Is social justice the same as socialism?

By Kathy McGourty| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Scripture and Theology Social Justice
Lately there have been accusations that a church with a social justice mission is one that supports socialism.

Conservative TV personality Glenn Beck told Christians, "I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice' or ‘economic justice' on your church website. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. . . . If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop."

Kathy McGourty is a youth minister in Bloomingdale, Illinois.

 

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Is social justice the same as socialism?

By Kathy McGourty| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Scripture and Theology Social Justice
Lately there have been accusations that a church with a social justice mission is one that supports socialism.

Conservative TV personality Glenn Beck told Christians, "I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice' or ‘economic justice' on your church website. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. . . . If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop."

Kathy McGourty is a youth minister in Bloomingdale, Illinois.

 

See more posts by Kathy McGourty

Our health care system needs a heart transplant

By Thomas G. Pretlow, M.D.| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Ethic of Life Social Justice
And our politicians need a brain transplant. Universal health care is the most compassionate option we have, argues a Catholic doctor, and it’s the smartest, most economical solution as well.

Thomas G. Pretlow, M.D., is a member of Physicians for a National Health Program and professor at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.

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The Congo’s killing fields

By Kevin Clarke| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice War and Peace
Families separated. Millions left for dead. Do we share some of the blame?

Patrick Mwnyamahord knows where his father is buried because a neighbor showed him that small place. What he doesn't know is how his father got there, and there was no one he could safely ask, not then. Twelve years ago he and his family made one of a series of sudden escapes from the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) into nearby Burundi. On this particular exodus his father was too ill to travel and the family had to leave him.

Kevin Clarke is a writer living in New York.

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Erich March: The unexpected grocer

By Nicholas Liao| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice
When poor diets caused too many early deaths in an urban community, a solution came from an unlikely source—the local mortician.

As a 61-year-old mortician, Erich March wasn’t interested in joining a food trend. You won’t hear any mentions of Michael Pollan or locavorism from March, even as he beams about Apples & Oranges Fresh Market, the health-oriented grocery store he and his wife, Michele Speaks-March, opened in their East Baltimore neighborhood earlier this year.

Nicholas Liao is a writer living in Washington.

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Evaluating the status of the Millennium Development Goals

By Kevin Clarke| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice
An end to global poverty and suffering is in sight, but much more work remains.

In a world awash with suffering and sorrow—the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe that is Syria comes quickly to mind—there is often little opportunity to comment on any good news. But human progress, however unsteady, should be acknowledged and celebrated. And in September there was some good news during the 68th United Nations General Assembly.

Kevin Clarke is a writer living in New York.

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Father Albert Foley: How one priest took on the KKK

By Kristen Hannum| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice
A scrappy Jesuit professor found the courage to fight not only the KKK but also the timidity of his own church.

Mobile, Alabama in autumn feels mutable, sunshine floating down on its filigreed iron railings and azalea gardens, then, suddenly, dispiritingly humid. It’s not just the humidity that weighs on you, it’s the history: the lingering horror of slave markets, cross burnings, and even the 1981 lynching of Michael Donald, a 19-year-old African American, chosen at random, who had been walking home from a convenience store.

Kristen Hannum is a freelance journalist based in Denver, Colorado.

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The high prices of living in poverty

By Kevin Clarke| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice
Avoiding bad choices is a lot easier when you’re not living on a shoestring budget.

What is the cost of being poor in America? Researchers have long known that because of a broad reduction in retail and other consumer choices experienced by America’s poor, it is often simply more expensive to be poor in the United States. Food shopping when you are poor in America doesn’t mean taking the minivan out to Costco; it can mean walking to the only “supermarket” in the neighborhood, often a small corner retail operation with high markups on food and household supplies.

Kevin Clarke is a writer living in New York.

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Slideshow: Serving children with disabilities in India

By Jo McGowan| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Social Justice
Twenty years ago, parents of children with disabilities in India had almost nowhere to turn. Since then, what began as one small school has become a game-changer.

We have it on good authority that one child can change history. There is no doubt that Moy Moy did that for my family; many say she did it for the city of Dehradun in the foothills of the Indian Himalayas, too.

Jo McGowan is a writer by profession and the founder and director of the Latika Roy Foundation, a voluntary organization in northern India for people with disabilities.

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Work ethics: How do today's jobs reflect our values?

By Bryan Cones| Print this pagePrint | Email this pageShare
Article Ethic of Life Social Justice
We lay off teachers and nurses while we hire for prisons, casinos, and fracking. This is progress?

At least once a week in my daily newspaper I see a full page ad from “the people of America’s oil and gas industry” touting the benefits of fracking, the process through which natural gas is extracted from shale formations using a combination of water and other unnamed chemicals. Always mentioned in these ads are the “millions of jobs” it will create—and that promise alone is sufficient to trump any concerns about the effects of fracking on the surrounding environment.

Bryan Cones is a writer living in Chicago. See more posts by Bryan Cones

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