Most gracious God, by whose knowledge the depths are broken up and the clouds drop down the dew: We yield thee hearty thanks and praise for the return of seed time and harvest, for the increase of the ground and the gathering in of its fruits, and for all other blessings of thy merciful providence bestowed upon this nation and people. And, we beseech thee, give us a just sense of these great mercies, such as may appear in our lives by a humble, holy, and obedient walking before thee all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with thee and the Holy Ghost be all glory and honor, world without end. Amen.

Read more on A Thanksgiving for the Harvest…

Last week, the Acton Institute Programs Department launched registration for an exciting project called AU Online.  If you haven’t already visited the website, I encourage you to do so!

AU Online is an internet-based educational resource for exploring the intellectual foundations of freedom and virtue.  It is designed to offer the Acton community another way to experience the first class content and interaction of an Acton sponsored event while at home, at the office, or at school.

Read more on Check out AU Online!…

Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported Author: Dustin

In this week’s Acton Commentary, “Blue Laws and Black Friday,” I argue that the increasing encroachment of commercial activity into holidays like Thanksgiving are best seen as questions of morality and the limits of the economic sphere of existence. The remedy for such issues is best sought at the level of relationship (between consumer and retailer, for instance, as well as employer and employee) rather than at the level of legal remedy, as in the case of blue laws.

Read more on On Blue Laws and Black Friday…

We are excited about our friend, Byron Borger at Hearts & Minds Books, carrying Wisdom & Wonder, “the long-awaited, freshly-translated, newly-produced, collection of newspaper pieces that Dr. Kuyper wrote so many years ago.” This book is a part of the larger “common grace” work that we are in the process of translating. We hope to have Volume 1 available by Fall 2012. Click here for more information on the Kuyper Translation Project.

Read more on Wisdom & Wonder At Hearts & Minds Books…

In a recent BBC article, Sean Coughlan reports a novel idea from Oxford academic Will Crouch,

He argues that someone becoming an investment banker could create sufficient wealth to make philanthropic donations that could make a bigger difference than someone choosing to work in a “moral” career such as an aid charity.

Indeed, there seems to be an ever increasing suspicion, even among Christians, that certain career paths are per se more moral than others. However, as Fr. Robert Sirico writes in The Entrepreneurial Vocation,

Read more on Occupy Business Careers?…

Over at the Economix blog, University of Chicago economist Casey B. Mullin takes another look at some of the recent poverty numbers. He notes the traditional interpretation, that “the safety net did a great job: For every seven people who would have fallen into poverty, the social safety net caught six.”

Read more on Safety Nets and Incentives…

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is congratulated in late September after the German parliament ratified key reforms of the eurozone's bailout fund

At National Review Online, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg observes that “much of Europe’s political class seems willing to go to almost any lengths to save the euro — including, it seems, beyond the bounds permitted by EU treaty law and national constitutions.” Excerpt:

Read more on Samuel Gregg: Eurocracy Run Amuck…

It seems that the supercommittee (the US Congress Joint Select Committee on Defict Reduction) has failed to agree on $1.5 trillion in cuts over the next decade. In lieu of this “failure,” automatic cuts of $1.2 trillion will kick in. These cuts will be across the board, and will not result from the committee’s picking of winners and losers in the federal budget.

Read more on A Failure to Govern?…

You have the fruit already in the seed. — Tertullian

Image-maker Alexander Tsiaras shares a powerful medical visualization, showing human development from conception to birth and beyond. (Some graphic illustrations.) From TEDTalks (TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design).

Read more on Science Meets Divinity…

Protesters outside parliament on May 5 in Athens, Greece.

On the blog of The American Spectator, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg looks at how Europe refuses to address the root causes of its unending crisis:

Read more on Samuel Gregg: Europe Can’t Face Economic Reality…