Catholic Lobby Endorses President Biden’s Build Back Better Plan

For Immediate Release: September 16, 2021
Contact: Colleen Ross | cross@networklobby.org | 202-601-7877
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Catholic Lobby Endorses President Biden’s Build Back Better Plan
Mary J. Novak: “President Biden’s plan to grow the economy ‘from the bottom up,’ is the embodiment of both Catholic Social Justice and good economic policy.”

WASHINGTON – As House debates the details of the FY2022 federal budget, Mary J. Novak, Executive Director of NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice issued the following statement:

“President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better plan will transform our economy and advance the common good. NETWORK is proud to endorse this plan and call for its swift passage in Congress.

“President Biden’s plan to grow the economy ‘from the bottom up,’ is the embodiment of both Catholic Social Justice and good economic policy. For too long, our economic systems have worked to exclude people—particularly Black, Brown, and Native American people— and benefit those already at the top. President Biden’s Build Back Better plan is a starting point to address the damaging effects of decades of systemic racism with investments in housing, health care, education, and more.

“Our social and economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic must center workers and families pushed to the economic margins. Now is the time to close the racial wealth gap and ensure all of us, Black, white, and Brown, can thrive here in the United States.

“Policymakers who refuse to reform unjust systems are thereby choosing tax-dodging corporations and the richest 1% over investments in jobs, healthcare, and education. These elected officials’ inaction  values profit over peoples’ lives. Pope Francis has been vocal about the evils of trickle-down economics, saying: “We have to say ‘thou shalt not’ to an economy of exclusion and inequality…where the powerful feed upon the powerless.” Refusing to acknowledge the ‘imago Dei’(Image of God) in every person and instead putting profit over peoples’ lives, will lead our country to moral and financial bankruptcy and further divide us.

“We must choose a different course. NETWORK calls on Congress to reform the tax code to require tax-dodging corporations and the ultra-rich to pay their fair share, raise adequate funding for critical human needs programs, and reduce economic inequality. By passing the Build Back Better plan into law, our tax policy will begin to reverse the persistent evil of the racial wealth gap and extreme economic inequality. Writing and passing such a budget, as Congress is seeking to do right now, is an example of the ‘better kind of politics’ with ‘human dignity at the center,’ described by Pope Francis in his encyclical Fratelli Tutti.”

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NETWORK – advocates for justice inspired by Catholic sisters – educates, organizes, and lobbies for economic and social transformation. They have a 45-year track record of lobbying for critical federal programs that support those at the margins and prioritize the common good. www.networklobby.org