As an eventful 2024 comes to an end and we approach a new year, a new presidential administration, and a new Congress, how can American Catholics and people of good will bring principles of Catholic social thought—human life and dignity, family and community, solidarity and subsidiarity, priority for the poor and care for creation—into U.S. public life more effectively and consistently?
Pope Francis has been our Holy Father for almost a dozen years. How can his priorities of encounter and mercy, respect for the dignity of all people and God’s creation, standing with migrants and poor families, and synodality and the “joy of the Gospel” help Catholics contribute to a “better kind of politics” and “an outward-facing Church that is healthy on the inside”?
After the election and the final session of the global Synod on Synodality, the Initiative brought together four respected and diverse leaders to assess where we have been, where we are now, and where we need to go. They explored how key principles of Catholic social thought can offer an affirmative path forward in both a challenged Church and a polarized nation.
Kim Daniels, director of the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life and member of the Vatican Dicastery for Communication, moderated the dialogue.
This Public Dialogue was part of the Initiative’s Faith and the Faithful series.
Resources
View articles and other resources from this dialogue.
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