The Roman Catholic Church has rarely shied from cashing in on the latest political and economic trends. It never thought much of Communism, of course, although mainly because Communism never thought much of the Church. Otherwise, over the centuries, but especially over last 100 years or so, a succession of Popes skillfully adapted the Church’s social, political and economic instruction to the prevailing ideological winds.
And so it should be no surprise that Benedict XVI, the current Pope, yesterday delivered a weighty encyclical that catches the anti-capitalist waves now washing over the globe’s political classes. The official Latin title of the encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, in English translation means Charity in Truth, which turns out to mean — on reading the encyclical — something along the lines of Caveat Venalicium Libertas.
That’s bootleg Latin for Beware Free Markets, which is what should be the title of this sweeping 140-page collection of sound bites and instant quotations that will be used by all and sundry as another authority for condemning free markets, globalization, big business, finance, outsourcing, capitalism, copyright law, greed, climate change, energy consumption, etc.
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