Catholics believe that wealth is a gift from God. It is only on loan and should be shared and used wisely to help the less fortunate. Everything given to us by God should be used to help others. Christians have a duty to use their money and possessions properly. This is called stewardship. This view is supported by this passage from the Catechism:
‘The churches love for the poor is part of her constant tradition. This love is inspired by the Gospel of the Beatitudes, of the poverty of Jesus and of his concern for the poor. Love for the poor is even one of the motives for the duty of working so as to be able to give ‘to those in need’. This extends not only too material poverty but also to many forms of cultural and religious poverty.’ - (CCC 1723) This means that we should not only just work for ourselves to earn money, but think of the poor and give them some of the money that you earn. We show that we are generous in sharing what we earn with the less fortunate. Again through the Bible, God’s words are expressed. This can be seen in the example of The Widow’s Wife:
‘Jesus sat down opposite the place where people made their offerings to the Temple in Jerusalem. After watching many people put large sums of money into the treasury Jesus saw a poor widow putting in 2 small copper coins. Jesus told his disciples that she put more in than the others since they had given to God out of their wealth but she had made her offering from her poverty.’ Even though the woman didn’t have much money, she still shared what she had and didn’t keep it for herself even though she needed it. She gave everything she had, thus making herself poor.
All Christians have a duty to help people in need whether in Britain or abroad as everyone is our neighbour. The Catechism supports this view as it says:
‘Rich nations have a grave moral responsibility toward those which are unable to ensure the means of their development by themselves or have been prevented from doing by tragic historical events.’ - (CCC 2439) Catholics believe more well off people should help the poorer people in the world. A good example of this is the parable of the Good Samaritan, it is what God’s message he is trying to get across is, that we should help and care for everyone, even if they are our enemy or we don’t like them. In Jesus’ life he set us an example for us to follow as he looked after the poor and had great compassion for them. He taught Christians that when they helped the poor they were being kind to and helping him. Jesus was like this and helped everyone, he still helps us now, he wants us to be like him and follow in his ways of helping our neighbours.
Mother Teresa is a woman in Calcutta that has set up a home for the dying, she lives with about 300 other sisters, they, like Jesus have no possessions and look after the poor. They go out and pick up dieing homeless people and take them back to the home and care for them. In the past 30 years they have had 30,000 patients, half of whom have survived. The whole point is to give these poor people love and care, give them a sense of purpose in life, because they have never experienced it before. This is what God would like us to be like, and maybe if more people were like this, some parts of the world wouldn’t be so underdeveloped and poor.
In conclusion, the Catholic teaching on wealth and poverty can be summarised as:
- Moneys and possessions become evil if they are worshipped more then and before God. We should worship God and God only.
- Stewardship is the duty of looking after something for someone. We are looking after wealth, because it is a gift from God, we should share it among each other and help the less rich and fortunate than ourselves otherwise God will become unhappy with us.
- As Christians we should help all our neighbours, weather here in Britain, or abroad. It is our duty to do so.
To be good and faithful Christians like God wanted us to be we should learn to try and follow these instructions in every day life.
