12/19/2007

Concern for a just Agrarian System

The Church does not have the technical competence to propose concrete solutions regarding complex agrarian reform questions. But its mandate is to teach and promote those moral values that help define the purpose of economic enterprise like haciendas. Thus the Church judges the economy by what it does for and to people. Something is wrong in a system where large numbers of workers are caught in a vicious cycle of heavy debt and who are denied the possibility of owning land.

This concern for a just agrarian system is not a new emphasis for the CBCP. Back in 1968 it organized a National Rural Congress which "saw the roots of much of our social evils in the present pattern of land ownership in our country" which condemns the farmer-tenants to a miserable condition of economic dependence and strips him of his freedom and dignity.


Click here to read full text