CSDC 578

The Church teaches men and women that God offers them the real possibility of overcoming evil and attaining good. The Lord has redeemed mankind “bought with a price” (1 Cor 6:20). The meaning and basis of the Christian commitment in the world are founded on this certainty, which gives rise to hope despite the sin that deeply marks human history. The divine promise guarantees that the world does not remain closed in upon itself but is open to the Kingdom of God. The Church knows the effects of “the mystery of lawlessness” (2 Thes 2:7), but she also knows that “there exist in the human person sufficient qualities and energies, a fundamental ‘goodness' (cf. Gen 1:31), because he is the image of the Creator, placed under the redemptive influence of Christ, who ‘united himself in some fashion with every man', and because the efficacious action of the Holy Spirit ‘fills the earth' (Wis 1:7)”¹²¹⁴ John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 47: AAS 80AAS — Acta Apostolicae Sedis (official gazette of the Holy See)Volume 80 (1988) at vatican.va — scanned PDF (1988), 580..