Chapter 2

Structures of Sin and Structures of Grace

Introduction
This chapter explains how Catholic social thought has understood and interpreted the reality of
social injustice using the concept of structural or social sin. In the face of social injustice, human
experience has shown that injustice is not just found in individual action, but rather in the
dominant social forces and institutions that can encourage people to live lives that discard the
common good. In response to this, Catholic social thought espouses the need for charity and
justice, as well as the building up of structures of grace.

Learning Objectives
1. Explain the concept of structural or social sin, its origins, and how it functions in
everyday life
2. Assess and critique institutions, organizations, or social forces based on Catholic social
thought’s understanding of social sin
3. Develop ideas on how communities can become structures of grace

Exposition
The first chapter detailed the contemporary situation today—on the one hand, there is
much progress that has happened, and on the other hand, there is still widespread poverty and
ways of life that are unjust, dehumanizing and death-dealing. This chapter now tries to
understand and describe this unjust reality in light of the Catholic faith commitment, by
describing the reality of social sin or structures of sin, as well as the continuing mission towards
building structures of grace that allow for all of creation, including human beings, to flourish and
develop.

It is important to remember that in Catholic theology, the human person is understood to

be radically social; his or her relationships with other people, with culture, and with other
institutions would have a very strong influence on the person, either forming or malforming him
or her. This theological anthropology thus has implications in how sin is understood in the
branch of theology called Catholic social thought. Catholic social thought is a broad umbrella
term that describes any form of Catholic theologizing on social issues and Catholic doctrine.
This would include theology from laypeople, and are often at the cutting edge of theology and
may sometimes disagree with magisterial pronouncements. A narrower term would be Catholic
social teaching, which would only include magisterial and official documents promulgated by
the pope or the bishops. These two terms will be taken up more in chapters 5 and 6.
Sin: Personal and Social

Catholic theology acknowledges the presence of sin, and there are many ways to describe
this. Among the early church fathers, one of the ways the concept was sin was developed and
that has endured is from Augustine of Hippo. For Augustine, sin was a “free act of will whereby
one turns from God, the highest and immutable good, to some created thing, the goodness of
which is deficient by comparison.”15 Sin is thus tied to will, understood as a way that a person
exercises his or her choices to do or not to do an action, and as something that can be formed or
malformed. He also describes categories of sin (e.g. great sins vis-a-vis small or trivial sins) and
how motives, inordinate desires, and passions affect what would count as a sin which category.
Sin by human beings today is also tied to original sin, which Augustine describes

Such an understanding of sin points to a personal action or omission. The emphasis is on

the individual either acting or not acting on a particular situation or event, which then causes
some form of evil to occur. This evil can be obvious or subtle and is easily traced to a particular
action or omission. Thus, the most common way of understanding sin is sin as a personal action,
and this was what was emphasized in fundamental moral theology as a starting point for
understanding sin in Catholic theology.

While sin is easy to describe as individual actions that cause some form of evil or harm, it
becomes more complicated when trying to describe the pervasive evil that are not simply caused
by just any one person. What was described in the first chapter as systems that are pervasive in
their injustice and their way of encouraging evil, such as our corrupt government system, is not
easily traced or tied to one particular action; rather, it is tied to many different factors and various
people who contribute to the situation. Not only then is sin personal, it is also social. By social,
not only does sin describe the individual rejection of the good, but it also describes the collective
situation of injustice and evil that prevail in the world. Gustavo Gutierrez, a notable liberation
theologian from Latin America, stresses that “things do not happen by chance, and that behind an
unjust structure there is a personal or collective will responsible—a willingness to reject God and
neighbor.”16 Sin therefore is not simply an:

...individual, private, or merely interior reality...sin is regarded as a social, historical

fact, the absence of fellowship and love in relationships among persons, the breach of
friendship with God and with other persons...sin is evident in oppressive structures,
in the exploitation of humans by humans, in the domination and slavery of peoples,
races, and social classes. Sin appears therefore, as the fundamental alienation, the
root of a situation of injustice and exploitation.17

15 Shawn D. Floyd, “How to Cure Self-Deception: An Augustinian Remedy,” Logos: A Journal of Catholic
Thought and Culture 7, no. 3 (2004): 63.
16 Gustavo Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics, and Salvation, trans. Caridad Inda and John

Eagleson, Revised edition (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1988), 24.

