2.2
2.2 Historical context and perspective in which the Second Vatican Council was held (October 1962–December 1965)
The world situation has entered a new era: the Chinese revolution led by Chairman Mao marked a major milestone with its triumph in 1949. It changed the balance of forces in the world, and under this sign, in the 1950s and early 1960s, events occurred that greatly transformed the world.
National Liberation struggles advanced unstoppably, the International Communist Movement grew stronger, and the masses throughout the world, including within the imperialist countries, were active and unleashing furious revolutionary storms, shaking the entire outdated and rotten system of exploitation of man by man.
Yankee imperialism, which reached the height of its power at the end of World War II, has entered its long and unstoppable process of collapse; it is the principal enemy of the peoples of the world and the global counterrevolutionary gendarme.
In the years 1957 and 1960, the International Communist Movement (the Communist and Workers' Parties) met in Moscow. At these two meetings, there was a bitter struggle between Marxists and revisionists; the Marxists, led by the President, who was present at the meeting, pushed back the revisionists.
The year 1963 marked a momentous milestone: on June 14, the CCP sent a letter to the CPSU, the famous Chinese letter, The Proposal Concerning the General Political Line of the International Communist Movement, 25 Points. This great international polemic between Marxism and revisionism was another event that shook the world.
The previous paragraph shows how the objective situation and subjective development of the world were reflected in the minds of the great revolutionaries who followed Mao Tse-tung Thought. It is now time to show how this same situation is reflected in the consciousness of the world reaction, in this case, in the Catholic Church, in the papacy. We give them the floor:
"The 1960s opened up promising horizons: recovery from the devastation of the war, the beginning of decolonization, and the first tentative signs of a thaw in relations between the two blocs, American and Soviet. In this climate, Blessed John XXIII profoundly read the "signs of the times."163 The social question was becoming universal and affected all countries: alongside the labor issue and the industrial revolution, the problems of agriculture, developing areas, demographic growth, and those related to the need for global economic cooperation were emerging. The inequalities, previously noted within nations, now appeared on the international level and revealed with ever greater clarity the dramatic situation in which the Third World finds itself" (Second Vatican Council, summary document in the PONTIFICAL COUNCIL FOR JUSTICE AND PEACE, COMPENDIUM OF THE SOCIAL DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH).
We comment: The transcribed paragraph shows us the reflection of the global situation in the Catholic Church, and therefore it decides to adapt its actions to this situation. They say, "The social question is becoming universal and affects all countries." It is no longer just "the labor question" but "the problems of agriculture," that is, for us, the agrarian question and the "Third World." This reflects the main contradiction between oppressed nations and imperialism. They know where the basis of the agrarian problem lies, in the immense peasant masses. So they decide to act and send their priests, lay people, and organizations to the neighborhoods and countryside of our countries. This is how catechists, NGOs, Catholic schools, etc. appear, growing like mushrooms in our countries since those years. In other words, the Vatican, in its council, decided to act ideologically, politically, and organizationally in our countries, trying to challenge the proletariat and its party for the masses in the countryside and the cities. They even mounted some guerrilla movements.
They say: The Second Vatican Council was the twenty-first ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, which "had as its principal object the relationship between the Church and the modern world."
We say, in its own words, that the Catholic Church convenes a council to adapt to the "new situations," to the "modern world" of class struggle, and since its system will collapse like all the other systems of oppression and exploitation that preceded it, it is slyly preparing to try to survive by adapting to the new order. This is what the Catholic Church intends with this event and its encyclicals. Because of this process and perspective, they call the post-Conciliar Church the "Church of the times." Chairman Gonzalo says:
"The Catholic Church considers itself the only social institution capable of rising above the classes that can 'save' humanity, and it also desires to persist in communism. That is why it specifies its role as an ideological shield today: to be an active ideological, political, and organizational part of the defense of the old order." Therefore, we say, this is how the Council specifies its role as an active ideological, political, and organizational part of the defense of the old world order.
"The Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes, 172 of the Second Vatican Council, constitutes a significant response of the Church to the expectations of the contemporary world. This Constitution, "in harmony with ecclesiological renewal, reflects a new conception of being a community of believers and the People of God. And it aroused new interest in the doctrine contained in previous documents regarding the witness and life of Christians, as authentic means of making God's presence visible in the world."… The Magisterium of the Church, at the highest level, expresses itself in such a broad way on the various temporal aspects of Christian life. "It must be recognized that the attention paid in the Constitution to social, psychological, political, economic, moral, and religious changes has increasingly awakened... the Church's pastoral concern for human problems and dialogue with the world." (Pontifical document summary cited above; the quotation marks are from the same document.) the "Constitution...")
