Tradistae is a Catholic Worker organization committed to proclaiming and living the Gospel of Jesus Christ through the works of mercy, intentional community, liturgical tradition, and the struggle for social justice. Tradistae is based out of Lancaster, PA, but has a number of friends and members, primarily throughout the United States.

We believe in Catholic Social Teaching, as taught by the Social Encyclicals of the Popes. This can be described in many ways, such as:

• the Gospel applied to governments, economies, cultures, and families
• the Politics of Virtue Ethics and the Common Good
• Distributism, including its agrarian and ecological origins (a.k.a. a Small Farm Future)
• Thomistic Liberation Theology
• the “New Traditionalism,” a paradox beyond the Left/Right dichotomy
• the Politics of the Real, Postliberal Thought, and Radical Orthodoxy—as articulated by our friends at New Polity

Our website exists to host resources on Catholic Social Teaching. Some of these are teaching tools, such as our easy essays and the Tradistae Podcast. We have other resources to inspire you in prayer and praxis, especially the spiritual and corporal works of mercy and the practice of intentional Christian community. We welcome all people of good will to join us in creating a better world through prayer, penance, and solidarity. 

To keep up to date with Tradistae, join our mailing list or follow us on Twitter and Facebook. To support the work of Tradistae, you can become a patron on patreon or volunteer with our worker-scholar missions. Please feel free to contact us.

The following list contains links to all the Easy Essays on Tradistae. Each one is under 500 words to provide straightforward answers to simple questions. This list will be updated whenever new Easy Essays are published.

Several Easy Essays are now available in PDF form to create printable one-page pamphlets. Spread the word in your parish and community!

• Re-Introducing Easy Essays

Definitions

• What is the Purpose of Law? (Pamphlet)
• Positive Freedom versus Negative Freedom
• What is The Good?
• What is Liberalism?
• What is Distributism?
• Integralism: the Politics of Virtue and the Common Good
• The Common Good Is Good for All of Us
• The Definition of Capitalism (Pamphlet)
• The Papal Condemnation of Capitalism (Pamphlet)
• The Myth of Modern Progress
• The Myth of Liberal Neutrality

Pro-Life

• From Margaret Sanger to Bill and Melinda Gates, Abortion is Racist Eugenics (Pamphlet)
• For Capitalists, Pregnancy is a Disease, Abortion is the Cure (Pamphlet)
• Sex Sells: Abortion, Capitalism, and the Sexual Revolution (Pamphlet)
• The Billionaires are Pro-Choice. You Shouldn’t Be. (Pamphlet)

Anti-Racism

• The Modern Origins of Race Theory
• How the Law Taught Racism in the United States
• Racism is a Tool to Divide the Working-Class
• The Black Napoleon of Integralism
• The Melting Pot of Whiteness

Society Before Capitalism

• Society Before Capitalism: The Premodern World
• Society Before Capitalism: The Subsidiary State
• The Working-Class in Christendom (Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913) (Pamphlet)
• Private Property in Classical Liberalism vs. Christian Tradition

Easy Encyclicals 

• Gaudium et Spes: Human Progress Must Honor and Glorify God
• Gaudium et Spes: Science Must Be Purified By Faith
• Gaudium et Spes: By the Grace of God, We Can Build a Better World
• Laudato Si’ on Integral Ecology and the Common Good
• Laudato Si’ on Global Inequality and the Technocratic Paradigm
• Laudato Si’ on Biblical Wisdom and Ecological Spirituality
• Pope Leo XIII’s Condemnation of Americanism
• The Papal Condemnation of Capitalism (Pamphlet)

Economics 

• Thomistic Economics: C—M—C versus M—C—M
• The Economics of Saint Thomas Aquinas
• Use-Value Versus Exchange-Value

Intentional Community 

• What is Intentional Community?
• Community in the Premodern Village
• “A New Set of Social Forms”: Alasdair MacIntyre on the “Benedict Option”

Other

“Priesthood and Revolution: Where Christianity and Marxism Part Ways” (Booklet)
by Fr. Herbert McCabe, O.P.

The Tradistae Reading Lists

If you would like to contribute writing, art, or translations to our Easy Essays, please contact us. Keep up to date with Tradistae on Twitter, Facebook, or our Mailing List. Please consider supporting Tradistae on Patreon; every dollar we receive allows our volunteer staff to spend more time promoting the politics of virtue and the common good.