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What would 'honest profit' be?
Could a Catholic start a non-profit "pawn shop" where the needy poor take out loans using their valuable goods as collateral. The loan would be no more than 2/3 of the value of the good put up as collateral and would last 1 year. This organization would collect a moderate interest (4-12%) on the loan. Plus, the non-profit organization has to store and secure the good, so perhaps it would not be "purely" interest.The salary for the "overseer" of the non-profit organization would definitely take care of his/her needs. The rest of the net income would pay for the salaries of the workers and to expand this charitable "pawn shop" organization.Is this sort of arrangement, Catholic?
Theologians and canonists of the Middle Ages constructed a rational theory of the loan for consumption, which contains this fundamental statement: The mutuum, or loan of things meant for immediate consumption, does not legalize, as such, any stipulation to pay interest; and interest exacted on such a loan must be returned, as having been unjustly claimed. This was the doctrine of St. Thomas [Aquinas] and Scotus; of Molina, Lessius, and de Lugo.
the 12th canon of the First Council of Carthage (345) and the 36th canon of the Council of Aix (789) have declared it to be reprehensible even for laymen to make money by lending at interest. The canonical laws of the Middle Ages absolutely forbade the practice. This prohibition is contained in the Decree of Gratian, q. 3, C. IV, at the beginning, and c. 4, q. 4, C. IV; and in 1. 5, t. 19 of the Decretals, for example in chapters 2, 5, 7, 9, 10, and 13. These chapters order the profit so obtained to be restored; and Alexander III (c. 4, "Super eo", eodem) declares that he has no power to dispense from the obligation.