Laborem Exercens, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, Centesimus Annus: The Social Doctrine of Blessed Pope John Paul II

From the invaluable Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church. Excerpts:

...Ninety years after Rerum Novarum, Pope John Paul II devoted the Encyclical Laborem Exercens [187] to work, the fundamental good of the human person, the primary element of economic activity and the key to the entire social question. Laborem Exercens outlines a spirituality and ethic of work in the context of a profound theological and philosophical reflection. Work must not be understood only in the objective and material sense, but one must keep in mind its subjective dimension, insofar as it is always an expression of the person. Besides being a decisive paradigm for social life, work has all the dignity of being a context in which the person's natural and supernatural vocation must find fulfilment.

With the Encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis[188], Pope John Paul II commemorates the twentieth anniversary of Populorum Progressio and deals once more with the theme of development along two fundamental lines: “on one hand, the dramatic situation of the modern world, under the aspect of the failed development of the Third World, and on the other, the meaning of, conditions and requirements for a development worthy of man”[189]. The Encyclical presents differences between progress and development, and insists that “true development cannot be limited to the multiplication of goods and service — to what one possesses — but must contribute to the fullness of the ‘being' of man. In this way the moral nature of real development is meant to be shown clearly”[190]. Pope John Paul II, alluding to the motto of the pontificate of Pope Pius XII, “opus iustitiae pax” (peace is the fruit of justice), comments: “Today, one could say, with the same exactness and the same power of biblical inspiration (cf. Is 32:17; Jas 3:18), opus solidaritatis pax (peace is the fruit of solidarity)”[191].

On the hundredth anniversary of Rerum Novarum, Pope John Paul II promulgates his third social encyclical, Centesimus Annus[192], whence emerges the doctrinal continuity of a hundred years of the Church's social Magisterium. Taking up anew one of the fundamental principles of the Christian view of social and political organization, which had been the central theme of the previous Encyclical, the Pope writes: “What we nowadays call the principle of solidarity ... is frequently stated by Pope Leo XIII, who uses the term ‘friendship' ... Pope Pius XI refers to it with the equally meaningful term ‘social charity'. Pope Paul VI, expanding the concept to cover the many modern aspects of the social question, speaks of a ‘civilization of love”'[193]. Pope John Paul II demonstrates how the Church's social teaching moves along the axis of reciprocity between God and man: recognizing God in every person and every person in God is the condition of authentic human development. The articulate and in-depth analysis of the “new things”, and particularly of the great breakthrough of 1989 with the collapse of the Soviet system, shows appreciation for democracy and the free economy, in the context of an indispensable solidarity.

Other tallies of the social encyclicals include Evangelium Vitae on this list.