3.11 Justice, Love and Charity
Justice and Natural Rights
The sentiment of justice is natural. We revolt at the thought of injustice. Moral progress undoubtedly develops this sentiment, but does not create it, for God has placed it in the human heart. That is why notions of justice are often found among simple and unlearned people that are more exact than those of very knowledgeable ones.
If people understand justice so differently, and what one individual considers just appears unjust to another, it is because the passions are often mingled with the sentiment of justice, thereby altering it. The same thing occurs with most other natural sentiments and causes matters to be seen from an erroneous point of view.
Justice consists in respecting the rights of others.
These rights are determined by two things: human law and natural law. Because human beings have established laws appropriate to their customs and character, such laws have established rights that can vary with progress. Though current laws are not perfect, they no longer consecrate the same rights as the laws of the Medieval Era, for instance. Even though those rights now seem monstrous and are obsolete, they seemed just and natural at the time. Therefore, the rights established by human beings do not always conform to justice. They regulate only certain social relations, whereas in private life there are a great number of actions that belong exclusively to the court of conscience.
Outside the rights consecrated by human law, the basis of justice founded on natural law is this: Christ has told you, “Do unto others whatsoever you would have them do unto you.” God has placed in the human heart the rule of all true justice through the desire all have to see their rights respected. If one is uncertain what one should do for one’s neighbor in any given circumstance, one should ask what one would want one’s neighbor to do in a similar situation. God could not give a safer guide than one’s own conscience.
The criterion of true justice lies in desiring for others what we would desire for ourselves; it does not lie in desiring for ourselves what we would desire for others, which is not the same thing. Since it is not natural to desire our own harm, if we take our personal desire as the norm or starting point, we can be certain that we will never do anything for our neighbor except what is good. In all ages and in all belief systems, human beings have always sought to enforce their own personal rights. The sublimity of the Christian religion was to take personal rights as the basis for the rights of one’s neighbor.
The necessity of living in society does impose special obligations on humankind. The first of all is respecting the rights of others; those who respect the rights of others will always be just. In a world where so many do not practice the law of justice, everyone resorts to reprisals, and that is what causes trouble and confusion in society. Social life bestows rights and imposes reciprocal duties.
Since human beings can be mistaken as to the extent of their rights, the guideline that enables them to know what limits to set on such rights is the limit of the right that each one recognizes for a neighbor in relation to oneself under the same circumstances, and vice versa.
If all attributed to themselves the rights of their neighbor, subordination to superiors would not thereby be destroyed. Natural rights are the same for everybody, from the least to the greatest. God has not made some from purer clay than others, and all are equal in the divine sight. These rights are eternal, whereas those established by human beings perish with their institutions. Moreover, all individuals sense their own strength or weakness and will always show a certain deference to those who deserve it because of their virtue and wisdom. It is important to point this out so that those who think they are superior may know their duties and may deserve such deference. Subordination will never be compromised if authority conforms to wisdom.
Those who practice justice in all its purity would be truly just and would be following Jesus’ example, because they would practice both charity and love toward their neighbor, without which there is no real justice.
The Right of Ownership. Theft
The first of all the natural rights of human beings is the right to stay alive. That is why no one has the right to assault a fellow human being’s life or to do anything that may compromise that person’s bodily existence.
The right to stay alive gives human beings the right to accumulate what is needed to live on and to retire when they can no longer work. They must do this as a family, like the bee, through honest labor, and not by accumulating assets as selfish individuals. Certain animals set an example of such foresight.
Human beings have the right to defend what they have accumulated through their labor. God has said, “Do not steal,” and Jesus said, “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.”
Assets that human beings accumulate through honest labor are legitimate property, and they have the right to defend it, because ownership that is the fruit of labor comprises a natural right that is as sacred as the right to work and to stay alive.
The desire to possess is natural, but when human beings desire to possess only for themselves and for their own personal satisfaction, it is selfishness.
The desire to possess is legitimate, since the one who has enough to live on is not a burden to others. There are insatiable individuals who accumulate possessions without benefit to anyone else, or merely to satisfy their passions. This is not approved by God. Those who accumulate assets through their labor with the intention of helping their neighbor practice the law of love and charity, and their labor is blessed by God.
There is only one legitimate ownership: owning something that has been acquired without harm to others. (See no. 808)
The law of love and justice forbids us to do to others what we would not want them to do to us, and by this same principle it condemns every means of acquiring property that is contrary to it.
