Matthew 27, 55-56 + CSDC and CV  

(CV 44a) The notion of rights and duties in development must also take account of the problems associated with population growth. This is a very important aspect of authentic development, since it concerns the inalienable values of life and the family[110]. To consider population increase as the primary cause of underdevelopment is mistaken, even from an economic point of view. Suffice it to consider, on the one hand, the significant reduction in infant mortality and the rise in average life expectancy found in economically developed countries, and on the other hand, the signs of crisis observable in societies that are registering an alarming decline in their birth rate.

Notes: [110] Cf. ibid., 36-37: loc. cit., 275-276.

Purpose of the Church's social doctrine: a society worthy of the human person

CSDC 580a. The immediate purpose of the Church's social doctrine is to propose the principles and values that can sustain a society worthy of the human person. Among these principles, solidarity includes all the others in a certain way. It represents “one of the fundamental principles of the Christian view of social and political organization”[1217]. Light is shed on this principle by the primacy of love, “the distinguishing mark of Christ's disciples (cf. Jn 13:35)”[1218].

Notes: [1217] John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Centesimus Annus, 10: AAS 83 (1991), 805-806. [1218] John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 40: AAS 80 (1988), 568. 

(Mt 27, 55-56) Not the logic of self-centredness and self-affirmation but that of love and solidarity

[55] There were many women there, looking on from a distance, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering to him. [56] Among them were Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.

CSDC 147. Woman is the complement of man, as man is the complement of woman: man and woman complete each other mutually, not only from a physical and psychological point of view, but also ontologically. It is only because of the duality of “male” and “female” that the “human” being becomes a full reality. It is the “unity of the two”[288], or in other words a relational “uni-duality”, that allows each person to experience the interpersonal and reciprocal relationship as a gift that at the same time is a mission: “to this ‘unity of the two' God has entrusted not only the work of procreation and family life, but the creation of history itself”[289]. “The woman is ‘a helper' for the man, just as the man is ‘a helper' for the woman!”[290]: in the encounter of man and woman a unitary conception of the human person is brought about, based not on the logic of self-centredness and self-affirmation, but on that of love and solidarity. 

Notes: [288] John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Mulieris Dignitatem, 11: AAS 80 (1988), 1678. [289] John Paul II, Letter to Women, 8: AAS 87 (1995), 808. [290] John Paul II, Sunday Angelus (9 July 1995): L'Osservatore Romano, English edition, 12 July 1995, p. 1; cf. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Collaboration of Men and Women in the Church and in the World: L'Osservatore Romano, English edition, 11/18 August 2004, pp. 5-8.

[Initials and Abbreviations.- CSDC: Pontifical Council for Justice And Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church; -  SDC: Social Doctrine of the Church; - CV: Benedict XVI, Caritas in Veritate (Charity in truth)]