Lux Lucet

The Catechism of the Catholic Church also speaks to the issue of the universal destination of all goods 

2403 The right to private property, acquired by work or received from others by inheritance or gift, does not do away with the original gift of the earth to the whole of mankind.  The universal destination of goods remains primordial, even if the promotion of the common good requires respect for the right to private property and its exercise. 

2406 Political authority has the right and duty to regulate the legitimate exercise of the right to ownership for the sake of the common good.

The term “common good” is frequently used in official Roman Catholic documents and is a term that John Robbins described as “the great fiction used by the Roman Church-State to justify government control of society and economy.” (Robbins, 1999) The universal destination of all goods is the controlling principle behind Rome’s collectivist economic policies.

In 2017, the Catholic publication National Catholic Reporter published an article about a speech given by San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy.  In his speech, McElroy gave a clear statement on the universal destination of all goods.  He said,

This stance of the church’s teaching flows from teaching of the Book of Genesis, that creation is the gift of God to all of humanity. Thus in the most fundamental way, there is a universal destination for all of the material goods that exist in this world. Wealth is a common heritage, not at its core a right of lineage or of acquisition.[1]

Let’s now look at how the universal destination of all goods bears on Rome’s immigration doctrine. 

In a document titled “Catholic Social Teaching on Immigration and the Movement of Peoples”[2] written by Catholic priest Thomas Betz, Director of Immigration and Refugee Services for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and found on the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), we find a list of three basic principles of Catholic social teaching on immigration. 

The first principle Betz notes is this, “People have a right to migrate to sustain their lives and the lives of their families.”  As the article goes on to explain, “This is based on biblical and ancient Christian teaching that the goods of the earth belong to all people.  While the right to private property is defended in Catholic social teaching, individuals do not have the right to use private property without regard for the common good.” 

This is the universal destination of all goods applied to immigration.

Put a bit more bluntly, if a migrant from a foreign country needs your stuff, he has a right to take it.  And if he doesn’t have the ability to take your stuff himself, it’s right and proper for the government to forcibly take your stuff by direct taxation or by indirect means such as inflating the currency and give it to him via the myriad welfare programs in this country, which themselves were set up in large part due to the efforts of the Roman Church-State.[3]     

This application of the universal destination of all goods to migrants is not original with Betz.  In his article he notes the source of his ideas, the 1952 apostolic constitution Exsul Familia Nazarethana (The Émigré Family of Nazareth) by Pope Pius XII, a man deemed “Hitler’s Pope” by author John Cornwell on account of the Pope’s close connections with the leader of the Third Reich.

While Exsul Familia[4] can be found online, I like to refer to a hardcopy edition I have edited by Giulivo Tessarolo. (Tessarolo, 1962)  It was published by St. Charles Seminary on Staten Island in 1962 and has the Church’s official nihil obstat and imprimatur on it, so no one can claim it’s not an official publication of the Roman Church-State.  One of the reasons why I like it is a comment found in the Editor’s Remarks section.

When you read immigration statements by Roman Catholic writers, you’ll often find them speaking in vague and flowery terms about the “obligation” nations have to migrants (their term) or illegal aliens (the proper term in US law).  Take this passage from another major Roman Catholic immigration document, Strangers No Longer Together on the Journey of Hope, a letter issued by the Catholic Bishops of Mexico and the United States in 2003.[5]  Write the bishops, “Pope John XXIII placed limits on immigration, however, when there are “just reasons for it.” Nevertheless, he stressed the obligation of sovereign states to promote the universal good where possible, including an obligation to accommodate migration flows. For more powerful nations, a stronger obligation exists.” 

Note the repeated use by the bishops of the term “obligation.”  It sure sounds expensive.  I’d hate to be the guy who had to foot that bill.  Newsflash, if you live in the United States, you’re that guy. Only the bishops are too clever to make that explicit. 

