Paul Ryan and the Georgetown left

George Weigel has an indispensable essay on the Catholic left's attack on Paul Ryan's invocation of Catholic subsidiarity and solidarity in his proposed solution to our budget and debt crisis.

The betrayal of the Church by the her leftist claque is being laid bare in the wake of the contraception mandate, and the Church is cleaning house. Not a moment too soon.

Excerpt:

What Ryan has in fact done is to follow Benedict XVI and push the subsidiarity-solidarity debate forward, suggesting that there is a kind of moral and political space where solidarity — the moral imperative to live responsibly with and for others — and subsidiarity — the anti-totalitarian, pro-civil-society principle of Catholic social doctrine — intersect. At that broad intersection, there are no obvious answers to public-policy questions, and especially to budgetary questions. But there is prudential judgment: the weighing of risks and benefits; the calculus of probable consequences; the fitting of ends to appropriate means.

Eloquent. Please read the whole thing. A beautiful explanation of the deep wisdom of genuine Catholic social teaching.