17 Gutierrez, 102-3.
These ruptures of relationships and other sinful behavior become institutionalized and built into
the very systems human beings. This is what the Catholic tradition has come to call social sin or
structures of sin, or the sin of the world.

Social Sin and Structures of Sin

Taking into account today’s globalized context, contemporary theologians continue to

describe and explain what sin means in the concrete daily lives of people, which, more often than
not, is structural and not just individual. Social sin acknowledges that the harmful effects of
individual, personal sin can crystallize into structures that affect people. It acknowledges that
certain ways that society has been constructed are sinful in that they encourage human beings to
do evil or force them to choose between two unjust decisions.

Social sin can be understood to have certain levels that form an interplay with each other:
the first level of social sin is made up of the dehumanizing trends and patterns of behaviors that
make up the various socio-economic and political institutions; the second level then includes the
symbols, ideologies, and stereotypes that are “operative in the imagination and fostered by
society, that legitimate and reinforce the unjust situation”; from there, the third level now
describes the “false consciousness” and values distortion created through these patterns and
symbols; lastly, the fourth level now includes the collective action and decision that are the
consequences of the false consciousness. An example would be classism: on the first level
would be a prejudice towards those who are of a different, usually poorer, social class; the
second level would then entail stereotypical ideas that poor people are simply lazy, or that they
are poor because they are being punished by God for being morally deviant; this feeds into to a
“false consciousness” of mythic individualism that everyone can be wealthy if only they tried
harder, or were morally better, and that those who aren’t wealthy are therefore not trying hard
enough, or that there is something wrong with them, and would eventually lead to collective
decisions or policies in the community that would either privilege the wealthy and reinforce the
prejudice of the poor, or simply be indifferent to the struggles of the poor.

Another way of understanding social sin in Catholic social thought would be to describe
them as: “1) a structure that violates and oppresses human dignity; 2) a situation that promotes
individual selfishness at the expense of others, especially those with no power; and 3) a situation
of complicity or silent acquiescence in social injustice.”18 19 20 These structures and systems are often
complex, and can also be understood as “a network of domination, oppression and abuses which
stifle freedom and which keep the greater part of humanity from sharing in the building up and
enjoyment of a more just and more loving world.” More often than not, a select group who are
powerful and privileged benefit from this unjust system, and since they are in power, there is

18
Gregory Baum, Religion and Alienation: A Theological Reading of Sociology, 1st ed. (Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis
Books, 1975), 174-76.
19 James D. Whitehead and Evelyn E. Whitehead, “Attending to the Experience of Injustice,” in Method in Ministry:

Theological Reflection and Christian Ministry (London: Sheed & Ward, 1995), 128-29.
20 World Synod of Catholic Bishops, “Justice in the World,” Villanova University, 1971,

https://wwwl.villanova.edu/content/dam/villanova/mission/JusticeIntheWorldl971.pdf. Hereafter referred to as JW.

JW3.
often little incentive for them to change the system. Thus, structures of sin often pit people
against other people: the rich, powerful, and privileged 1% versus the middle to lower class 99%.

Another case: corrupt governments, for example, may take bribes from companies so that
governments would either work in favor of those companies’ interests, or so that the
governments would not penalize the businesses for any illegal wrongdoing. Creating such a
system harms smaller businesses, who want to engage in good business but cannot afford to
engage in large-scale bribery, and harms society at large, because businesses may get away with
harmful activities that could harm the environment (e.g. dumping waste in rivers, illegal
deforestation or mining) or the consumers themselves (e.g. creating products and services that
may be cheaper but use harmful materials such as lead, or cutting comers in constructing
buildings that could lead to harm or accidents).

