Christian Social Thought

January 04, 2013

Human Population and Material Prosperity

Following up a bit on last week’s discussions of population and prosperity, I thought this section (44) from Caritas in Veritate to be a good summary statement of the various dynamics at play: Morally responsible openness to life represents a rich social and economic resource. Continue Reading...

January 02, 2013

Unemployment and Despair in the UK

The BBC News reports that 1 out of 10 young people between the ages of 16 and 25 are struggling to cope with life. The main culprit: despair related to unemployment. Continue Reading...

December 31, 2012

The New Colonialism: Renting Wombs

It was once said that the sun never set on the British Empire. The Brits colonized vast areas of the earth, civilizing exotic places with the likes of afternoon tea and cricket. Continue Reading...

December 28, 2012

The ‘Ghost of Fiscal Future’

Matt Mitchell at Neighborhood Effects offers an interesting perspective regarding the fiscal cliff. As we hurriedly approach the edge, Mitchell’s insights ought not to be ignored, whatever the outcome of today’s last minute meeting at the White House. Continue Reading...

December 26, 2012

Life-Long Learners or Good Test-Takers? An Orthodox Christian Critique

The video below of a second grade teacher in Providence, RI reading his letter of resignation has recently gone semi-viral with over 200,000 views on YouTube. What I would like to offer here is an Orthodox Christian critique of the anthropological assumptions that separate this teacher from the “edu-crats,” as he terms them, who in his district so strongly championed standardized testing-oriented education at the exclusion of all other methods and aims. Continue Reading...

December 20, 2012

How Should Christians View Property?

Étienne Cabet, a French philosopher and founder of a utopian socialist movement, once said: “Communism is Christianity.” The concept of property has existed longer than Western Civilization; trying to understand what property is and who can claim it has been an important issue for centuries. Continue Reading...

December 19, 2012

Social Engineering Makes For Poor Economic Policy

Writing over at The Atlantic, American Enterprise Institute scholar Christina Hoff Sommers shares the unsettling story of what a growing number of Swedish activist groups and political factions are attempting to do to “traditional” gender roles. Continue Reading...

December 18, 2012

Economics is Too Important to be Left to Economists

I rather like Serene Jones’ piece in Huffington Post, “Economists and Innkeepers.” Jones got some things right. She knows that Christian Scripture teaches many economic lessons, like subsidiarity and stewardship (although she doesn’t use those terms.) Continue Reading...

December 18, 2012

On the Importance of Definitions

I recently asked the question at Ethika Politika, “Which Capitalism?” (also the title of my article), and I followed it up with a related question here regarding the relationship between distributism and capitalism (is the former a form of the latter?). Continue Reading...

December 17, 2012

Wealth and Political Rhetoric in Ancient Christian Perspective

Last Thursday, NPR ran an interesting piece by Alan Greenblat that featured the perspective of several of the nation’s rich (read: annual household income over $250,000) in relation to President Obama’s determination that the Bush era tax increases end for the nation’s rich as part of any deal related to the looming “fiscal cliff.” Continue Reading...

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