Quadragesimo anno (Latin for “In the 40th Year”) is an encyclical issued by Pope Pius XI on 15 May 1931, 40 years after Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum novarum, further developing Catholic social teaching.

Rerum novarum’ s social justice marked a shift from noblesse oblige or charity of tradition. It placed the Church with the labouring man and the poor : it endorsed Catholic working class political activism. It stemmed ‘leakage’. It opened doors – at least slightly – to non- Catholic reformers.

What were some of the challenges the Church faced after the 2nd Vatican Council? They faced the challenge of keeping the Church’s teachings of the Sacraments to the Spirit of Jesus. This allowed the Church and their sacrament practice to be an instrument of God’s grace in the world.

Quadragesimo anno reflects an effort by Pius XI to restore Aquinas’s understanding of general justice to a central place in Catholic political reflection.

mother and teacher

Noun. magistra f (genitive magistrae, masculine magister); first declension. a female teacher; mistress.

Second Vatican Council, also called Vatican II, (1962–65), 21st ecumenical council of the Roman Catholic Church, announced by Pope John XXIII on January 25, 1959, as a means of spiritual renewal for the church and as an occasion for Christians separated from Rome to join in a search for Christian unity.

Vatican II also made profound changes in the liturgical practices of the Roman rite. It approved the translation of the liturgy into vernacular languages to permit greater participation in the worship service and to make the sacraments more intelligible to the vast majority of the laity.