Thy Kin-dom Come: Reimagining the Family in Catholic Social Teaching

Abstract

This thesis is an effort to demonstrate Catholic Social Teaching’s reliance on official Catholic dogma on the “natural” hetero-patriarchal family, in order to argue that the way we understand the family as a theological category is woefully inadequate. Upholding the family as the fundamental unit of society makes Catholic Social Teaching unique in the world of liberal thought. I believe that this idea could be constitutive of a Catholic identity rooted in commitment to human flourishing and the common good. But it is failing to do so now, because the Catholic theology of the family is wooden, abstract, devoid of lived experience, and lacking the concern for justice and human dignity otherwise indicative of Catholicism’s social tradition. This thesis seeks to articulate a theology of the family that better aligns with CST principles by engaging with papal documents, biblical traditions, and the works of Catholic theologians and ethicists. My aim is to reclaim the family as a fundamental mode of embodiment that is grounded in lived realities, particularly those of the poor and marginalized, and which rejects abstract, normative constructions of the “natural,” traditionalist family that render countless sacred, loved and loving human persons outside the purview of the just world that Catholic Social Teaching imagines.