The Common Good

2. Common good is a composite by
product of all efforts made by
individuals and institutions to make
sure that everyone is happy and
fulfilled. It is achieved if people take
common responsibilities and
cooperate toward a shared goal.

3. Common good pertains to a society that
aspires to see everyone flourish and succeed
in life. This may be achieved if people are
encouraged or empowered to argue the
execution of laws that serve the interest of the
general public.

4. In a democratic society, where the citizens
exercise freedom of expression, the
common good is easily maintained. The
people can question how government
leaders use their powers for as long as the
criticisms are bound by acceptable legal
and moral bases.

5. ELEMENTS OF COMMON GOOD
According to the education for Justice,
there are three essential elements of the
common good. These are the following;:
• Respect for the human person
• Social well-being and development of the group
• Peace, stability and the security of a just order.

6. Respect for the human person – This upholds the
well-being of every individual such as giving special
assistance to the elderly and helping victims of natural
and man-made calamities.
Supporting Bible Verse
o Let us make man in our own image’
Genesis 1:27

7. o Respect for life and for
the dignity of the human
person also extends to the
rest of the creation, which
is called to join man in
praising God.
Pope John Paul II

8.  Social well-being and development of the group –
this maintains a strong preference toward a group of
people who are marginalized such as the indigenous
tribes, illegal settlers in depressed areas, or a group who
are victims of domestic abuse.
Supporting Bible Verse
• And He said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the
Gospel to the whole creation”
Mark 16:15
• “We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be
found with our ministry”.
Corinthians 6:3

9. Peace, stability, and the security of
a just order - This refers to a society
governed by rules and policies in
order to maintain a healthy
coexistence among the people.
Obedience to existence laws is
not based on fear but rather on fair
policies. An ideal example of this is
a neighborhood living in peace and
harmony with sustainable source
for their daily needs.

11. IN THE CHURCH DEFINITION

12. At the foundation of Catholic Social Teaching is the
concept of the “common good.” Here is a definition
drawn from Pope St. John XXIII and quoted in the
Vatican II document: the common good is “the sum
total of social conditions which allow people,
either as groups or individuals, to reach their
fulfillment more fully and more easily.”

13. By common we mean all people. To pursue the
common good is to work towards the greatest
good for all persons, not the greatest good for
the greatest number and certainly not the
greatest good for only a specific group of
people. There is a difference between the good
for a majority of people and the good for all
people.

14. One example that is sometimes used to illustrate
the common good is a sports team.
The common good of a team is to win, or maybe
to protect the integrity of the game. Certainly, a
team wants individual players to perform well
and to improve, but ultimately the common
good of the team is to win. This sometimes
requires star players to make sacrifices in order
for the team to work together to win.

15. Then, of course, there is the role of the coach in a
sports team. The coach must protect the common
good of the team (that goal of winning) not just
the individual players and their individual
goods.
Likewise, it is the role of the state to defend and
promote the common good of civil society and its
citizens.

16. The Catechism of the Catholic
Church describes three essential elements
of the common good:
1. Rights: The common good presupposes
respect for the person as such. The public
authorizes (government) must respect and
protect the rights of the human person. In
other words: respect people.

17. 2. Needs (Prosperity): The common good
requires the social well-being and
development of the group itself. Public
authorities should make accessible what is
needed to lead a truly human life, for
example: food, clothing, health, work,
education and culture, information, and the
right to establish a family. In other words:
help people.

18. 3. Peace: The common good requires
peace. Public authority should ensure a
morally acceptable means of security and
defense of its people. In other words:
protect people.

19. In addition, however, we also pursue a Universal
Common Good.
The world today is increasingly interdependent,
meaning, we all rely on other countries for our own
well-being. Though we may live in different parts
of the world, we are all a part of one human family
and, therefore, we seek a universal common good.

20. This means that nations must also help
humans who are not from their country.
This is why the Church works toward
assisting refugees and migrants who are
displaced from their homes.

21. Jesus taught the Golden Rule to his
disciples: “Do to others whatever
you would have them do to you”
(Matthew 7:12)
JESUS GOLDEN RULE FOR THE COMMON GOOD

22. From this law is drawn the great wisdom
of the common good. To seek the common
good is to seek to fulfill Jesus’ command
to do unto others as we would have them
do unto us.

23. Following
Jesus:
The Common
Good

26. Mary,
Mother of Jesus
Mary is the mother of the
Messiah, Jesus Christ,
the Savior of the world.
She was a willing servant, trusting
in God and obeying his call.

27. Calling of Mary
Fearful and troubled, Mary found herself in the
presence of the angel Gabriel listening to his
announcement. She could never have expected to hear the
most incredible news—that she would have a child, and
her son would be the Messiah. Although she could not
comprehend how she would conceive the Savior, she
responded to God with humble belief and obedience.

