Christology, Catholic social teaching is circumscribed by a corpus of magisterial teaching.4 Though it makes use of auxiliary texts and materials, the proper matter of the discipline and therefore its content are determined principally by the content of these papal texts. Being first a "doctrine," rather than a field of study, it makes sense that these papal documents have a defining character. Thus, university and seminary courses of Catholic social doctrine usually explain and discuss the development and content of this growing corpus of doctrine, often making use of collections of the social encyclicals as their point of reference or textbook.

It was Pope Pius XII who coined the expression "social encyclical" in his radio message of June 1, 1941, referring to Leo XIII's Rerum Novarum.5 Pope John XXIII, in his 1961 encyclical Mater et Magistra, again employed the term in reference to the same encyclical;6 and from there the term found its way into the common vocabulary of the Church's Magisterium. Later Pope John Paul II would refer to Paul VI's Populorum Progressio as a social encyclical as well in his 1987 commemorative encyclical Sollicitudo Rei Socialis.7

Though the Magisterium offers no definition of "social encyclical," one understands that the expression refers to those encyclicals (and related documents, like Paul VI's apostolic letter Octogesima Adveniens) that deal specifically and often exclusively with the just organization of society. Roughly speaking, the collection of social encyclicals makes up the corpus of the social Magisterium of the Church, with the notable exception of Pope Pius XII's radio message of Pentecost 1941 commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Rerum Novarum. While obviously not an encyclical at all, the text of his address is usually considered part of the

4 In 1987 Pope John Paul II wrote that Catholic social doctrine, "beginning with the outstanding contribution of Leo XIII and enriched by the successive contributions of the Magisterium, has now become an updated doctrinal 'corpus.'" Pope John Paul II, encyclical letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (1987), §1.5 Pius broadcast his message "to call to the attention of the Catholic world a memory worthy of being written in letters of gold on the Church's Calendar: the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of the epoch-making social encyclical of Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum." AAS 33 (1941): 196.6 "It was at such a time and under pressure of such circumstances as these that Leo XIII wrote his social encyclical, Rerum Novarum, based on the needs of human nature itself and animated by the principles and spirit of the Gospel." Pope John XXIII, encyclical letter Mater et Magistra (1961), §15.7 "But first I wish to say a few words about the date of publication; the year 1967. The very fact that Pope Paul VI chose to publish a social Encyclical in that year invites us to consider the document in relationship to the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, which had ended on December 8, 1965." Pope John Paul II, Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, §5.

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Abortion and Catholic Social Teaching

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