The Church teaches men and women that God offers them the real possibility of overcoming evil and attaining good. The Lord has redeemed mankind “bought with a price” (1 Cor 6:20). The meaning and basis of the Christian commitment in the world are founded on this certainty, which gives rise to hope despite the sin that deeply marks human history. The divine promise guarantees that the world does not remain closed in upon itself but is open to the Kingdom of God. The Church knows the effects of “the mystery of lawlessness” (2 Thes 2:7), but she also knows that “there exist in the human person sufficient qualities and energies, a fundamental ‘goodness' (cf. Gen 1:31), because he is the image of the Creator, placed under the redemptive influence of Christ, who ‘united himself in some fashion with every man', and because the efficacious action of the Holy Spirit ‘fills the earth' (Wis 1:7)”1214John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 47: AAS 80 (1988), 580..
Christian hope lends great energy to commitment in the social field, because it generates confidence in the possibility of building a better world, even if there will never exist “a paradise of earth”1215John XXIII, Encyclical Letter Mater et Magistra: AAS 53 (1961), 541.. Christians, particularly the laity, are urged to act in such a way that “the power of the Gospel might shine forth in their daily social and family life. They conduct themselves as children of the promise and thus strong in faith and hope they make the most of the present (cf. Eph 5:16; Col 4:5), and with patience await the glory that is to come (cf. Rom 8:25). Let them not, then, hide this hope in the depths of their hearts, but let them express it by a continual conversion and by wrestling ‘against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness' (Eph 6:12)”1216Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, 35: AAS 57 (1965), 40.. The religious motivation behind such a commitment may not be shared by all, but the moral convictions that arise from it represent a point of encounter between Christians and all people of good will.