The right of ownership is not unlimited. Of course, everything that is legitimately acquired represents proper ownership; but as has been said, human legislation is imperfect, and it frequently sanctions conventional rights that natural justice does not approve of. That is why human beings reform their laws as they make progress and better comprehend justice. What appears perfect in one century appears barbaric in the next. (See no. 795)
Charity and Love for Our Neighbor
Saint Vincent de Paul
The true meaning of the word charity, as Jesus understood it, is benevolence toward everyone, indulgence toward the imperfections of others, and forgiveness for offenses.
Love and charity supplement the law of justice, because loving our neighbors is doing them all the good possible, all that we would wish to be done to ourselves. Such is the meaning of Jesus’ words: “Love one another as brothers.”
Charity, according to Jesus, is not restricted to almsgiving, but embraces all our relations with our fellow human beings, whether they are in positions below, equal to, or superior to our own. It orders us to be indulgent because we need indulgence ourselves, and it forbids us to humiliate the unfortunate, contrary to what is commonly practiced. Whenever wealthy persons seek us out, we regard them with an overabundance of consideration and attention, but whenever poor persons seek us out, it seems as though we do not want to be troubled by them. However, the more pitiable their situation, the more we should refrain from increasing their disgrace through humiliation. Those who are truly charitable seek to uplift the self-esteem of those in lower positions, thereby diminishing the distance between them.
Jesus also taught: “Love even your enemies.” Loving one’s enemies is not showing tender and passionate love toward them, and that is not what Jesus meant. Loving one’s enemies means forgiving them and returning good for their evil. That is how we place ourselves above them; by seeking vengeance, we place ourselves beneath them.
Those who are reduced to begging for alms morally and physically degrade themselves in an existence that puts them on the level of the brute. A society based on the law of God and justice should provide for the life of the weak without humiliating them. It should ensure an existence for those who cannot work, without leaving them at the mercy of chance and goodwill.
Almsgiving in itself is not reprehensible, but the way in which it is done almost always is. Moral individuals, those who understand charity according to Jesus, seek out the unfortunate without waiting for them to hold out their hand.
True charity is always kind and benevolent; it is demonstrated both in the act itself and in the way it is done. A service rendered with graciousness thus has a double value; but if it is rendered with haughtiness, the recipient’s need compels acceptance, yet the heart is hardly touched.
Also, in God’s sight, ostentation erases the merit of benevolence. Jesus said: “Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” In this, he teaches us not to tarnish charity with pride.
It is necessary to distinguish between almsgiving in itself and benevolence. The one who is most needy is not always the one who begs; the fear of humiliation restrains the truly poor, who almost always suffer without complaining. It is these whom the authentically humane person knows how to help without ostentation.
“Love one another” is the whole law, the divine law through which God governs the worlds. Love is the law of attraction for living and organized beings, and attraction is the law of love for inorganic matter.
Never forget that a spirit, whatever its degree of advancement or its situation as an incarnate individual or as a discarnate spirit, is always placed between a more evolved spirit who guides and perfects it, and a less evolved one toward whom it has the same duties to fulfill. Therefore, be charitable not only by taking from your bag a coin that you callously give to one who dares to beg from you, but by seeking out hidden poverty. Be indulgent toward the errors of your neighbor. Instead of despising the ignorant and the addict, educate and moralize them. Be gentle and benevolent toward all those who are less evolved than you. Be the same toward the lowermost beings of creation, and you will have obeyed the law of God.
There are those who are reduced to begging through their own fault. But if a good moral education had taught them the law of God, they would not have fallen into the excesses that led them into ruin. It is upon this, above all, that the improvement of your globe depends.
Maternal and Filial Love
Maternal love is both a virtue and an instinctive sentiment common to both human beings and animals. Nature has endowed the mother with love toward her children in the interests of their preservation, but in animals this love is limited to the offspring’s material needs and ceases when it is no longer needed. In human beings, this love persists throughout life and consists in a devotion and self-denial that comprise true virtues. It even survives death itself, accompanying the child from beyond the grave. This sort of love contains something more than the love displayed in animals.
If maternal love is so natural, there are mothers who hate their children, frequently from birth, because this is sometimes a trial chosen by the spirit of the child, or an expiation if the spirit itself had been a bad father, a bad mother, or a bad child in another existence. In all such cases, a bad mother can only be animated by a little-evolved spirit who seeks to create difficulties for the child so that the child will fail in the chosen trial. Such a violation of the laws of nature will not remain unpunished, and the spirit of the child will be rewarded for the obstacles it has overcome.
When parents have children who cause them grief, they are not excused from failing to feel the tenderness they would otherwise have felt, for this is regarded as a task entrusted to them, and their mission is to make every effort to lead such children to the good. Besides, such grief is almost always the consequence of the bad habits that parents have allowed their children to follow from the cradle; thus, they reap what they have sown.