Proper Responsibility of the Lay Faithful
The Church contributes to the just ordering of society, the work of politics, by calling the reasoning of politicians to a greater purity and by inspiring works of justice, according to the demands of ethics. The duty of the State is direct. The duty of the Church is indirect, that is, the duty to foster the right reasoning by which the State will fulfill its responsibility.
The lay faithful have the proper responsibility to participate in the native political activity of the State for the sake of the common good. Pope Benedict XVI recalls the teaching in Pope John Paul II's Post-synodal Apostolic Exhortation Christifideles laici, "On the Vocation and Mission of the Lay Faithful in the Church and in the World ," which underlines the moral responsibility of the laity for "the many different economic, social, legislative, administrative and cultural areas, which are intended to promote organically and institutionally the common good" (Christifideles laici). The Catholic faith has always taught patriotism as a fundamental virtue, by which the faithful assume their proper part in the safeguarding and promoting of justice in society.
Organized Charitable Activity
Pope Benedict XVI reminds us that the same charity which "must animate the entire lives of the lay faithful" must also inspire "their political activity," which, indeed, is a form of "social charity." The Church's works of charity, for example, Catholic Charities and the Saint Vincent de Paul Conferences, are, however, proper to her. The Church carries out the works of charity as her "direct responsibility." As earlier noted, the Church has rightly understood, from her first days of existence, that the faithful must organize the works of charity.
In this regard, the Holy Father reminds us that "there will never be a situation where the charity of each individual Christian is unnecessary, because in addition to justice man needs, and will always need, love."
