Catholic social teaching is the Catholic doctrines on matters of human dignity and common

good in society. The ideas addressoppression, the role of the state, subsidiarity, social organization,

concern for social justice, and issues of wealth distribution. Its foundations are widely considered to
have been laid by Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical letter Rerum novarum, which advocated
economic distributism. Its roots can be traced to the writings of Catholic thinkers such as Thomas
Aquinas and Augustine of Hippo, and is also derived from concepts present in the Bible and the
cultures of the ancient Near East.[1][page  needed]

According to Pope Benedict XVI, its purpose "is simply to help purify reason and to contribute, here
and now, to the acknowledgment and attainment of what is just. ... [The church] has to play her part
through rational argument and she has to reawaken the spiritual energy without which justice ...
cannot prevail and prosper",[2] According to Pope John Paul II, its foundation "rests on the threefold
cornerstones of human dignity, solidarity and subsidiarity".[3]

Catholic social teaching is distinctive in its consistent critiques of modern social and political

ideologies both of the left and of the right: liberalism, communism, feminism,[4][5] atheism,[6] socialism,
[7]
 fascism, capitalism,[7] and Nazism[8] have all been condemned, at least in their pure forms, by
several popes since the late nineteenth century.

Catholic social doctrine has always tried to find an equilibrium between respect for human liberty,
including the right to private property and subsidiarity, and concern for the whole society, including
the weakest and poorest.[9]

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