When the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace needed an expert economist to assist in articulating the “Note” titled Towards Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of Global Public Authority to feisty journalists at an Oct. 24 Vatican press conference, it called on the University of Rome “Tor Vergata” economics professor, Leonardo Becchetti. For an English translation of the professor’s remarks at the Vatican press conference, go to the end of this post. Prof. Becchetti is...

If you were lucky enough to be at our Houston luncheon last Thurday, you enjoyed Rev. Robert A. Siciro’s very well-received talk on The Moral Adventure of a Free Society, and pany of more than 200 other friends of the Acton Institute. We are grateful to the Honorable George W. Strake, Jr., who served as emcee, and Dr. Robert B. Sloan, Jr., president of Houston Baptist University, who gave the invocation. The table of young men from Western Academy A...

Andreas Widmer, co-founder of the SEVEN Fund and Acton’s research fellow in entrepreneurship, explains the lessons in entrepreneurship he learnt while serving Pope John Paul II as a Swiss Guard in this interview from the Wall Street Journal. He then describes the mission of the Seven Fund. He makes a number of thought-provoking points in the eight minute video: Andreas Widmer is also a voice of the PovertyCure project. ...

Acton’s prolific director of research Samuel Gregg writes at Crisis Magazine about those who would modernize the Catholic Church (theologically): “Dissenting Catholics’ Modernity Problem.” His reflection centers on the thought of Pope Benedict XVI, whose recent visit toGermany brought the modernizers out of the woodwork, and whose speeches and writings have placed the faithful in their proper context. Judging from the hundreds of thousands of Germans who attended and watched Pope Benedict XVI’s September trip to his homeland (not to...

In an editorial in a previous issue of the Journal of Markets & Morality, “Printed Source and Digital Resource in Economics and Theology” (PDF), I examined developments in research methodology, particularly with an eye toward digital research tools. One of the tools I highlighted was a project that I had some involvement with, the Post-Reformation Digital Library (PRDL). The PRDL has launched a new version today at it’s own website, and includes a substantive move from bibliography to database, as...

For too long government-run systems have dominated American primary and secondary education. As innovations of the past two decades such as charter schools and vouchers prove, parents, children, and society benefit when government promotes rather than stifles educational reform based on choice petition. Add to the mounting evidence another success story: St. Martin de Porres school in Philadelphia. This inner city school is finding new life through the cooperation of three not-always-cooperative entities: munity, and government. Read the rest of...

In the Wall Street Journal, Acton Institute President and Co-Founder Rev. Robert A. Sirico looks at the recent “note” on economics released this week by the Vatican. The document, titled “Toward Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of a Global Public Authority,” was published with an eye toward the ing G-20 meeting in Cannes, France, on Nov. 3-4. This 18-page document has, Rev. Sirico observes, “been celebrated by advocates of bigger government the world over.” But...

On The American Spectator, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg looks at the death of Wang Yue, a Chinese toddler run over — twice — in a public market while passersby continued on their way. Gregg: Accidents happen. But what made little Wang Yue’s death a matter for intense public discussion was the fact that nearly 20 people simply walked by and ignored her plight as she lay bleeding in the gutter. What, hundreds of Chinese websites, newspapers and even state...

A couple weeks ago I engaged CPJ senior fellow Gideon Strauss in a debate at the Christian Legal Society, “Justice, Poverty, Politics & the State: Is There a Christian Perspective?” One of the questioners afterward proposed that the large scale of the poverty problem required an institution equally as large, i.e. the government. There are lots of problems with that kind of analysis, not least of which is that the “poor” are not some homogeneous blob of humanity, but individual...

In the wake of the release of the Vatican’s Note on Global Financial Reform, the media has called on Acton ment and analysis. Presented here are three interviews on the topic from the past few days; we’ll post more as audio es available. On Monday afternoon, Acton’s Director of Research Dr. Samuel Gregg joined host Al Kresta on Kresta in the Afternoon to discuss the problems with the note: [audio: The following day, Dr. Gregg joined host Drew Mariani on...