Christian Social Principles: The Complete Guide to Catholic Social Teaching

In her penetrating exploration of Catholic Social Teaching, Sr. Mary Consilia O’Brien, O.P., Ph.D., offers the most clear-eyed description ever written on this foundational subject. She explores the Church’s authentic teachings on the dignity of the human person as well as man’s freedoms and obligations to society. She describes when individual liberties must transcend social control -- and when they must not. Best of all, she explains the final purpose of society, to which all its activities must be oriented.

Skillfully crafted to appeal to both students and adults, each chapter features a probe of the content, leavened by practical examples, excerpts from the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, quotes from encyclicals, as well as discussion questions and additional study resources. In Christian Social Principles, you’ll also learn:

• The Church’s teachings on communism, liberalism, and capitalism
• How free will is the source of our obligations to society
• Why Communism is a natural offspring of Liberalism
• How freedom of thought and action is a false concept that can degenerate into license
• Why neither the ＂liberty＂ of Liberalism nor the ＂equality＂ of Communism can serve as the reliable cornerstone of a social order
• Why no one can be both a sincere Catholic and a true Socialist
• Why norms of morality must be universal in scope across society
• Why the work of government will be of little avail without religion to enlighten the mind
• Why justice alone can never bring about a union of hearts and minds

Dave Armstrong is a Catholic writer, apologist, and evangelist who has been actively proclaiming and defending Christianity for more than twenty years. Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Armstrong was received into the Catholic Church in 1991 by the late, well-known catechist and theologian Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J. Armstrong’s conversion story appeared in the best-selling book Surprised by Truth, and his articles have been published in a number of Catholic periodicals, including The Catholic Answer, This Rock, Envoy, Hands On Apologetics, The Coming Home Journal, and The Latin Mass. His apologetic and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of Envoy. Armstrong is the author of the books A Biblical Defense of Catholicism and More Biblical Evidence for Catholicism and of forty-four apologetics articles in The Catholic Answer Bible. His website, Biblical Evidence for Catholicism (www.biblicalcatholic.com), online since March 1997, re