The Working Catholic: Social Doctrine Part Twelve by Bill Droel Stay in your lane. That’s one paraphrase of the Catholic principle of subsidiarity. The word itself is not found in most English dictionaries. It is derived from the Latin word subsidium, meaning help or aid. The idea behind this principle is that higher or bigger entities should assist lower or smaller entities, not usurp them. It can apply to family life, to dealings within business, in schools and other social... Read more

The Working Catholic: Church and Technology by Bill Droel Covid-19 has accelerated our churches’ use of streaming and other audio-visual tools. Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980) was a pioneer in media studies. Yet he is largely ignored in our day of omnipresent media. Digital Communion by Nick Ripatrazone (Fortress Press, 2022) sets out to revive McLuhan through a focus on his Catholic faith. McLuhan died before our universal use of mobile devices and laptops, before social media and before niche TV channels.... Read more

The Working Catholic: Flee the World? by Bill Droel The monastic idea is to devote one’s entire attention to God. Doing so during the Middle Ages meant turning against the frivolous distractions of the world and concentrating fully on God, writes Jamie Kreiner in The Wandering Mind: What Medieval Monks Tell Us About Distraction (Liveright, 2023). Various monasteries and individual monks (women and men) used multiple techniques for achieving singular attention. Some practices were extreme. Plenty of monastic types, like... Read more

The Working Catholic: Charity by Bill Droel “To give away money is an easy matter… But to decide to whom to give and how much and when, and for what purpose and how, is neither in every [person’s] power nor an easy matter.” –Aristotle (384 BC-322 BC) The hard part of giving away wealth “is figuring out how to do it in a leveraged way. It is not easy. Building Amazon was not easy… And I am finding that philanthropy... Read more

The Working Catholic: Democracy by Bill Droel Democracy requires a thick, independent civil society. Democracy is a fraud when restrictions are placed on churches, when unions are really fronts for the government or the company, when self-supporting newspapers and other media succumb to mega-forces and when there is only one viable political party. It is likewise difficult to impose genuine democracy in a place that does not traditionally have networks of autonomous groups. The benefits of civil society are multiple.... Read more

The Working Catholic: Signs of the Times by Bill Droel How do we become aware that a new age has dawned? Did anyone in November 1492 proclaim that the modern age began the previous month when Native Americans discovered Christopher Columbus (1451-1506)? Did anyone in November 1517 realize that the modern age began the previous month when Rev. Martin Luther (1483-1546) challenged the Roman Catholic bureaucracy? Yet looking back to those events we trace global commerce, exploration, cultural imperialism, a... Read more

The Working Catholic: Green Transportation by Bill Droel “Bicycles are not only thermo-dynamically efficient, they are also cheap,” says Catholic philosopher Ivan Illich (1926-2002) in Energy and Equity (Harper Collins, 1974). “Bicycles let people move with greater speed without taking up significant amounts of scarce space, energy or time.” Jody Rosen affirms Illich’s contention in Two Wheels Good: the History and Mystery of the Bicycle (Crown, 2022). Bikes are “a remarkably effective device for converting human exertion into locomotion,” he... Read more

The Working Catholic: Identity by Bill Droel The pro-ethnicity movement of the early 1970s made some sense. Michael Novak (1933-2017), to mention one proponent, convincingly argued that the elite Hollywood and Wall St. and Beltway culture might not be “good for children and other living things.” He foresaw that the modern emphases on achievement, bureaucratic efficiency, tech-obsession, celebrity status and quick results leaves many people behind, especially those who live in de-industrial cities and in smaller towns. Novak’s The Rise... Read more