As we face the challenge of Covid-19, our obligations to the citizens of our own country must not negate our duties to global humanity. Active support for the poor and the displaced will be essential in longer-term efforts for a more just, more inclusive and healthier post-crisis world.

At an April 29 forum at Santa Clara University, business leaders urged prudence with the desire to resume business activity while the pandemic is ongoing.

On the fiftieth anniversary of the enactment of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, a livestreamed Mass sponsored by the Catholic Labor Network was offered in memory of all workers who died doing their jobs.

“This may be the time,” he said, “to consider a universal basic wage.” This points to what is usually known as universal basic income—a regular, substantial cash payment to people just for being alive.

Maureen Day is an assistant professor of religion and society at the Franciscan School of Theology and the author of Catholic Activism Today: Personal Transformation and the Struggle for Social Justice.

Catholic social teaching offers us principles for reflection, criteria for judgment, guidelines for action which can guide our individual, institutional and national choices.