Thus, in Gaudium et Spes on the Church in the Present World, the Council, starting from the international situation and the development of fundamental contradictions in the late 1950s to the mid-1960s, just as China's Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) was about to begin, reaffirmed the defense of private property advocated by Rerum Novarum and other encyclicals that belong to the so-called "social doctrine of the Church."
It's noteworthy that when they talk about investments, they're referring to those made by both factions of the imperialist financial oligarchy, both state monopoly capital and private monopoly capital (which they call "private"). They hypocritically preempt what the World Bank is now promoting, the so-called "corporate social responsibility." They portray them as providers of work and profit, as if they were carrying out an activity for the "common good." In other words, they pour blessings and smoke over exploitation and the exploiters; it's a call for class conciliation.
But what's important is that in GAUDIUM ET SPES, they speak of "less developed nations or regions," that is, they are calling for focusing reactionary ideological, political, and organizational action on oppressed countries. And regarding the agrarian problem, the landowners are calling for agrarian measures "with fair payment" for the land (of large estates) in order to develop bureaucratic capitalism and prevent the new democratic revolution in our oppressed countries. They are trying to deprive the majority mass base, the peasantry, of the democratic revolution through reactionary preemptive action. We transcribe the two sections of the "Pastoral Constitution...", which contain what we have just stated and much more:"
"Investments and Monetary Policy
70. Investments must be directed toward ensuring employment opportunities and sufficient benefits for the present and future population. Those responsible for investments and the organization of economic life, whether individuals, groups, or public authorities, must keep these ends in mind and recognize their grave obligation to ensure, on the one hand, that the necessities for a decent life are provided for both individuals and the entire community, and, on the other hand, to foresee the future and establish a fair balance between the current needs of individual and collective consumption and the investment demands of future generations. Furthermore, the urgent needs of economically less developed nations or regions must always be kept in mind. In matters of monetary policy, care must be taken not to harm the good of one's own nation or that of others. Precautions must be taken to ensure that the economically weak are not unjustly affected. due to changes in currency value.
Access to ownership and control of assets.
The problem of large estates
71. Property, like other forms of private dominion over external goods, contributes to the expression of the individual and offers the opportunity to exercise his or her responsible role in society and the economy. It is therefore very important to promote access for all, individuals and communities, to some dominion over external goods.
Private property or a certain dominion over external goods ensures for each person an area absolutely necessary for personal and family autonomy and must be considered an extension of human freedom. Finally, by stimulating the exercise of work and responsibility, they constitute one of the conditions of civil liberties.
The forms of this dominion or ownership are diverse today and are becoming increasingly diverse. All of them, however, continue to be a significant element of security, even when taking into account the social funds, rights, and services provided by society. This must be said not only of material property, but also of intangible assets, such as professional capacity.
The right to private property is not incompatible with the various forms of existing public property. The transfer of property to public ownership can only be carried out by the competent authority in accordance with the requirements of the common good and within the limits of the latter, assuming adequate compensation. Public authority is also responsible for preventing the abuse of private property against the common good.
Private property itself also has, by its very nature, a social nature, the foundation of which lies in the common purpose of property. When this social nature is neglected, property often becomes an occasion for ambition and serious disorder, to the point that it provides a pretext for those who oppose it to deny the right itself.
In many economically less developed regions, there are extensive and even very extensive rural estates that are poorly cultivated or set aside for speculation, while the majority of the population is landless or owns only paltry plots, and the development of agricultural production is urgent. Not infrequently, laborers or tenants of some part of these properties receive wages or benefits unworthy of human dignity, lack decent housing, and are exploited by middlemen. They live in the most total insecurity and in such a situation of personal inferiority that they have little opportunity to act freely and responsibly, to improve their standard of living, and to participate in social and political life. Reforms are therefore necessary, aimed, as appropriate, at increasing wages, improving working conditions, increasing job security, and encouraging initiative in work; even more so, at distributing insufficiently cultivated properties to those capable of making use of them. In this case, they must be assured of the essential elements and services, particularly the means of education and the opportunities offered by a just cooperative arrangement. Whenever the common good requires expropriation, compensation must be assessed according to equity, taking into account the circumstances as a whole.
2.3. Historical context and perspective in which the encyclical “Centesimus Annus” was written, 1991, and a brief commentary on its content: