A weekly membership
The Catholic Citizen
One question from the week’s news, worked through the Church’s social teaching, with every claim cited so you can check it yourself. A new issue every Thursday morning.
Written by Deacon Dan DeLuca, a permanent deacon ordained for the Archdiocese of Omaha in 2023.
Seven days free, then $4.99 a month. Cancel any time.
Why This Exists
Catholic social teaching is the part of the faith most Catholics have never been taught. It is also the part the world asks you about most often, usually at a table where somebody has already decided what the Church thinks and is wrong about it.
It is genuinely difficult for Americans, because we are so polarized into a right-versus-left frame that we read everything through it. Neither side of the American political spectrum represents Catholic social teaching fully. Whichever way you lean, this teaching will challenge something you assume.
The Catholic Citizen takes one principle a week and one story from the news, shows you what the Church actually teaches and where the teaching comes from, gives you the words to say it, and answers the strongest objection honestly. Roughly 1,800 words. Fifteen minutes on a Thursday.
Read the Issues
Issues 1 to 4 are free and need no account. From issue 5 onward, the second half of each issue is for members.
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Measured Against the Family
The Church teaches that a just wage must support a worker’s family. What that demands of Amazon’s new $20 starting wage, and how to test any…
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The Number Came First
The Church teaches that labor has priority over capital. What that means when Omnicom cuts 15,000 jobs to meet a cost-savings promise made to investors.
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The Proof That Belongs to Everyone
A mathematician says an AI company may have trained on his unpublished notes. Catholic teaching on who owns knowledge and who owns the proof.
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The Work That Ships Nothing
The Church ranks the worker above the output. Uber cut 3,300 coordination roles. What Catholic social teaching says about automation and work.
What Arrives Every Thursday
The Principle
One teaching of the Church, stated plainly, quoted from the document it comes from with the paragraph number.
The Case
A real story from the week, and the reason the principle applies to it.
What to Say
The actual words to use when this comes up at work, at dinner, or in the parish hall. Nobody else in Catholic media writes this section.
The Objection
The strongest argument against the Church’s position, stated the way its best advocate would state it, and then answered. If an intelligent opponent would not recognize his own view here, it gets rewritten.
This Week
One thing to do about it. Small enough to actually do.
Footnotes
Every issue is sourced the way a thesis is sourced. Real paragraph numbers, checkable. Where Catholics may licitly disagree, the issue says so and says why.
A Year of Formation, Not a Newsletter
The issues are built as a curriculum. Twelve modules of four issues each, running through the whole of the Church’s social doctrine in a year. Start at any point and the archive is there behind you. See all twelve modules.
- Human Dignity in the Age of the Machine
- Work and the Worker
- The Common Good
- Subsidiarity
- Solidarity
- The Preferential Option for the Poor
- Property and the Universal Destination of Goods
- War and Peace
- Life, From Conception to Natural Death
- Family, Community, Participation
- Integral Ecology
- The Political Vocation of the Laity
At the end of each module, the four issues are collected into a printable study guide with discussion questions, for reading alone, as a couple, or in a parish small group.
Who Writes It
Deacon Dan DeLuca was ordained for the Archdiocese of Omaha in 2023. He is completing a Master’s degree in theology and preparing to begin doctoral studies. He writes and speaks on Catholic social teaching, including a series on Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical Magnifica Humanitas for Spirit Catholic Radio.
Every issue is written under his name, and every claim in it can be checked against the document it came from. That is the whole promise.
Questions People Ask
Is This Political?
No. The Catholic Citizen never endorses or opposes a candidate, a party, or a named piece of pending legislation, and it never describes a Church teaching as conservative or liberal. Where the Church has a mind, it names the document. Where Catholics may licitly disagree, it says so.
Do I Need a Theology Background?
No. It assumes you are intelligent, faithful, and busy. Everything is explained from the ground up, and the sources are there if you want to go further.
What Happens When the Trial Ends?
The trial takes a card and bills $4.99 on day seven unless you cancel. You get an email the day before it ends, so nothing lands on your statement as a surprise. Cancel any time from your account page.
Does This Include The Objection?
No. The Objection is a separate subscription at $9.99 a month, answering one hard question about the Catholic faith every Tuesday. The two do not overlap. All Access covers both.
I Also Preach. Is There a Bundle?
Yes. All Access is $17.99 a month and includes The Catholic Citizen, the weekly Sunday homily preparation guides, and The Objection, against $24.97 bought separately. Compare the memberships.
Start Your Free Week
Seven days free. $4.99 a month after that. Cancel any time.
Not ready to decide? Read the free plain-English guide to Magnifica Humanitas first. It is the document the first module works through, and it will tell you quickly whether this is written for you.