Nature and Order of Society

in General
Prepared by
Jonald Justine Umali Itugot, LPT
University of Perpetual Help System DALTA
Notion of Society
• A society is a grouping of individuals, which
is characterized by common interest and
may have distinctive culture and
institutions.
• An organized group of people associated
together for religious, benevolent, cultural,
scientific, political, patriotic, or other
purposes may also be considered a society.

https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Society
Four Principles of Catholic Social Teaching
• No human can reasonably situate
himself outside of social life. With these
four principles we can grasp human
society in its entirety and consider this
reality truthfully:
• Personhood
• Common Good
• Subsidiarity
• Solidarity

https://rcpolitics.org/four-principles-personhood-common-good-solidarity-subsidiarity/
Personhood and Human Dignity
• The human person is essentially a social being
and because of this, human beings form
communities, take responsibility for them, and
leave their distinctive mark on them.
• However, the social nature of human beings
does not always lead to harmonious
communion among persons. Through pride
and selfishness man discovers in himself the
seeds of asocial behavior, impulses leading
him to close himself within his own
individuality and to dominate his neighbor.

https://rcpolitics.org/the-dignity-of-the-human-person/
Personhood and Human Dignity
• The Church sees in men and women, in every person, the living image of God, who
said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. So God created man in his
own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
• Because of this, human dignity (the worth and value of every person) is:
• Universal because they are present in all human beings, without exception of
time, place or subject.
• Inviolable insofar as they are inherent in the human person and in human
dignity, and because it would be vain to proclaim rights, if at the same time
everything were not done to ensure the duty of respecting them by all people,
everywhere, and for all people.
• Inalienable insofar as no-one can legitimately deprive another person, whoever
they may be, of these rights, since this would do violence to their nature.

https://rcpolitics.org/the-dignity-of-the-human-person/
Common Good

• “God intended the Earth with everything

contained in it for the use of all human
beings and peoples. Thus, under the
leadership of justice and in the company of
charity, created goods should be in
abundance for all in like manner.” (GS, 69)

https://www.devp.org/en/cst/common-good
Common Good

• We must all consider the good of others,

and the good of the whole human family,
in organizing our society – economically,
politically, and legally.

https://www.devp.org/en/cst/common-good
Common Good
• The demands of the common good… concern above all the
commitment to peace, the organization of the State’s powers, a sound
juridical system, the protection of the environment, and the provision
of essential services to all.

(Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, 166)

https://www.devp.org/en/cst/common-good
Subsidiarity
• Every task of society should be assigned to the
smallest possible group that can perform it.
This idea is summed up in the principle of
subsidiarity.
• Pope Pius XI’s encyclical letter Quadragesimo
Anno, which introduced the principle, goes as
far as to say that ‘it is an injustice and a grave
evil and disturbance of right order to assign to
a greater and higher association what lesser
and subordinate organizations can do.’

https://rcpolitics.org/the-dignity-of-the-human-person/
Solidarity

• No human being can live for himself alone; he

is always dependent on others.

https://rcpolitics.org/the-dignity-of-the-human-person/