Here is yet another great post from
Catholic Moral Theology. Charles Camosy points out the apparently missing preferential option for the rich from Catholic Social Teaching which has in many places written about the preferential option for the poor. CST has, I think, danced around the 'preferential option for the rich' but certainly hasn't explicitly named any such principle as it has the preferential option for the poor. For example one can find this passage in
Populorum Progressio:
We must repeat that the superfluous goods of wealthier nations ought to be placed at the disposal of poorer nations. The rule, by virtue of which in times past those nearest us were to be helped in time of need, applies today to all the needy throughout the world. And the prospering peoples will be the first to benefit from this. Continuing avarice on their part will arouse the judgment of God and the wrath of the poor, with consequences no one can foresee. If prosperous nations continue to be jealous of their own advantage alone, they will jeopardize their highest values, sacrificing the pursuit of excellence to the acquisition of possessions. We might well apply to them the parable of the rich man. His fields yielded an abundant harvest and he did not know where to store it: "But God said to him, 'Fool, this very night your soul will be demanded from you . . .' "
I agree with Charles, that there should indeed be an explicit preferential option for the rich, particularly in our wealthy society. We should at once emphasize not only the need to help those who suffer from materially poverty, but all forms of poverty, including the poverty in virtue and faith that materialism or consumerism causes as Pope John Paul II makes clear in
Centesimus Annus:
Today more than ever, the Church is aware that her social message will gain credibility more immediately from the witness of actions than as a result of its internal logic and consistency. This awareness is also a source of her preferential option for the poor, which is never exclusive or discriminatory towards other groups. This option is not limited to material poverty, since it is well known that there are many other forms of poverty, especially in modern society—not only economic but cultural and spiritual poverty as well. The Church's love for the poor, which is essential for her and a part of her constant tradition, impels her to give attention to a world in which poverty is threatening to assume massive proportions in spite of technological and economic progress.
