Catholic Social Thought and Liberal Institutions: Freedom with Justice

Increasingly, the religious leaders of the world are addressing problems of political economy, expressing concern about the poor. But will their efforts actually help the poor? Or harm them? Much depends, Michael Novak asserts, upon what kind of institutions are constructed, that is, upon realism and practicality.

His thesis may be simply stated: Although the Catholic Church during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries set itself against liberalism as an ideology, it has slowly come t...