Does the Church disapprove of the right of an individual to private ownership?

In such matters the Church generally considers the positive aspects before the negative. For instance, the Church urges people to love others before warning them against hatred, resentment, and envy. As the community of the Church developed, the Church promoted a life of fellowship and generous almsgiving without disapproving of any individual’s right to own property privately. The Church was more interested in the manner in which the faithful

1090 Lactantius, The Divine Institutes 6.12 (ANF 7:175–178).

1091 Cf. “Epistle to Diognetus,” in Staniforth, Maxwell, and Andrew Louth, eds. Early Christian Writings (Penguin Classics, 1987) 10: p. 148.

1092 St. Augustine of Hippo, Enarr. In Ps. 131.5. Cf. his Expositions on the Book of Psalms 35.9; 82.4 (NPNF I/8:81, 386).

1093 St. Cyprian of Carthage, Treatise 8: On Works and Alms 13 (ANF 5:479).

1094 St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Ephesians 6.5–6 (NPNF I/13:76–77).

use their property — that is, that they use it for the edification of the whole community and for everyone’s contentment in the Lord.

St. Ambrose believes that all things were created for the use of all, that every person has the right to enjoy the goods of the earth, and that the idea of private ownership creates inequality.¹⁰⁹⁵

According to St. Augustine , a pious person distinguishes between the use of an object and the enjoyment of it; one ought to use what he needs, and enjoy what may be enjoyed, without mixing the two up. He says:

“Those things which are objects of enjoyment make us happy. Those things which are objects of use assist, and (so to speak) support us in our efforts after happiness, so that we can attain the things that make us happy and rest in them.”¹⁰⁹⁶

“… do you think it is right to blame silver and gold because of greedy men, or food and wine because of gluttons and drunkards, or the feminine form because of fornicators and adulterers, and so on, particularly, when you see the physician puts fire to a good use while the poisoner uses bread for his wicked purposes?”¹⁰⁹⁷

“[Job], having lost all his riches and been reduced suddenly to destitution, he kept his soul so undisturbed and fixed upon God as to show that earthly things were not important in his sight, but that he was greater than they and God greater than he. If the men of our day could be of such mind, we would not have to be so strongly prohibited in the New Testament from possessing these goods in order that we might become perfect. For to possess such things without clinging to them is much more admirable than not to possess them at all.”¹⁰⁹⁸

St. Augustine believes that we ought to use what we have and not let it use us, or as he says, “Possess temporal things, but do not let them possess you.” Concerning this matter he says, “In the Catholic Church, there are great numbers of the faithful who do not use worldly goods; there are others who use them as though not using them, as the Apostle said (cf. 1 Cor. 7:31), and as has been proved in times when Christians were forced to worship idols. For how many men of wealth, how many rural householders, and merchants, and soldiers, how many civic leaders, and even senators, persons of both sexes, suffered for the true faith and religion, giving up all those vain and temporal goods which they used but were not enslaved to, thus providing to unbelievers that they possessed these goods and were not possessed by them.”¹⁰⁹⁹

1095 St. Ambrose of Milan, Commentary of St. Ambrose on the Gospel according to Saint Luke , trans., Ide M. Ni Riain (Dublin: Halcyon Press. 2001) 7.124, 247: pp. 228–229, 268.

1096 St. Augustine of Hippo, On Christian Doctrine 1.3 (NPNF I/2:523).

1097 St. Augustine of Hippo, The Free Choice of the Will 1.15.33 (FOTC 59:105).

1098 St. Augustine of Hippo, The Way of Life of the Catholic Church 1.23.42 (FOTC 56:36).

1099 St. Augustine of Hippo, The Way of Life of the Catholic Church 1.35.77 (FOTC 56:59).

“What comfort do they [i.e., possessions] bring, seeing that it is better to be independent of such things than to enjoy abundance of them, because, when possessed, they occasion, through our fear of losing them, more vexation than was caused by the strength of desire with which their possession was coveted? Men are not made good by possessing these socalled good things.”¹¹⁰⁰

“But this class does not include the rich Christians who, although they possess riches, are not possessed by them, because they have renounced the world in truth and from their heart, and who put no hope in such possessions. These use a sound disciple in training their wives, their children, and their whole household to cling to the Christian religion; their homes, overflowing with hospitality … they deal their bread to the hungry, they clothe the naked (cf. Isa. 48:7; Matt. 25:35–36), they ransom the captive, ‘to lay up in store for themselves a good foundation for the time to come that they may lay hold on the true life’ (1 Tim. 6:19).”¹¹⁰¹

“If we wish to return to our Father’s home, this world must be used, not enjoyed, that so the invisible things of God may be clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made (Rom. 1:20) — that is, that by means of what is material and temporary we may lay hold upon that which is spiritual and eternal.”¹¹⁰²