Working Class Anger and the Demands of Social Justice

Jean Porter, Professor of Theology at Notre Dame, gave the annual Sorensen Lecture at YDS on Thursday, November 2. The lecture is premised on the observation that as the condition of the working classes in the developed world improved, Catholic social teachings increasingly focused on the situation of the so-called Third World, the challenges of globalization, and the environmental crisis. At the same time, however, the situation of the working class has once again deteriorated, especially within the United States. In this context, early Catholic doctrines pertaining to the rights of the working class are once again timely, not only for Catholics but for everyone who would hope to offer a theological response to working class anger. Porter, who received her Ph.D. from Yale in 1984, has authored a dozen books and book chapters. Her books are Ministers of the Law: A Natural Law Theory of Legal Authority (Eerdmans, 2010); Nature as Reason: A Thomistic Theory of the Natural Law (Eerdmans, 2005); Natural and Divine Law: Reclaiming the Tradition for Christian Ethics (Eerdmans, 1999); and Moral Action and Christian Ethics (Cambridge, 1994). Yale Divinity School's Margaret Lindquist Sorensen Lectureship was established in 1978 by a gift from her son, Dr. Andrew A. Sorensen '62 B.D., to provide an annual lecture on politics and ethics.