The Poor Need More Than What Government Can Provide

To the Editor:

In a recent editorial (“Solutions to Poverty Must Be Based on More Than Faith,” My View, December 11), Thomas J. Harvey, former president of Catholic Charities USA, makes some remarkable statements regarding charity and poverty alleviation. Mr. Harvey claims that real solutions to poverty require more than faith-based organizations can muster. In addition, Mr. Harvey accuses those who advocate faith-based alternatives to government-sponsored welfare of cloaking their anti-government sentiments in religious rhetoric.

What would lead the former leader of one of the largest reli- gious charitable organizations in America to such drastic conclusions? I offer that this position is not the result of wise reflection upon years of experience but rather the result of faulty application of church teaching.

A central and disturbing aspect of Mr. Harvey’s argument is the assumption that welfare is an either-or situation. According to Mr. Harvey, helping the poor requires either massive government-funded programs or inadequate faith-based endeavors. Framing the debate in this manner is counterproductive and contradicts the very position Mr. Harvey wishes to prove.

Reasonable people agree that social ills are best solved when all the institutions in society — including government and church — fulfill their natural responsibilities to the best of their ability. The proper functioning of social institutions, each supporting and working with each other, leads to what the Catholic social teaching calls the common good — that set of social conditions in which the dignity of all is affirmed and community life flourishes.

Yet fundamental to the church’s understanding of the common good — and missing from Mr. Harvey’s article — is another principle of Catholic social teaching: subsidiarity. Subsidiarity must be applied if we wish to achieve the common good.

According to subsidiarity, each institution in society must understand its basic role, accepting those responsibilities that derive from its nature. Families raise children, schools teach, the church preaches the gospel and helps the poor, and government — now, what exactly is government supposed to do?

According to Mr. Harvey, government should be the primary provider of charitable efforts in America. The solution to poverty rests with the government because faith-based organizations and charities just do not have what it takes to meet the demands of the poor. The government wins this lofty position by default — a default caused by advocates like Mr. Harvey who, in effect, call for the church’s abdication of caring for the needy.

This sort of reasoning betrays a reductionist attitude toward poverty and the poor themselves. The poor require more than money. Yes, on the surface economic deficiency is the most obvious problem of the poor. However, if we scratch the sur

face, another reality emerges. This reality is far more complex and multifaceted. It is a reality where the spiritual meets the material and the economic intersects with the moral.

People are poor because they cannot avail themselves of the productive means of society. Normal means of participation in the productive sector takes place through marriage, family life, and employment. Presuppositions for such means of participation are education, basic life skills, and functional behavior. Many people are poor not because they lack money but because they are marginalized by a lack of education and the damage caused them by dysfunctional relationships and unhealthy ways of being. Those dysfunctions are not always the fault of the poor.

Poverty is at root a moral and spiritual problem and not an economic one. Again, I recognize our obligations to care for the marginalized. But if we wish to move beyond mere maintenance — and really strive for healing and restoration — then we must address the problem as it presents itself.

Moral and social rehabilitation is something government is ill-equipped to perform. The primary player in this game is the church. This is not to say the government has no role. Government must assist the church first and foremost by avoiding unnecessary restrictions on the church and second by performing its basic tasks of protecting persons and property and upholding contracts and social covenants.

Massive wealth-redistribution schemes, which are nothing more than forced charity, are not a primary function of government. When government allows itself to drift into such roles, it harms the common good and upsets the social balance, robbing the other social institutions of their rightful functions. In essence, the government is trying to crowd out the church as it seeks to fulfill its mission.

I agree with Mr. Harvey that the church needs to do more. I also agree that many faith-based organizations are in need of revival and restructuring after years of dependence on government money and programs. Yet I, unlike Mr. Harvey, have faith that the church and its related ministries can rise to the occasion and assume their rightful role as charitable provider to the poor and needy.

The Rev. Robert A. Sirico
President
Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty
Grand Rapids, Mich.