But not the Rev. Giulivo Tessarolo, the editor of my edition of Exsul Familia.  Here’s what he has to say,

In undertaking this work, I took cognizance of a signficant (sic) social fact of our time; that, due to enormous financial implications, the phenomenon of emigration will find some relief only in the English-speaking countries.  The vast influx of immigrants into Canada and Australia confirms that fact. (Tessarolo, 1962)

Note Tessarolo’s comment about the “enormous financial implications” of the mass migration called for in Exsul Familia.  Note also that Tessarolo mentions Canada and Australia as the receiving countries of this “vast influx of immigrants.”  Tessarolo does not mention the United States.  The reason for this is that the Immigration Act of 1924 was still in effect, an act that brought an end to the Ellis Island era and essentially ended immigration into the United States from its inception until it was replaced with the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965.[6] This act, also known as the Hart-Celler Act, was pushed through the Senate by Roman Catholic Senator Edward Kennedy and subsequently led to a huge increase in legal immigration.   

Writing in Exsul Familia, Pius XII expressed the universal destination of all goods in the following language, “Forthe Creator of the universe made all good things primarily for the good of all.”

But this is not what the Scriptures teach at all.  In his Trinity Review “Ronald Sider-Contra Deum,” John Robbins sharply criticized Sider, a purportedly Evangelical writer, for his Romanist economics. 

Sider would have us believe that when God put man on Earth, he gave the Earth to men corporately, not severally. Nowhere does he present any evidence for this idea. God, holding ultimate ownership of the Earth, gave it to men severally, not collectively. The argument for this may be found in the works of the seventeenth-century Christian thinker, Robert Filmer, of whom, presumably, Sider has heard. God is not, as Sider believes, impartial. He does not have “the same loving concern for each person he has created.” God does not intend for the “earth’s resources” “to be husbanded and shared for the benefit of all.” On the contrary, he prefers certain persons above others; he loves Jacob and hates Esau. He ordered the Israelites to destroy the Canaanites. His remnant is the apple of his eye, and he governs the universe for the particular good of the Church. Sider offers no proof for his global egalitarianism for a very good reason: There is none. Rather, the Bible protects private property from the larcenous and the covetous, from those who, like Jezebel, would take private property by force. ^[7]

If the universal destination of all goods is a fiction, and it is, then Rome’s case for the sort of mass, taxpayer-subsidized, illegal immigration of the sort we see on our southwestern border falls apart.  There is no “obligation” on the part of Americans to foot the bills of foreigners who have zero claim on the property of the American people.  By invoking the universal destination of all goods, what Rome calls for is not Christian charity, but the mass violation of the eighth commandment.

But as devastating as the refutation of the universal destination of all goods is to Rome’s case for flooding our nation with welfare migrants, we’re not yet done critiquing Antichrist’s destructive doctrine of immigration.  Let us now turn toward Rome’s equally flawed globalist politics. 

---

[1] In powerful speech, Sand Diego bishop challenges organizers to disrupt, rebuild https://www.ncronline.org/powerful-speech-san-diego-bishop-challenges-organizers-disrupt-rebuild accessed 10/24/2022.  In August 2022, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that Robert McElroy was “elevated to cardinal by Pope Francis on Saturday in Vatican City” https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/religion/story/2022-08-27/robert-mcelroy-cardinal-qa accessed 10/24/2022. Socialist birds of a feather flock together. 

[2] “Catholic Social Teaching on Immigration and the Movement of Peoples” https://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/immigration/catholic-teaching-on-immigration-and-the-movement-of-peoples accessed 10/24/2022

[3] “We, the bishops of the United States – – can you believe it – in 1919 came out for more affordable, more comprehensive, more universal health care” Politifact, 12/4/2013 https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2013/dec/04/timothy-dolan/us-bishops-have-supported-universal-health-care-19/ accessed 10/28/2022.

[4] Exsul Familia Nazarethana https://www.papalencyclicals.net/pius12/p12exsul.htm accessed 10/24/2022. 

[5] Strangers No Longer Together on the Journey of Hope https://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/human-life-and-dignity/immigration/strangers-no-longer-together-on-the-journey-of-hope accessed 10/24/2022

[6] 1965 Immigration Law Changed the Face of America https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5391395 accessed 10/24/2022

[7] “Ronald Sider-Contra Deum” https://www.trinityfoundation.org/journal.php?id=18 accessed 10/24/2022.

Pages: 1 2