As per Paul Ryan himself, "The Catholic Church offers a rich overview of its thought, summarized in the Compendium of Social Doctrine, to guide Catholics in bringing truth to society’s problems" (Applying Our Enduring Truths to Our Defining Challenge, National Catholic Register, 4/25/12). As per Chapter 1 of the Compendium,
- “Moral existence is a response to the Lord's loving initiative. It is the acknowledgment and homage given to God and a worship of thanksgiving. It is cooperation with the plan God pursues in history'.
“the principles of justice and social solidarity are inspired by the gratuitousness of the salvific event wrought by God, and that they do not have a merely corrective value but must rather become…the normative points of reference....
- "God freely confers being and life on everything that exists. Man and woman, created in his image and likeness (cf. Gen 1:26-27), are for that very reason called to be the visible sign and the effective instrument of divine gratuitousness….
“It is in the free action of God the Creator that we find the very meaning of creation, even if it has been distorted by the experience of sin…. Disobedience to God means hiding from his loving countenance and seeking to control one's life and action in the world. Breaking the relation of communion with God causes a rupture in the internal unity of the human person, in the relations of communion between man and woman and of the harmonious relations between mankind and other creatures….
"In Jesus Christ the decisive event of the history of God with mankind is fulfilled…. The love that inspires Jesus' ministry among men is the love that he has experienced in his intimate union with the Father ....Jesus announces the liberating mercy of God to those whom he meets on his way, beginning with the poor, the marginalized, the sinners. He invites all to follow him because he is the first to obey God's plan of love, and He does so in a most singular way, as God's envoy in the world....Jesus' followers are called to live like him and, after his Passover of death and resurrection, to live also in him and by him, thanks to the super-abundant gift of the Holy Spirit….
"Christian revelation shines a new light on the identity, the vocation and the ultimate destiny of the human person & the human race….Human activity, when it aims at promoting the integral dignity and vocation of the person, the quality of living conditions and the meeting in solidarity of peoples and nations, is in accordance with the plan of God….
“[To man and woman], as the culmination of creation, the Creator has entrusted the task of ordering created nature according to his design (cf. Gen 1:28)….The salvation offered in its fullness to men in Jesus Christ by God the Father's initiative, and brought about and transmitted by the work of the Holy Spirit, is salvation for all people and of the whole person: it is universal and integral salvation....The salvation offered by God to his children requires their free response and acceptance. It is in this that faith consists....
“The universality and integrality of the salvation wrought by Christ makes indissoluble the link between the relationship that the person is called to have with God and the responsibility he has towards his neighbour in the concrete circumstances of history. This is sensed, though not always without some confusion or misunderstanding, in humanity's universal quest for truth and meaning”
The Compendium is composed of twelve chapters and a conclusion:
Part One
Chapter 1, God's Plan of Love for Humanity
Chapter 2, The Church's Mission & Social Doctrine
Chapter 3, The Human Person and Human Rights
Chapter 4, Principles of the Church's Social Doctrine
Part Two
Chapter 5, The Family, the Vital Cell of Society
Chapter 6, Human Work
Chapter 7, Economic Life
Chapter 8, Political Community
Chapter 9, The International Community
Chapter 10, Safeguarding the Environment
Chapter 11, The Promotion of Peace
Part Three
Chapter 12, Social Doctrine & Ecclesial Action
Conclusion, For a Civilization of Love
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