Rerum novarum
| Rerum novarum Latin : New Things Encyclical letter of Pope Leo XIII |
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| Date | 15 May 1891 |
| Argument | On Capital and Labour |
| Encyclical number | 37 of 85 of the pontificate |
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Rerum novarum (from its first two words, Latin for "of revolutionary change"), or Rights and Duties of Capital and Labor, is an encyclical issued by Pope Leo XIII on 15 May 1891. It was an open letter, passed to all Catholic Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops and bishops, that addressed the condition of the working classes.
It discussed the relationships and mutual duties between labor and capital, as well as government and its citizens. Of primary concern was the need for some amelioration of "The misery and wretchedness pressing so unjustly on the majority of the working class." It supported the rights of labor to form unions, rejected socialism and unrestricted capitalism, whilst affirming the right to private property.
Rerum Novarum is considered a foundational text of modern Catholic social teaching. Many of the positions in Rerum novarum were supplemented by later encyclicals, in particular Pius XI's Quadragesimo anno (1931), John XXIII's Mater et magistra (1961), and John Paul II's Centesimus annus (1991).
The first draft and content of the encyclical was written by Tommaso Maria Zigliara, professor from 1870 to 1879 at the College of Saint Thomas, the future Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum. Zigliara, a member of seven Roman congregations including the Congregation for Studies, was a co-founder of the Academia Romano di San Tommaso in 1870. Zigliara's fame as a scholar at the forefront of the Thomist revival at the time of his rectorship of the College of St. Thomas after 1873 was widespread in Rome and elsewhere. "Zigliara also helped prepare the great encyclicals Aeterni Patris and Rerum novarum and strongly opposed traditionalism and ontologism in favor of the moderate realism of Aquinas."
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