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Agriculture is not just another economic sector. It is about food and hunger, the way we treat those who grow and harvest our food and fiber, and what kind of nation and world we are shaping. Agriculture and rural life, farmers and farmworkers have been longstanding concerns for our Conference, but the forces of increasing concentration in agriculture and increasing globalization in our world are raising new questions that have significant human dimensions and ethical implications. We hope these reflections will contribute to a broader dialogue about the moral dimensions of agriculture and to renewed efforts to advance the dignity of farmers, ranchers, and farmworkers.
1 Cf. National
Conference of Catholic Bishop/United States Catholic Conference, Report of
the Ad Hoc Task Force on Food, Agriculture, and Rural Concerns (Washington,
DC: USCCB, 1988); United States Catholic Conference, Food Policy in a Hungry
World: The Links That Bind Us Together (Washington, DC: USCCB, 1989).
2 Among the key national Catholic organizations are the Catholic Committee on Appalachia, Catholic Extension, Catholic Relief Services, National Catholic Rural Life Conference, and the USCCB Catholic Campaign for Human Development and Secretariat for Home Missions.
3 Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life (November 24, 2002), no. 3, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20021124_politica_en.html. . . (accessed in November 2003).
4 Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life, no. 6.
5 USCCB, Economic Justice for All: Tenth Anniversary Edition (Washington, DC: USCCB, 1997): “U.S. food policy has had a parallel goal of keeping the consumer cost of food low. As a result, Americans today spend less of their disposable income on food than people in any other industrialized country. . . . while low food prices benefit consumers who are left with additional income to spend on other goods, these pricing policies put pressure on farmers to increase output and hold down costs. This has led them to replace human labor with cheaper energy, expand farm size to employ new technologies favoring larger scale operations, neglect soil and water conservation, underpay farmworkers, and oppose farmworker unionization” (nos. 219-220).
6 Cf. USCCB, A Place at the Table: A Catholic Recommitment to Overcome Poverty and to Respect the Dignity of All God’s Creation (Washington, DC: USCCB, 2002).
7 Catholic social teaching is a rich tradition that is rooted in the Scripture and the lived experience of the people of God. It has been developed in the writings of church leaders through the ages and has most recently been articulated through a tradition of modern papal, conciliar, and episcopal documents. For a more thorough discussion of the themes identified here and their roots, see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Washington, DC: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops [USCCB]-Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2000); Sharing Catholic Social Teaching (Washington, DC: USCCB, 1999); the USCCB website www.usccb.org; the Vatican website www.vatican.va. . . . Also for previous statements of the Catholic bishops on agriculture—namely, the report of the Ad Hoc Task Force on Food, Agriculture, and Rural Concerns (1988) and Food Policy in a Hungry World: The Links That Bind Us Together (1989)—contact USCCB Publishing at 800-235-8722 or check the USCCB website.
8 John Paul II, On the Hundredth Anniversary of Rerum Novarum (Centesimus Annus) (Washington, DC: USCCB, 1991), no. 48
9 Cf. Archbishop Renato R. Martino, Address at the Ministerial Conference on Science and Technology in Agriculture, Sacramento, California, June 23-25, 2003.
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