Several years ago the Philadelphia Inquirer published an editorial outlining the absence of moral direction in the public forum as a consequence of the current understanding of the separation of church and state. The author argued that it is as though the embrace of any moral standards implies the adoption of certain religious tenets or the dogma of a particular church. The Founding Fathers were, of course, decidedly religious men; and it was precisely their desire to protect the...

The book jacket on Capitalism and Christians, the newest dispatch by Arthur Jones, assures us that this editor-at-large of the National Catholic Reporter is “an economist by training.” That fact makes the pervasive and remarkable confusions in this book all the more depressing. Jones seeks to define the relationship between capitalism and Christianity but begins with an unfair description of capitalism. It is a system, he says, in which finding “new ways of making a buck” quickly “conditions the...

The authors of Eco-Sanity have addressed a formidable challenge in bringing empirical analysis to the religious subject of environmentalism. By looking at a wide array of issues, they give readers a solid sense of the diversity of environmental problems as well as the recurrent similarities. They have done mendable job, and I admire their efforts. However, I encourage the authors and sympathetic readers to defer optimism about the impact of this book's important perspective. We should carefully separate our...

Marquardt begins by examining several areas of Wesley’s social praxis. They include slavery, economics and ethics, his work on aid to the poor, prison reform, and education. One of Wesley’s greatest strengths was his ability to organize. The Methodist Societies were established to provide forums in which the members could help one another in living the Christian life, and in which they could more effectively engage in social action. It is important to note that the organizations developed by...

The book is actually pilation of papers that were delivered at a conference held in November, 1990, at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. Following a preface by editor Michael Cromartie, the book consists of four chapters. Each chapter contains a paper that was presented at the conference, followed by a formal response from another conference participant, which in turn is followed by more ments from other participants. The book concludes with an afterward by George...

The essence of what Jennings has extracted from Wesley is that the Christian ethic revolves entirely around providing for the poor. Moreover, the “rich” who do this are not just people living in great plenty but also those who have attained only sufficient shelter, food, and clothing to sustain life at a reasonable level fort–in other words, anyone in the lower middle class. Even reaching this modest level of prosperity, one runs the risk of falling into spiritual pride;...

This dynamic is and always has been present in jury trials, and every trial lawyer knows it. Jury trials are ultimately a contest between truth and rhetoric, in which rhetoric often has the advantage. The validity of any jury trial system depends, then, on its ability to develop and implement evidentiary rules that neutralize this advantage, i.e., that gives truth an even chance against flimflam. In his book Galileo’s Revenge, Peter W. Huber presents us pelling evidence that the...

Some of Goodman’s and Musgrave’s premises seemed to be self-evident, although they are not usually included in the discussion of health care. For example, they reminded us that, in a market system, the pursuit of self-interest is usually consistent with social goals. With that statement considered, some of their other conclusions e a lot clearer: We cannot solve America’s health care crisis if 250 million Americans find it in their self-interest to act in ways that make the crisis...