28. Joseph, the husband of
Mary, may be superfluous for
Jesus’s existence, but by
responding to his dreams he
becomes integral for Jesus’
safety.
Husband : Joseph

29. 1. Jesus life in Palestine
Jesus was born relatively between 6 BCE and 4 BCE in the
time of King Herod in Bethlehem of Judea. He was raised in
the small village of Nazareth. Growing up, he learned and
practice the trade of carpentry.
- It was about the age of thirty that Jesus started His three-year
ministry of preaching the good news of salvation. Those who were
in power, the members of the Sanhedrin (tribunal or council
headed by the High Priest), brought Him to trial, declared Him
guilty of crimes under the roman law, and had Him executed by
crucifixion around the year 30 BC.

30. - After the resurrection, the apostles preached that Jesus
Himself is the good news, for, in Him, God definitely
revealed Himself and His love for us in a total and
unconditional way. God sent His only Son to become man
and die for us, the greatest sign of His love.
- Through Jesus, we are saved from our sins and
reconciled with God. Through Jesus’ actions and teaching,
most especially His passion, death and resurrection, Jesus
became our savior. He won for us the salvation from sin
that God had promised.

31. 2.Oral tradition
Oral gospel traditions,
cultural information passed
on from one generation to
the next by word of mouth,
were the first stage in the
formation of the
written gospels.

32. These oral traditions included different types
of stories about Jesus. For example, people told
anecdotes about Jesus healing the sick and
debating with his opponents. The traditions
also included sayings attributed to Jesus, such
as parables and teachings on various subjects
which, along with other sayings, formed the
oral gospel tradition.

33. Importance of the Oral Tradition
Before the gospels were composed, Jesus' first
followers sustained his memory by sharing stories of
his life, death and teachings.
It's rather clear from the way that the stories develop in
the gospels that the Christians who are writing the
gospels a generation after the death of Jesus are doing
so from a stock of oral memory, that is, stories that had
been passed down to probably by followers

34. But if we think about the death of Jesus and
remember a group of people who would have
still been attached to him and to his memory
after his death, it must have been a rather stark
and traumatic period of time. Many of their
initial hopes and expectations had been dashed.
All of this talk of the kingdom of God arriving
soon seemed to be disconfirmed with his death.

35. We have to remember that Jesus died around 30.
For 40 years, there's no written gospel of his life, until
after the revolt. During that time, we have very little in
the way of written records within Christianity. Our first
writer in the New Testament is Paul, and his first letter is
dated around 50 to 52, still a good 20 years after Jesus,
himself. But it appears that in between the death of Jesus
and the writing of the first gospel, Mark, that they clearly
are telling stories. They're passing on the tradition of
what happened to Jesus, what he stood for and what he
did, orally, by telling it and retelling it....

37. The fact that we're dealing in oral medium of
storytelling is very important to the
development of the tradition itself because
stories tend to be told in some units that can be
passed along easily, easily remembered.
Sometimes they may even be put in different
order or you may only tell certain parts of the
story.

38. They're indications that we may have
collections of miracle stories that
circulated independently and maybe
collections of teachings, as well. But,
probably the core of all the oral tradition is
the summary of the death, burial, and
resurrection of Jesus, the Passion tradition.

39. How did this start to get written
down, these stories that people are
telling one another?

40. In the development of the oral tradition then, it
seems that over time some of these stories came to
be written down, and the use of these summary
statements about the contents of the story of Jesus
are what came to be thought of as the gospel, the
good news, the story of Jesus. But the term gospel,
or good news, itself, means just a proclamation of
the information, of what happened - The Great
Story. And that's what the gospels are, a narrative
tradition, the story of Jesus.

41. 3. The written Gospel
They are faith testimonies to life, death and
resurrection of Jesus written by believers to
guide fellow believers and inspire new ones.
The gospel was not written as biographies
whose historical date need to be confirmed
by many sources.

42. The evangelist, the writers of the four
canonical Gospel, drew their materials
from the oral preaching of the apostles
and earliest disciples of Jesus, and
partial written compilation of Jesus’
teaching and accounts of Jesus’
miracles, passion and death that were
in the church.

43. The written gospel are church
documents, created in, by, and for
Christian communities. The evangelist
organized the materials according to
their own particular sources and
purpose. They were able to do this with
the special grace of the Holy Spirit,
which is called biblical inspiration.

44. BIBLICAL INSPIRATION
]
refers to the Holy Spirit’s divine
activity of overseeing and directing
the authors, editors, and compilers of
the Bible that allowed them to use
their personalities and writing styles
to communicate and compile God’s
revelation to humankind without
error.