Pope St. John Paul II summarized his approach to jurisprudence and the juridical science in an address on the occasion of receiving an honorary degree in jurisprudence in connection with the 700th anniversary of La Sapienza University of Rome.

“I gladly accept this recognition,” he stated, “which I consider as conferred upon the Church for her role as teacher in the sensitive context of the law, inasfar as it concerns the basic principles on which orderly human coexistence is based.” He continued:

2. In my years of pastoral service to the Church, I have considered it part of my ministry to give ample space to the affirmation of human rights because of their close connection with two fundamental features of Christian morality: the dignity of the person and peace. Indeed, in creating man in his image and calling him to be his adoptive son, God conferred an incomparable dignity upon him; and God created men to live together in harmony and peace, providing them with an equal distribution of the necessary means in order to live and to develop. Awareness of this has motivated me to do my utmost to serve these values; but I could not carry out the mission required of me by my apostolic office without having recourse to the categories of law.

Although I dedicated myself in the years of my youth to studying philosophy and theology, I have always felt great admiration for the juridical science in its most elevated forms: the Roman law of Ulpian, Gaius and Paul, the Corpus iuris civilis of Justinian, the Decretum of Gratian, the Magna Glossa of Accursius, the De iure belli et pacis of Grotius, not to mention certain peaks reached by juridical science which have brought renown to Europe and particularly to Italy. With regard to the Church, I myself had the opportunity in 1983 to promulgate the new Code of Canon Law for the Latin Church, and in 1990, the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches

3. The principle that has guided me in my commitment is the fact that the human person – as created by God – is the foundation and the goal of social life, which law must serve. In fact, “the centrality of the human person in law is effectively expressed by the classical aphorism: “Hominum causa omne ius constitutum est‘. This means that law is such if and to the extent to which it is based on man in his truth” (Address to Symposium on “Evangelium Vitae” and Law, 24 May 1996, n. 4: ORE, 29 May 1996, p. 3). And the truth about man consists in his being created in the image and likeness of God.

As a “person”, man, according to a profound thought of St Thomas Aquinas, is “id quod est perfectissimum in tota natura” (what is most perfect in all nature) (S. Th., q. 29, a. 3). Setting out from this conviction, the Church has spelled out her doctrine on “human rights”, which do not derive from the State or from any other human authority but from the person. Public authorities must therefore “[ensure that these rights are] recognized, respected, co-ordinated, defended and promoted” (Pacem in Terris, n. 60): In fact these rights are “universal and inviolable, and therefore altogether inalienable” (ibid., n. 9).

This is why Christians “should work ceaselessly and effectively to further the dignity which each person receives from the Creator and to join forces with those others to defend and promote this dignity” (Address to the Plenary Assembly of the Pontifical Commission “Iustitia et Pax” and the Colloquium on “The Church and Human Rights”, 15 November 1988, n. 4; ORE, 19/26 December 1988, p. 15). “The Church, in fact, can never abandon man, whose destiny is closely and indissolubly linked to Christ” (Address to the World Congress on Pastoral Promotion of Human Rights, 4 July 1998, n. 3; ORE, 29 July 1998, p. 3).

These two paragraphs contain several noteworthy items. Here are five:

First, the categories of law are indispensable for carrying out the mission required of the Pope by his apostolic office.

Second, several works are worthy of great admiration for expressing “the juridical science in its most elevated forms.” These range from the Roman jurists Ulpian, Gaius, and Paul to De iure belli et pacis of Grotius.

Third, the Pope is a lawmaker. Pope St. John Paul II promulgated the 1983 Code of Canon Law for the Latin Church and the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches.

Fourth, the guiding principle of Pope St. John Paul II’s commitments in working with the categories of law is “the fact that the human person—as created by God—is the foundation and the goal of social life—which law must serve.”

Fifth, this guiding principle is not a novelty of twentieth-century human rights documents or philosophical personalism, but “is effectively expressed by the classical aphorism “Hominum causa omne ius constitutum est.” Or put another way, perhaps, law is made for man.