Another example would be how governments may build infrastructure such as roads and
mass transit, or fund some schools or health service centers, but cut comers in the process in
order to pocket the rest of the funds. This can lead to accidents and delays and can lead to less
quality education or healthcare that produces citizens who are sick or not equipped with the skills
needed to work or contribute to the community. Businesses may not be able to bring their goods
and services to where they are needed, and the people who are employed in various organizations
will not be able to work if healthcare and education do not provide medical attention when
needed, or the education to do their job. Low quality education and healthcare correlates with
lower quality of life.

Note that these situations are complex, made up of different people who have different
motivations, beliefs, and values. It is difficult to pinpoint what needs to be done first and what
the root cause is—should it be on the side of the businesses? Or on the side of the government? It
is also difficult to come up with a solution that everyone will agree on, because each group and
person will have a different idea of what is good, what is needed, and what is beneficial. The
sheer complexity in understanding the problem needs to be acknowledged; one cannot be
complacent or overly confident in tackling injustice in socio-economic and political institutions.
 Note also how the different sectors in society are all involved in the examples mentioned,
and that while often the average citizen is also harmed by these situations, the average citizen
also often is complicit in the situation: either through supporting businesses that are involved,
working in government, or passively and silently seeing it happen yet not trying to do anything
about it, perhaps seeing as “not their problem” or feeling overwhelmed and unable to help. For
whatever reason, motive, or belief, even ordinary people can and often do contribute to the unjust
situation, whether consciously or unconsciously. This important to consider, not because this
book wants to make all people to feel guilty or condemn them; rather, this is important to
consider because it is part of the complexity of social sin that needs to be acknowledged and
considered when coming up with solutions in response to structures of sin, and it reminds people
to be humble before placing all the blame on other people. It helps people examine themselves
more honestly in terms of what they have done to contribute to the injustice today, and what they
have done to respond to this injustice.

Social sin is particularly detrimental to the community because, not only does it affect
people and the relationships among people, but it also affects people’s relationship with God.
Structures can impinge on a person’s freedom, encouraging evil rather than good. It thus affects
what Karl Rahner calls a person’s categorical and transcendental freedom. Categorical freedom
is what people most often understand freedom to be: the freedom to choose certain things over
others. Transcendental freedom, on the other hand, goes deeper than that: it is where one makes
the fundamental “yes” or “no” to God, which is understood to be a person’s fundamental option.
Categorical freedom is the level wherein a person actualizes one’s transcendental freedom.
Social sin makes it difficult to make choices that orient people toward God, as the structures
skew the values and “sets up a strong tendency to choose lesser values or to act against authentic
values”; there is thus a difficulty of choosing the values and saying “yes” to God as one’s
fundamental option.21

This understanding of sin and its effects on people also draws on sociology to describe
how social sin works in reality. Sociologists Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann would describe
this as a process of externalization, objectivation, and internalization: “society is a human
product. Society is an objective reality. Man is a social product.” 22 In externalization, human
beings, through creative activity, create and support values, patterns of behavior, languages, and
institutions; in objectivation, these patterns of behaviors, and institutions become an objective
part of the social site, have their own facticity, and now confronts and impinges their particular
logic on human beings. This thus leads to internalization wherein human beings begin to be
formed or malformed by the institutions and systems that exist.

21 Mark
O’Keefe, OSB, “Social Sin and Fundamental Option,” Irish Theological Quarterly 58, no. 2 (1992): 90-91.
22 Peter
L. Berger and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of
Knowledge (New York: Doubleday, 1967), 61.
 Creation of Personal knowledge

Sample photo of Externalization, Objectivation and Internalization

Charity, Justice, and Structures of Grace

It is not enough to criticize these structures of sin—in order to take seriously the call for
justice and love that Catholic social teaching and thought calls for, there is a need to strive to
change these structures, systems, and policies. There are two ways that Catholics have responded
to social sin: the first way is through charity, and the second way is through justice. Charity
addresses the symptoms of the problem; it responds to the immediate needs of the time and are
often short-term social services. Justice, on the other hand, is more interested in social change,
which is more long-term and seeks to address the root cause of the problem.

