrine of the Church, an instrument of peace and dialogue to build bridges of universal fraternity.

Especially at this time Pascual, we recognize that the risen is in front of us, even where it seems that injustice and death have triumphed. Let’s help each other, as I exhorted the night of my choice, “to build bridges with dialogue, with the encounter, joining us all to be a single town always in peace.” This is not improvised: it is a dynamic and continuous network of grace and freedom that also now, when we strengthen.

Pope Leo XIII – who lived in a historical period of epochal and disruptive transformations – aspired to contribute to peace stimulating social dialogue: between capital and work, between technologies and human intelligence, among the diverse political cultures, among nations.

Pope Francis used the term “policrisis” To evoke the drama of the historical situation we are living, in which wars, climatic changes, growing inequalities, forced and hindered migrations, stigmatized poverty, disruptive technological innovations, work precariousness and rights (1) converge (1). Faced with issues of such importance, the social doctrine of the Church is called to offer interpretive keys that put science and consciousness in dialogue, thus offering a fundamental contribution to knowledge, to hope and peace.

The social doctrine, in fact, educates us to recognize that the most important thing is not the problems, not even the answers to them, but the way in which we face them, with evaluation criteria and ethical principles, and with openness to the grace of God.

You have the opportunity to show that the social doctrine of the Church, with its particular anthropological vision, seeks to favor true access to social issues: it does not intend to fly the flag of the possession of truth, nor regarding the analysis of problems or its resolution. In these issues it is more important to know how to get a hurried response about why something has happened or how to overcome it. The objective is to learn to face the problems, which are always different, because each generation is new, with new challenges, new dreams, new questions.

Here we find a fundamental aspect for the construction of the “Meeting culture” through dialogue and social friendship. For the sensitivity of many of our contemporaries, the words “dialogue” and “doctrine” sound as opposite and incompatible. Perhaps, when we hear the word “doctrine”, we think of the classical definition: a set of ideas of a religion. And with this definition, we feel little free to reflect, question or look for new alternatives.

It becomes urgent, then, the task of showing, through the social doctrine of the Church, that there is a different meaning – and promising – of the term “doctrine”, without which the dialogue is also emptied. Their synonyms can be “science”, “discipline” or “know.” Thus understood, every doctrine is recognized as the fruit of the investigation, and therefore of hypotheses, voices, advances and failures, through which it is sought to transmit reliable, orderly and systematic knowledge about a certain issue. In this way, a doctrine does not equal an opinion, but to a common, coral and even multidisciplinary path towards the truth.

The indoctrination is immoral, prevents critical judgment, threatens the sacred freedom of respect for one’s conscience – even if it is wrong – and closes to new reflections because it rejects the movement, change or evolution of ideas in the face of new problems. On the contrary, the doctrine, as a serious, serene and rigorous reflection, seeks to teach us, first of all, to know how to approach situations, and even before, to people. In addition, it helps us in the formulation of the prudential trial. Seriousness, rigor and serenity are what we must learn from all doctrine, also from social doctrine.

In the context of the ongoing digital revolution, the mandate to educate the critical sense must rediscover, explain and cultivate, fighting the opposite temptations, which can also cross the ecclesial body. There is little dialogue around us, and the wet words predominate, not rarely false news and irrational thesis of a few arrogant. Therefore, the study and deepening are fundamental, as are the encounter and listening of the poor, treasure of the Church and humanity, carriers of discarded views, but indispensable to see the world with the eyes of God. Who is born and grows away from the centers of power should not simply be instructed in the social doctrine of the Church, but recognized as its continuator and update: the witnesses of the social commitment, the popular movements and the various Catholic organizations of workers are expression of the existential peripheries in which hope resists and always blooms. I entrust them to give the word to the poor.

Dear, as the Second Vatican Council affirms, “it is permanent duty of the Church to scrutinize the signs of the times and interpret them in the light of the Gospel, so that it can respond, properly to each generation, to the perennial questions of men about the meaning of the present and future life and on their mutual relationships” (Joy and hope4).

Therefore, I invite you to participate actively and creatively in this exercise of discernment, contributing to the development of the social doctrine of the Church together with the people of God, in this historical moment of great social transformations, listening and dialoguing with all. Today there is an extended need for justice, a demand for paternity and maternity, a deep desire for spirituality, especially among young and marginalized, who do not always find effective channels to express themselves. There is a growing demand for social doctrine of the church to which we must respond.

I thank you for your commitment and your prayers for my ministry, and I bless all of you, your families and your work. Thank you!