But in those discussions one group is missing: the poor. For at least two reasons: First, their presence is a reminder of the inability of the capitalist system to provide for all, and so they represent a silent reproach to the capitalist “way of proceeding.” Second, the material needs of the poor remind us of our responsibility to care for them. For both reasons, the poor appear, in the words of Pope John Paul II, as “a burden, as irksome intruders trying to consume what others have produced.”
