By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
In an important and refreshing exchange, U.S. bishops conference president Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York and the author of a proposed new budget deal, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), have corresponded with one another regarding the moral implications of the ongoing budget debate.
The Catholic News Agency is reporting that Rep. Ryan responded to the Church’s concerns about his proposed budget in a letter dated April 29 in which he acknowledged their worry that proposed cuts in social programs will leave the neediest citizens at risk.
“Catholic Americans are blessed to have the social teaching of the Church as moral guidance as we consider legislative proposals such as the Fiscal Year 2012 Budget,” Ryan wrote, but said there was a moral obligation “implicit” in Catholic social teaching to address “difficult basic problems before they explode into social crisis.”
Ryan quoted a passage from Pope John Paul II’s 1991 encyclical Centisimus Annus in which the late pontiff criticized the “social assistance state” for leading to “an inordinate increase of public agencies” dominated by bureaucratic thinking and accompanied by an “enormous increase in spending” and “a loss of human energies.”
He also cited the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, claiming that the House budget was informed by the principle of subsidiarity. This principle holds that higher-level social associations should not do what lower-level associations can.
Ryan noted that if the U.S. government continues to drive up the deficit through reckless spending, “the weakest will be hit three times over: by rising costs, by drastic cuts to programs they rely on, and by the collapse of individual support for charities that help the hungry, the homeless, the sick, refugees and others in need.” The failure of many European nations to address their financial crises has led to “drastic cuts in benefits to the retired, the sick, the poor, and millions of public employees.”
He said the House Committee’s budget “better targets assistance to those in need, repairs the social safety net, and fulfills the mission of health and retirement security for all Americans. The budget reforms welfare for those who need it—the poor, sick, and vulnerable; it ends welfare for those who don’t—entrenched corporations, the wealthiest Americans.”
Archbishop Dolan was pleased with the response, and sent a response to Ryan last week.
“As you allude to in your letter, the budget is not just about numbers,” the Archbishop wrote. “It reflects the very values of our nation.”
He went on to thank Ryan for attending to important values that the Church prioritizes, such as “fiscal responsibility; sensitivity to the foundational role of the family; the primacy of the dignity of the human person and the protection of all human life; a concrete solicitude for the poor and the vulnerable…[and] a commitment to the common good.”
Archbishop Dolan expressed his hope that the exchange of letters will be the beginning of an ongoing dialogue in service of the country and “the religious convictions that have always inspired sound citizenship and generous public service.”
The current budget disputes are centered on the need to raise the national debt limit with fiscal conservatives refusing to do so unless substantial spending cuts are made. House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) is demanding $2 trillion in cuts. The Democrats have yet to counter this with their own proposal.
Speaker Boehner, a Catholic, has expressed his approval of the dialogue between House Republicans and the bishops.
“Our nation’s current fiscal path is a threat to human dignity in America, offering empty promises to the most vulnerable among us and condemning our children to a future limited by debt,” he said on May 19.
Echoing Ryan’s letter, he added: “Americans are blessed to have the teachings of the Church available to us as guidance as we confront our challenges together as a nation.”
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