John Couretas

is a writer and editor based in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Posts by John Couretas

Economic Justice for All Revisited

Catching up on “Revisiting the 1986 economic pastoral”, an article from October in the National Catholic Reporter: The bishops’ point “that Catholics’ moral life cannot be separated entirely from their economic life has relevance for what we’re going through now,” said Kevin Schmiesing, research fellow for the Acton Institute, a proponent of free markets. Continue Reading...

Soul Searching at Yeshiva U.

In “Betrayed by Madoff, Yeshiva U. Adds a Lesson,” the New York Times interviews students and teachers at the New York University which was closely linked to Bernard Madoff, the financier who has been charged by federal prosecutors with orchestrating a $50 billion Ponzi scheme fraud. Continue Reading...

Avery Cardinal Dulles (1918-2008)

Avery Cardinal Dulles lecturing at the Acton Institute. I knew the reputation of Avery Dulles, SJ, long before I entered that classroom at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., Continue Reading...

Alexy II: The ‘Transitional’ Patriarch

Vladimir Berezansky, Jr., a U.S. lawyer with experience in Russia and former Soviet republics, recalls an interview with Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexy II in 1991. Like many Russians at the time, the Patriarch was coping with a “disorienting change” following the fall of the Soviet Emprie, Berezansky writes. Continue Reading...

Colson Receives Presidential Citizens Medal

It is with a sense of great pride and joy that I join with thousands around the nation in congratulating Chuck Colson on his reception of the Presidential Citizen’s Medal presented to Chuck at the Oval Office today by President Bush. Continue Reading...

The Church and the Terror State

Patriarch Alexy II The Moscow Times reports on the funeral of Russian Patriarch Alexy II: Candles flickered and white-robed elders chanted prayers as the country bade farewell Tuesday to Patriarch Alexy II, who guided the country’s dominant Russian Orthodox Church through its remarkable recovery after decades of Communist-era repression. Continue Reading...

Patriarch Alexy II: An Epoch Passes Away

The casket with the body of Patriarch Alexy II is displayed during a farewell ceremony in Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow, on December 6. Russian Orthodox Christians are holding memorial services and preparing for the Tuesday funeral of Patriarch Alexy II, the man who led the world’s largest Orthodox Church out of the Soviet era and into a period of remarkable rebirth and growth following decades of persecution and genocidal martyrdom at the hands of atheistic communist regimes. Continue Reading...

The Rabbis and the Credit Crunch

In the inaugural lecture of the Center for the Study of Judaism and Economics at the Jerusalem Institute for Market Studies, Nobel Laureate economist Professor Robert (Yisrael) Aumann talked about the link between economics, Judaism and the current economic downturn. Continue Reading...

IBD: Papal Bullishness

Following up on our coverage of Pope Benedict’s economic “prophecy,” here’s a snip from yesterday’s “Papal Bullishness” editorial in Investor’s Business Daily. Read then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s 1985 article “Market Economy and Ethics” here. Continue Reading...