The article by Professor F. Sacco and Professor MP Dalbem CSsR on the Alphonsian Academy Blog
Since ancient times, many scholars, and thinkers, in highlighting the social nature of man, have called for mutual responsibility. Perhaps the most well-known name that comes to mind is that of Aristotle. As men who inhabit this world, we are called to ask ourselves how we place ourselves in relation to our fellow man: as travelling companions or indifferent wayfarers? It is interesting that this logic also underlies some legislative systems, such as the Italian Constitution. Article 2 states the inviolable rights of man and immediately adds that the Republic: “requires the fulfillment of the inalienable duties of political, economic and social solidarity.” The law establishes a link between duties and solidarity [1] . This principle of solidarity transforms the person from an individual to a citizen.
For Christians, responsibility towards others is the expression and concretization of personal faith. Jesus himself clearly said that it is the hallmark of those who believe in him: “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” ( Jn 13:35). In another place, he went even further. In the Gospel of Matthew 25, on the one hand, Jesus declares that in the evening of life we will be judged on our concrete gestures of helping those in need; on the other, he makes a shocking statement: he identifies himself with the poor man we help [2] . This allows us to say that for Christians, being in solidarity is part of their vocational DNA; it is the very essence of Christian identity.
One of the first writings of the nascent Church that has come down to us is the Letter to Diognetus. In chapter X it offers a profound vision of Christian charity: “He who takes upon himself the burden of his neighbor and in what is superior seeks to benefit the inferior; he who, giving to the needy what he has received from God, is like a God to those he has benefited, he is an imitator of God” [3] . The text clearly says that solidarity is an imitation of God, a participation in his nature, because God is love (1 John 4:8.16).
This theme also recurs in the Fathers of the Church, for example, St. John Chrysostom. In his homilies he goes as far as to affirm that the goods we possess do not belong to us, but to our fellow servants. He goes as far as to affirm that it is also theft not to give part of one’s goods. He says this to make the rich understand that the goods they possess also belong to the poor [4] . Not sharing what we have in excess is not simply a lack of generosity, for Chrysostom it is theft from the poor because the goods are entrusted to the rich as to a custodian who must distribute them according to the will of God.
In recent papal teaching, from John Paul II to Leo XIV, we find several very important elements for reflection on this theme, which allow us to establish a line of continuity between the various documents. A text that can be considered fundamental for reflection on solidarity is Sollicitudo Rei Socialis: “[Solidarity] is not a feeling of vague compassion or superficial concern for the misfortunes of so many people, near or far. On the contrary, it is the firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good: that is, to the good of all and of each individual, because we are all truly responsible for all” (SRS, 38); “the exercise of solidarity within each society is valid when its members recognize one another as persons” (SRS, 39).
In the encyclical letter Caritas in Veritate , Pope Benedict XVI, speaking of the necessary relationship between justice and charity, states that “charity exceeds justice […] but is never without justice” (CiV, 6). It can thus be deduced that solidarity, as an exercise of charity, finds its first and necessary impetus in giving each person their due. The gratuitousness of charity can find its true realization only when the legitimate rights of individuals and people are recognized and respected. From this reasoning of Pope Ratzinger, we can conclude that true Christian solidarity is, at the same time, charity, and justice, which is realized for the life of humanity.
Pope Francis, in a beautiful passage from his encyclical letter Fratelli Tutti, recalling part of his speech at the World Meeting of Social Movements in 2014, states that solidarity cannot be reduced to mere sporadic acts of generosity. According to him, solidarity: “Means thinking and acting in terms of community, of prioritizing the lives of all over the appropriation of goods by a few. It also means combating the structural causes of poverty, inequality, the lack of work, land and housing, the denial of social and labor rights. It means confronting the destructive effects of the empire of money […]. Solidarity, understood in its deepest sense, is a way of making history” (FT, 116).
As previously stated, solidarity profoundly affects the Christian vocational DNA, shaping the way believers are called to interpret and respond to the signs of the times. Justice and charity walk hand in hand in the construction of history.
Finally, Pope Leo XIV, in his apostolic exhortation Dilexi te, states that the poor must not be considered only “as a social problem: they are a ‘family question'” (DT, 104). This statement illuminates the reflection on solidarity which thus becomes an essential movement of that universal brotherhood desired by the Creator, who has generated us as children in his beloved Son, by the grace of the Spirit.
Solidarity, therefore, can be considered simultaneously a moral virtue and a social principle (cf. CDSC , 193). As a moral virtue, to be constantly implemented and exercised, it fits within the dimension of charity and justice, realizing itself as service and not as exploitation of others, orienting humanity toward true fraternity which is the common good. As a social principle, it is understood as an ordering element of institutions, so that structures of sin are uprooted, overcome, and transformed for the good of each and all.
[1] For example, the duty of economic solidarity refers, among other things, to the duty to pay taxes. By fulfilling it, citizens enable the State to raise funds to build schools or hospitals, which everyone will have access to.
[2] “As you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me” ( Mt 25:40). Cf. Caesarius of Arles, “Divine and Human Mercy”, in Discourses, 25, 1; CCL 103, 111-112.
[3] Fabio Ruggiero (edited by), A Diogneto , X, 6, Città Nuova Editrice, Rome 2020, 10.
[4] «Not sharing one’s goods with the poor is theft. […] Riches do not belong to us, but to our fellow servants» (John Chrysostom, Second Homily on Lazarus and the Rich Man , PG 48, col. 992).