Charity Justice |

Charity is social service. Justice is social change. Justice

Charity provides direct promotes social change in
services like food, clothing, institutions or political
shelter. structures.

Charity responds to immediate Justice responds to long-term

needs. needs.

Charity is directed at the effects Justice is directed at the root

 1— ..
of injustice, its symptoms. causes of social problems.
Charity addresses problems Justice addresses the
that already exist. underlying structures or causes
of these problems in order to
ensure that the problem doesn’t
happen in the first place.
f
Charity is private, individual Justice is public, collective
acts. actions.

Box 1: Charity and Justice

It is important to understand that both charity and justice are needed in responding to social sin:
they are the “two feet” of Catholic social thought. On the one hand, there is a need to help the
wounded, the poor, and the suffering today. Their pain cannot wait and should be addressed. On
the other hand, there is also a need to make sure that the problem does not happen again so that
others do not suffer as well. Thus, both are essential aspects of responding to social sin in
Catholic theology. It is not a matter of one being more important than the other; both the effects
and the root causes need to be addressed through charity and justice.

Charitable works are often more common and not as controversial, and so many Catholics
engage in these works: donating money or food to shelters, sponsoring families during
Christmas, or volunteering at local parish or barangay activities during special occasion. Most
people who volunteer for charitable acts are praised. However, charity is not enough, and while
there are many Catholics who engage in acts of justice these are often seen as controversial, with
Catholics and the Catholic church being told to stay out of political or public discourse or being
seen as a nuisance who is simply trying to make trouble. Pope John Paul II makes it clear,
however, that justice is important:

But [charity] is not enough. Within the framework of your national institutions and in
cooperation with all your compatriots, you will also want to seek out the structural
reasons which foster or cause the different forms of poverty in the world and in your
own country, so that of you can apply the proper remedies...neither will you recoil
before the reforms—even profound ones—of attitudes and structures that may prove
necessary in order to re-create over and over again the conditions needed by the
disadvantaged if they are to have a fresh chance in the hard struggle of life.

23 John Paul II, “Mass at Yankee Stadium in New York,” Vatican.va, October 2, 1979,
https://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/homilies/1979/documents/hf_jp-ii_hom_19791002_usa-new-york.html.
 Direct
Social Services Social Change

(heiping (woffle fremcH'urf the causes

address present needs' of social problems}

WORKS OF CHARITY WORKS OF JUSTICE

(icing politically active

Supporting food pantries
Providing food baskets
Promoting clothing centers
Visiting the elderly, prisoners,
shut-ins
I lelping women who face a
crisis pregnancy
Supporting hospitality houses
Sponsoring a refugee family
Volunteering for protects such as
Meals on Wheels,
transporting ddcrlv.
tutoring children,
providing cultural
opportunities
Volunteering for voter
registration drives
Supporting political platforms
that arc pro-life and support
"people” issues
Scarring a diocesan or statewide
legislative network
Organizing community-based
self-help projects
Scarring a co-op or credit union
Monitoring government agencies
—getting them to change
administrative policy that
causes problems
Educating the public
Raising funds for needed projects
Facilitating reflection on Catholic
social teaching and its call
to action in everyday
community life

Examples of charitable actions and justice actions sample photo

Catholic social teaching and thought thus also call for the building up of what are called
structures of grace as part of justice. These structures of grace are those which allow for human
flourishing and the flourishing of creation, rather than enable sinfulness. These structures would
encourage good rather than sinful choices and would help people choose to do the good rather
than distort the values of the community. It is attempting to create a more transparent
government system, a culture that allows both men and women to develop into flourishing
human beings, or an economic system that does not privilege the few and allows everyone to
contribute to the community but at the same time allows everyone to have access to the resources
they need.

