The Vatican is currently hosting a three-day inter-faith conference and discussion entitled Humanum. According to their website, it is … a gathering of leaders and scholars from many religions across the globe, to examine and propose anew the beauty of the relationship between the man and the woman, in order to support and reinvigorate marriage and family life for the flourishing of human society. Witnesses will draw from
 the wisdom of their religious tradition and cultural experience as they attest...

There are 35.8 million people living in some form of modern slavery, claims the Global Slavery Index. The Index is a report produced by the Walk Free Foundation, a global human rights organization dedicated to ending modern slavery. This year’s Index estimates the number of people in modern slavery in 167 countries, and includes an analysis of what governments are doing to eradicate the this form of human suffering. According to the Index, of those living in modern slavery 61...

Roberty P. Murphy at the 2014 Acton Lecture SeriesOn this edition of Radio Free Acton, we talk about sound money with economist and author Robert P. Murphy. What is money? Why does it have value? What happens when a government detaches the value of money from gold or modities? We look at these questions, find out what our dollars are really worth, and look at ways to restore the value of our money. You’ll recall that Murphy was a guest...

What just happened in Jerusalem? Two Palestinian men armed with axes, meat cleavers, and a pistol, entered a plex in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of West Jerusalem on Tuesday morning and killed four rabbis, one from the UK and three from United States (all had dual-citizenship in Israel). Israeli police killed the assailants in a gun battle that critically wounded one officer. According to the New York Times, relatives identified the attackers as two cousins, Odai Abed Abu Jamal, 22,...

Christianity sets forththat humans are made in the image of God — that we have particular God-like characteristics when es to creation, passion, relationship, and so on. Such a remarkabletruthtells us something deeply profound about the world we live in, as well ashow we ought to respond inany number of situations. In an excerpted video from the PovertyCure series, John Stonestreet explains how the Christianworldviewtransforms our approachto poverty: From the video: The Christian worldview teaches that as individuals we are...

Close to 2.5 million children experienced homelessness in the U.S. in 2013, according to America’s Youngest Outcasts. The report looks at child homelessness nationally and in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. “Child homelessness has reached epidemic proportions in America,” said Dr. Carmela DeCandia, Director of The National Center on Family Homelessness at American Institutes for Research (AIR), which prepared the report. “Children are homeless tonight in every city, county and state—in every part of our nation.” From...

It has e a regular occurrence at conservative publications to note the strong correlation between traditional marriage and family and higher e levels. Take, for example, Ari Fleischer, who wrote the following in the Wall Street Journal last June: If President Obama wants to reduce e inequality, he should focus less on redistributing e and more on fighting a major cause of modern poverty: the breakdown of the family. He continues, “One of the differences between the haves and the...

For the fourth time in thirty years, well-intentioned but misguided musicians have recorded a new version of “Do They Know It’s Christmas?,” a cheesy Christmas song intended to raise awareness and funds for Africa. But why don’t Africans everyraise awareness and aid for Westerners? Fortunately, one group of Africans has united to save Norwegians from dying of frostbite. By joining Radi-Aid, you too can donate your radiator and spread some warmth in the frozen wasteland of Norway. Why Africa for...

The numbers are discouraging: 1 in 28 American children has at least one parent in prison. Even though crime rates have dropped, our prison population has quadrupled; there are now about 2.4 million adults behind bars. It is costing us $80 billion a year to maintain our prison system. At one point, society thought that prison was about reform. We’ve all but dropped any pretense of reform; we’re just warehousing people. Can we fix this? One organization is trying. Families...

Almost twenty years ago I learned an important lesson in Christian ethics from a Jewish writer. In his book, Think a Second Time, Dennis Prager explains a principle from the Talmud about consumer ethics. While I had read several book about business ethics, I don’t recall ever hearing much, if anything, about the ethical obligations of consumers. Prager helped me see not only how the “shopkeeper’s law” should apply to my consumer choices, but also to many of the relationships...