Benedict XVI's latest encyclical is here! His first "social encyclical," he chooses to approach the question of Christian justice and social responsibility through the words of St. Paul in Ephesians 4:15: "truth in love.""Truth," writes Benedict, "needs to be sought, found and expressed within the “economy” of charity, but charity in its turn needs to be understood, confirmed and practised [sic] in the light of truth."
He makes no bones about it: a world that relativizes truth is incapable of practicing charity, just as a world without charity has no knowledge of truth. "Without truth, charity degenerates into sentimentality. Love becomes an empty shell, to be filled in an arbitrary way. In a culture without truth, this is the fatal risk facing love. It falls prey to contingent subjective emotions and opinions, the word “love” is abused and distorted, to the point where it comes to mean the opposite."
Enjoy.
UPDATE: Links to commentary.
Amy Welborn is first.
The Catholic Register provides the "unofficial Vatican synthesis."
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