Does God watch the ways employers treat their workers? St. James excoriates rich
employers who are miserly with their employees, (James: 5:1-6). A young priest told me
that when he was a student and needed school fees, he worked on a construction
project for two weeks before he realized that, despite the owner’s promises, he would
not be paid. When he went to the employer’s home, his wife said her husband wasn’t in.
The student hid and soon the man walked out the door.
Does God punish such people? He doesn’t need to. People who cheat others, like this
employer and his wife, will cheat each other as well. If they have children, the children
will imitate what they see. Father-cheater, mother-cheater and the little cheaters will not
believe each other. Homes where God is honored may not have luxuries but love is
there.
Employers may delay payment or ask for overtime work or add additional
responsibilities. They hold off paying while a worker’s family needs food. St. James
asserts that this a way of killing people.
Can employees cheat their employers? They can slow down when the employer is not
present, use the equipment to do their own projects or steal small things. It is true the
employer may not be fair but the Letter to the Colossians tells us to do our work for
Lord, “Whatever you do, do it from the heart, for the Lord and not for others, knowing
that you will receive the reward from the Lord, you serving the Lord Christ” (Col 3:23-
24).
Thomas Aquinas comments: “It is within our power to will or not to will and so such an
act is meritorious” (Commentary on Colossians, 179).
Justice is a virtue, which is an inclination to do a good action (2a.2ae. 58, 1). It is not a
feeling or an emotion. There are other virtues that concern ourselves, like being humble
or courageous, but justice is how we relate to others by a deliberate choice. The will is
that part of the intellect which makes choices. Justice is not directly related to feelings
but is directly related to actions.
Thomas explains that because justice is situated in the will rather than the emotions, it
excels the other moral virtues: “The other virtues are commendable in respect to the
sole good of the virtuous person himself, whereas justice is praiseworthy in respect to
the virtuous person being well disposed towards another, so that justice is somewhat
the good of another person” (2a2ae. 58, 12).
Justice is not a favor we give to some people but it is a deliberate choice to give
everyone what is due to them. We don’t have the virtue of justice if we choose to be just
to some people but not to others. Justice means to give what is right to everyone.
St. Thomas says that justice is giving each person what is his or her due consistently
(2a.2ae. 58, 1). The virtue of justice indicates giving what is due or right to everyone.
The tradition of the Church includes justice as one of the “cardinal” virtues, along with
prudence, fortitude and temperance. All the other moral virtues are sub-categories of
these four major virtues. Thomas asserts that justice is foremost among the moral
virtues: “Justice stands foremost among all the moral virtues, for as much as the
common good transcends the individual good of one person” (2a2ae. 58, 12). 1
Thomas believes that, in serious matters, sins against justice are mortal sins: “… a
mortal sin is one that is contrary to charity, which gives life to a soul. Every injury
inflicted on another person is of itself contrary to charity which moves us to will the good
of another. And so since injustice always consists in an injury inflicted on another
person, it is evident that to do an injustice is a mortal sin…” (2a2ae. 59, 4).
In justice, we respect other persons. In a way, parents represent God and so respect is
due to them. We also respect the political and religious leaders because of their
promotion of the common good (2a2ae. 63, 3).
Many people are not aware of the strong teachings of the Popes on social issues. In
1891, Pope Leo XIII wrote an encyclical, Rerum Novarum. The Pope pointed out the
injustices against workers, recognizing their duties but also their rights to just payment
and working conditions.
Pope Saint Paul VI acknowledged the close connection between the communication of
the faith and the concrete situation of those to whom it is addressed, in his encyclical
Evangelii Nuntiandi: “Evangelization would not be complete if it did not take account of
the unceasing interplay of the Gospel and of man’s concrete life, both personal and
social.” 2
Pope Paul affirmed that evangelization required “an explicit message, adapted to the
different situations…about the rights and duties of every human being, about family
life…about life in society, about international life, peace, justice and development [which
he called] a message, especially energetic about liberation.” 3
In Populorum Progressio, Paul VI stated clearly that the Church maintains each
person’s right to self-fulfillment.
In God’s plan, every man is born to seek self-fulfillment, for every human life is
called to some task by God. At birth a human being possesses certain aptitudes
1 References to the Summa Theologiae of St. Thomas Aquinas give the part of the Summa, the question
and the article. If the passage is found in a response to an objection that Thomas has introduced in the
first part of the article, the Latin word “ad,” meaning “to,” is added with the number of the objection. This
particular reference is to the second section of the second part of the Summa, the fifty-eighth question
and the twelfth article.
2 Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, 29.
3 Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, 29.
and abilities in germinal form, and these qualities are to be cultivated so that they
may bear fruit. By developing these traits through formal education of personal
effort, the individual works his way toward the goal set for him by the Creator.
Endowed with intellect and free will, each man is responsible for his self-
fulfillment even as he is for his salvation. 4
We must recognize, as Pope Benedict XVI does in his encyclical Caritas in
Veritate, that social issues have increasingly moved beyond the local and even national
to the international. As a result of economic globalization, international trade, with its
emphasis on competition and efficiency affects every society and profit has replaced
ethics as a guiding rule. Prosperous nations continue to take advantage of the less
prosperous ones in self-serving pursuits of profit, removing natural resources from poor
nations and exploiting its labour force with little concern for the workers’ lives. The
results of these behaviors have affected the entire world, as illustrated by the current
world financial crisis brought about by the greed of investors.
In calling for integral development, the Pope insists that technological progress is
not enough: “Yet it should be stressed that progress of a merely economic and
technological kind is insufficient. Development needs above all to be true and integral.”
The Pope calls for a Christian humanism that is based on the willingness to fight for and
suffer, in solidarity, for the common good, with a gratuitousness as seen in the family:
“The theme of development can be identified with the inclusion-in-relation of all
individuals and peoples within the one community of the human family, built in solidarity
on the basis of the fundamental values of justice and peace.” 5
Denis Vincent Wiseman, O.P.