“There can never be a world without work,” says James Bruce in this week’s Acton Commentary. “We are made to work. We flourish when we do, and we suffer when we don’t.”

Now, if we think about work’s purpose or goal, we will realize that work can never end. Philosophically, rational agents have specific conditions for genuine flourishing, one of which is work. The sociological data certainly support the claims that we are made for work, and that we suffer when we don’t. In Jewish and Christian theology, work began in the Garden, not as a result of the Fall. We were made to work.

The full text of the essay can be found here. Subscribe to the free, weekly Acton News & Commentary and other publications here.