Such structures of grace can be said then to have the presence of God working in its
systems and can be characterized as a gratuitous elevating of human nature in order to help
people participate in God’s love; in this sense, grace is not simply a personal gift, but now a
communal gift and character of the community. These structures actively oppose structures of sin
through forming consciences and proper ethics, as well as nurturing relationships among people,
God, and all of creation. They also directly lobby for policies and projects by both local
government units and non-government organization in their communities that can help the
community flourish. Such structures of grace seek to raise the consciousness of the community,
and at the same time seek to work with other groups who genuinely serve the community or hold
other groups accountable if these other groups fail to do their mandate. Thus, the end goal is to
transform society at large into one that is closer to what God wants: a society marked by justice,
love and mercy, and flourishing of creation.

Creating structures of grace as part of the Catholic mission entails creating structures of
charity and solidarity.24 Kevin Ahem, whose research discusses various Catholic organizations
and their social work, notes that the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church argues
that structures of sin should be “purified and transformed into structures of solidarity through the
creation or appropriate modification of laws, market regulations, and judicial systems.”25 He also
points out that Pope Benedict XVI also discusses the importance of creating “networks of
charity” and strengthening “networks of solidarity” in Caritas in Veritate\ genuine human
development and the common good are undergirded by these networks, and is it through such
networks that people are able to pour out God’s love. 26 Ahern also notes the important place of
communal discernment in creating structures of grace. Discernment allows for the people to
come together and be aware of where God’s grace is possibly moving. It can also help the people
discern whether the structure is genuinely being a structure of grace.

Notable structures of grace as seen in certain organizations and the various principles that
undergird them and that have been mentioned here will be further explored in chapters 6, 7, and
8. Many people strive to directly respond towards the injustice they have experienced in the
world, through either

Summary and Implications

Sin is not simply an individual act. Taking seriously the notion of sin means that
Catholics should understand the social aspect of sin. Sin is not simply private or personal; rather,
it is a social and historical reality that affects people over time. It affects our orientation towards
God, making it difficult to fundamentally say “yes” to God, and at the same time ruptures our
relationships with other people, with the environment, and with ourselves. It makes it more
difficult to do the good that people ought to do, and it makes it difficult to create a world where
people and creation can flourish and become who and what God wanted them to be.

This understanding of sin thus implies that actions have a social dimension, whether
obvious or not. It pushes people to take a step back and reflect on what possible effects one’s
actions have, possibly seeing the effects in another country or community. Though no one can
foresee all the possible effects of one’s actions, it is still a point of thought to consider: how does
one’s actions affect other people who one may not automatically see or think off?

24 Kevin Ahern, Structures of Grace: Catholic Organizations Serving the Global Common Good (Maryknoll, New
York: Orbis Books, 2015), 136-38.
25 Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, “Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church,” Vatican, va, 2004,

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/justpeace/documents/rc_pc_justpeace_doc_20060526_comp
endio-dott-soc_en.html. Hereafter referred to as CSDC. CSDC 193.
26 Benedict XVI, “On Integral Human Development In Charity and Truth: Caritas in Veritate,” Vatican.va, June 29,

2009, http://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_ben-xvi_enc_20090629_caritas-in-
veritate.html. Hereafter referred to as CV. CV 5 and 25.
 After deconstructing structures of sin, there are two ways of responding: either through
charity or through justice. Acts of charity can help address the short-term and immediate needs
of the community by responding to the symptoms and effects of the problem, but there is also a
need to engage in acts of justice that address the root causes of the problem in order to genuinely
progress as a community.

As part of justice, it is also important that Catholics engage in building structures of

grace, in order to help co-create with God the world that God wished for this creation to be.
Creating structures of grace will not be easy, especially since there are people who are
benefitting from the current system, and will use their influence, power, and privilege, to keep
things the way they are and oppose any change. However, this will be an important task today
and in the future for the Catholic faith commitment, because charitable acts are not enough: both
acts of charity and acts of justice are needed in cooperating with God’s grace and creative power.
Guide Questions

1. “Structures can’t be sinful! It is only people who can be sinful because they can choose to
sin!” How would you describe social sin to a person who makes this argument?
2. What other sinful structures do you see in your local community? Why do you describe
them as sinful?
3. What other factors do you think are important considerations in building structures of
grace?
 Bibliography

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