INSIDE america

Charity and Politics

By Lorenzo Albacete

When we speak of “charitable work” or of a “charitable institution” or “charitable society,” it is important to remember that charity is a divine reality. Charity is the love of God, the Love that is God. A charitable work is one motivated by a share in God’s life, in God’s reality. Could we ever speak then about a “politics of charity?”
Charity can never be tied to any political system. The presence of charity in a society cannot be due to its political system. Politics as such aims at justice, not charity. 
Recall the words of Pope Benedict XVI in Deus Caritas Est (28): “Love–caritas–will always prove necessary, even in the most just society. There is no ordering of the State so just that it can eliminate the need for a service of love. Whoever wants to eliminate love is preparing to eliminate man as such…. The State which would provide everything, absorbing everything into itself, would ultimately become a mere bureaucracy incapable of guaranteeing the very thing which the suffering person–every person–needs: namely, loving personal concern. We do not need a State which regulates and controls everything, but a State which, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, generously acknowledges and supports initiatives arising from the different social forces and combines spontaneity with closeness to those in need…. In the end, the claim that just social structures would make works of charity superfluous masks a materialist conception of man: the mistaken notion that man can live ‘by bread alone.’”
During the years of “Liberation Theology,” many Catholics were suspicious of this position. The separation of charity from politics seemed to excuse the rich and powerful Catholics from the obligation to participate actively with their resources and power in the struggle for social justice. The proponents of Liberation Theology argued that the ever-growing and scandalous gap between rich and poor in many of the so-called “Catholic countries” in Latin America was an example of what happens when charity was left to “private initiatives.” The Magisterium’s opposition to Liberation Theology was seen as an example of an “other-wordly” kind of theology that deprived the Christian faith of its power to bring about the much needed revolutionary changes in society. 
What was missing in this controversy was an adequate understanding of how the “other-wordly” becomes present in this world. This is in fact what Pope Benedict XVI has been offering to us with his insistence on the relation between faith and reason.
Fr. Giussani frequently told the story of how his seminary friend Enrico Manfredini said to him one day that the fact that God made Himself one of us in the Incarnation was something of “another world.” Fr. Giussani agreed, but added, “Yes, of another world, in this world.”  
Indeed, charity is a reality of another world. It a “supernatural,” divine reality. But for those of us who believe in the Incarnation, the “other-wordliness” of charity doesn’t prevent it from building a new kind of life, a new culture, a “civilization of love” in this world. To understand how this can happen, it is important to understand how it has already happened, and to be faithful to that unimaginable, absolutely exceptional, and unique meeting point between this world and the divine world. The meeting point between charity and politics cannot be deduced from theology, nor philosophy, nor even less political ideologies. It cannot be constructed by human thought, by reason. It can only be recognized by faith. The meeting point between charity and politics is Someone, a Man who is “God from God.” The meeting point in this world with “another world” is Jesus Christ. 
The starting point for the Christian contribution to the struggle for liberation and social justice can only be faith in Jesus Christ. However, faith cannot be separated from reason. Politics is an exercise of human reason. The fact that faith in Jesus Christ–not simply “in God,” but in this Man, Christ–makes love (charity) present in this world happens because faith has an impact on reason. It doesn’t depend on us; it is not that faith inspires us or imposes a moral obligation on us. Faith changes the way we see reality, the way we think about it and respond accordingly. Pope Benedict said it very clearly in Aparecida, Brazil: “If we do not know God in and with Christ, all of reality is transformed into an indecipherable enigma.”
Without Christ, there is no way because there is no hope strong enough to overcome the law of corruption and death. Only love (charity) can overcome death and has already overcome death in Christ. Without Christ, therefore, charity is not present in this world.