Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Radio Free Acton: Brent Waters on just capitalism
Radio Free Acton: Brent Waters on just capitalism
May 19, 2025 4:33 AM

On this edition of Radio Free Acton, we talk with Brent Waters, Jerre and Mary Joy Stead professor of Christian social ethics at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary and author of Just Capitalism: A Christian Ethic of Economic Globalization. The market economy is often criticized as being unjust and harmful to the poor, but Waters makes the argument that global capitalism is well-suited to provide the material goods that are a necessary prerequisite for human flourishing, thus offering the most realistic and promising way for Christians to exercise the preferential option for the poor.

You can listen to the podcast via the audio player below, and be sure to subscribe to Radio Free Acton on iTunes.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Does Microlending Solve Poverty?
If you give a man a fish you feed him for a day, but if teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime. But what if a man knows how to fish but can’t afford a fishing pole? Or what if he knows how to sew but can’t afford a sewing machine? Can farm, but lacks a plow? The recognition that some people have skills to make themselves self-sufficient but lack capital to buy the tools they...
3 Modern Economic Lessons from an Ancient Tax on Windows
King William III of England needed money, so in 1696 he decided to implement a new property tax. To make sure the tax was progressive (i.e., affected the rich more than the poor), the parliament devised a seemingly clever idea: they’d use the number of windows as an index for the value of a house. The assumption was that larger homes, presumably owned by the wealthy, would have more windows than the houses of the poor. All a tax assessor...
Christians, Capitalism, and Culture
In a reply to theologian David Bentley Hart, Acton’s Director of Research Samuel Gregg says that instead of engaging in sweeping condemnations of contemporary capitalism, those concerned about the present state of Western culture should focus upon the theological and philosophical errors shaping our time. In an article praising Pope Francis in the December 2015 edition of First Things, the Orthodox theologian David Bentley Hart confesses his bafflement at “the anxiety, disappointment, or hostility he clearly inspires in certain American...
Facebook and the Institutional Forms of Social Good
Over at Think Christian, I take a look at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and derive a lesson from Jesus’ interaction with the rich young man in Mark 10. A basic lesson we can take from the decision to organize the initiative as an LLC rather than a traditional non-profit corporation is that pursuing social good is possible in a wide variety of institutional forms. A for-profit incorporation doesn’t preclude a main, or even primary, purpose aimed at social good. Just...
Aslan’s Song of Stewardship
When wethinkabout “stewardship,” our minds tend to revert to the material and the predictable. We think about money or the allocation of resources. We think about growing crops or creating goods or financial investment andgenerosity. For the Christian, however, stewardship goes much further, weaving closely together the tangible andtranscendent in all areas of life.“Stewardship is far more than the handling of our money,” write Lester DeKoster and Gerard Berghoef. “Stewardship is the handling of life, and time, and destiny.” In...
Uber, New York Traffic, and Spirituality
Riding to LaGuardia at the end of a business trip to New York City this past Saturday, my cab plained of the traffic in Midtown. In a non-malicious way (for a New Yorker), he suggested that the general increase in recent times might be due to the ride-sharing service Uber. Generally speaking, I like Uber. I can only say “generally,” because I haven’t actually tried it yet. It’s a good idea though, as far as I’m concerned (shhh, don’t tell...
6 Quotes: The Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom (Dignitatis Humanae)
Fifty years ago today, on December 7, 1965, Pope Paul VI promulgated the Declaration on Religious Freedom (Dignitatis humanae). This document produced by the Second Vatican Council clarified the Catholic Church’s views on religious liberty, changed the way the Church interacted with states, and helped foster ecumenical relations with other faith traditions. Since the release of Dignitatis humanae, the importance of defending religious freedom has e even more necessary. As Archbiship Charles J. Chaput has said, “In some ways, the...
Italian nativity scene adds holiday sparkle to downtown Grand Rapids
Special window display at the Acton Building For the holiday season this year, the Acton Institute has a very special window display facing Veteran’s Park and Fulton Street in downtown Grand Rapids. The window display, “Wise men still seek Him” features a rare nativity set, Cathedral glass-inspired paint, and more. Acton’s president and co-founder, Rev. Robert Sirico, inspired the work, wanting to create a proper display for his personal precepio (extended nativity scene). It’s said that in 1223, St. Francis...
Rev. Sirico: Fox TV’s unserious ‘Lucifer’ nothing to get upset about
Fox TV is prepping for a Jan. 25 release of a new show titled “Lucifer,” where “bored and unhappy as the Lord of Hell, the original fallen angel, Lucifer Morningstar has abandoned his throne and retired to L.A., where he owns Lux, an upscale nightclub.” Fox adds helpfully, “He’s no angel.” A report by Barbara Hollingsworth on notes that “a number of faith-based and conservative watchdog groups are panning Lucifer.” Among others, she interviewed Rev. Robert A. Sirico, president and...
Abraham Kuyper and the ‘Bearer of Principle’
“What might Abraham Kuyper teach us as Americans prepare to go to the polls next year?” asks David T. Koyzis in this week’s Acton Commentary. “I believe that he can help us to vote more intelligently by clarifying the true nature of representation in a democratic munity.” Kuyper treated representation in Ons Program [Our Program] published in 1879 in the platform of the newly established Anti-Revolutionary Party in the Netherlands. The delegate conception he titled the “imperative mandate,” in which...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved