Working for the common good means that our social, economic and governmental decisions, plans and policies contribute toward providing all people with the basic necessities for a decent life: living-wage jobs, transportation, housing, effective schools, and health care. Working for the common good also includes examining how we are affecting this wonderful part of God’s creation. It has too often been the case, as Pope John Paul II remarked, that we “have been making decisions, taking actions and assigning values that are leading us away from the world as it should be, away from the design of God for creation, away from all that is essential for a healthy planet and a healthy commonwealth of people. . . .” (Bishops of Connecticut, “Common Ground, Common Good”)

Solidarity

In the Catholic tradition, the universal common good is specified by the duty of solidarity, "a firm and persevering determination to commit oneself to the common good," a willingness "to ‘lose oneself' for the sake of the other[s] instead of exploiting [them]" (Pope John Paul II, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, no. 38). In the face of "the structures of sin," moreover, solidarity requires sacrifices of our own self-interest for the good of others and of the earth we share. Solidarity places special obligations upon the industrial democracies, including the United States. "The ecological crisis," Pope John Paul II has written, "reveals the urgent moral need for a new solidarity, especially in relations between the developing nations and those that are highly industrialized" (EC, no. 10). Only with equitable and sustainable development can poor nations curb continuing environmental degradation and avoid the destructive effects of the kind of overdevelopment that has used natural resources irresponsibly. (U.S. Catholic Bishops, “Renewing the Earth”)

Common Heritage

The earth is ultimately a common heritage, the fruits of which are for the benefit of all. In the words of the Second Vatican Council, "God destined the earth and all it contains for the use of every individual and all peoples" (Gaudium et Spes, 69). This has direct consequences for the problem at hand.

It is manifestly unjust that a privileged few should continue to accumulate excess goods, squandering available resources, while masses of people are living in conditions of misery at the very lowest level of subsistence. Today, the dramatic threat of ecological breakdown is teaching us the extent to which greed and selfishness — both individual and collective — are contrary to the order of creation, an order which is characterized by mutual interdependence. (Pope John Paul II, “Peace with God the Creator, Peace with All of Creation”)