"If you don’t believe Catholics about this, just read Ayn Rand"

Patrick J. Deneen at The American Conservative:

I think it is because of the left’s “narrative of disruption” that the right is panicked over Francis’s critiques of capitalism. These Vatican criticisms—suddenly salient in ways they weren’t when uttered by JPII and Benedict—need to be nipped in the bud before they do any damage. Of course, all along Catholic teaching has seen a strong tie between the radical individualism and selfishness at the heart of capitalism and liberationist sexual practices, understanding them to be premised on the same anthropological assumptions. (If you don’t believe Catholics about this, just read Ayn Rand.) While Hadley Arkes laments that Pope Francis did not speak at more length on sexual matters, if one reads his criticisms of the depredations of capitalism with care, one notices that he uses the same phrases with which he criticized abortion—namely, that abortion is but one manifestation of “a throw-away culture,” a phrase as well as in Evangelii Gaudium in his critique of capitalism (Section 53). If one attends carefully to Francis’s criticisms of the economy’s effects on the weak and helpless, one can’t help but perceive there also that he is speaking of the unborn as much as those who are “losers” in an economy that favors the strong. Like John Paul and Benedict before him, Francis discerns the continuity between a “throw-away” economy and a “throw-away” view of human life. He sees the deep underlying connection between an economy that highlights autonomy, infinite choice, loose connections, constant titillation, utilitarianism and hedonism, and a sexual culture that condones random hook-ups, abortion, divorce and the redefinition of marriage based on sentiment, and in which the weak—children, in this case, and those in the lower socio-economic scale who are suffering a complete devastation of the family—are an afterthought.

There are other parts of Deneen's essay with which I disagree, but I agree emphatically with this paragraph. People who think that it is high time that the Pope spoke out decisively on the evil traces in capitalism do have some quite valid points. This is of course established Catholic teaching, but the Holy Father is emphasizing it with particular clarity.

Readers of the blog know well that I detest socialism. Socialism is now and always, here and everywhere, a catastrophe. It is greed and envy annealed into an economic system. It serves only the indolent and powerful. It is without question the worst economic system, next to slavery, that man has devised.

Capitalism is undoubtedly the most effective generator of wealth man has ever devised. It has lifted billions of people out of poverty, and has saved billions of lives of people who otherwise would have perished of hunger and disease.

But that is not to say that capitalism is without sin. Capitalism facilitates a "throw-away culture", and too often dehumanizes man and treats his as a commodity, as a "consumer" or a "producer", rather than as a human being.

Capitalism is also a soporific. It dulls the senses, and encourages millions of people to live in cheap bling-luxury. It easily leads to the worship of things. It is a deep idolatry, more lethal than many other idolatries because of its remarkable effectiveness at creating wealth. It can be corrosive in a way that other idolatries, such as communism, cannot. Masses living under the socialist/communist boot are never convinced of their "bliss". The rot is always in front of socialism's chattel-slaves. People living under capitalism too often don't even know they're chattel, of a spiritual sort.

The answer to capitalism is not socialism. We must not replace overstuffed Madison-Avenue-hedonism and spiritual corruption with Detroit-style economic implosion and state corruption.

The answer to capitalism and to socialism-- the answer to all slavery-- is Christ.

We need a spiritual revival, and I think the Pope is right. Life issues are not entirely distinct from economic and cultural issues. One need look no further than Ayn Rand to see the link between unfettered worship of material acquisition and unfettered lust and disregard for innocent life. One can lust for possessions as easily as one lusts for mistresses. One can throw away an uneconomical employee just as callously as one throws away an unwanted wife or a child. Rand was a passionate advocate for capitalism and material acquisition, and a passionate advocate for contraception, abortion and eugenics.

I read Rand avidly in college-- I assure you that Howard Roark would be just as comfortable in a Planned Parenthood boardroom as he would be in a Wall Street boardroom. There is a worldview-- a growing worldview-- in which there is no cognitive dissonance between capitalism and anti-life views.

Although the Catholic Church explicitly condemns socialism, it does not condone unfettered capitalism either. The Church teaches solidarity and subsidiarity as the basis for a good society. We are called by God to help each other (solidarity), on as close a scale to the family and community as we can (subsidiarity).

Solidarity and subsidiarity are the anthesis of capitalism and socialism, and form the basis for a truly humane-- a truly Christian-- social system.

The devil-- or should I say the problem-- is in the details. The easiest response to dehumanized capitalism is impoverished socialism. But that is the wrong response. Worship of State is not the remedy for worship of Wealth. There is another way-- the Christian way-- but that way is spiritual and moral renewal, and does not lend itself well to political methods.

It won't be easy. It means changing hearts and souls. We need Him.