CSDC 202

Justice is particularly important in the present-day context, where the individual value of the person, his dignity and his rights — despite proclaimed intentions — are seriously threatened by the widespread tendency to make exclusive use of criteria of utility and ownership. Justice too, on the basis of these criteria, is considered in a reductionist manner, whereas it acquires a fuller and more authentic meaning in Christian anthropology. Justice, in fact, is not merely a simple human convention, because what is “just” is not first determined by the law but by the profound identity of the human being⁴⁴⁷ Cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 40: AAS 80AAS — Acta Apostolicae Sedis (official gazette of the Holy See)Volume 80 (1988) at vatican.va — scanned PDF (1988), 568; cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1929..