[Part 1 is here.] The free economy frees entrepreneurs to create new wealth for themselves and others, which brings us to the issue of consumption. In his book Crunchy Cons, conservative author Rod Dreher describes consumerism this way: “Consumerism fetishizes individual choice, and sees its expansion as unambiguous progress. A culture guided by consumerist values is one that es technology without question and prizes efficiency…. A consumerist society encourages its members both to find and express their personal identity through...

Those with disabilities face unique challenges in the workplace and with regards to vocation.As I recently wrote regarding the story of Jamie Bérubé, a young man with Down syndrome, we oughtto be more attuned to these challenges and respond accordingly, rejecting limited notions of “value” and instead viewing all human persons as creators and contributors. I was therefore heartened to read the story of Randy Lewis, a senior vice president at Walgreens, whose son, Austin, faced similar obstacles as someone...

If you thought the Obama Administration had taken its final swipe at religious liberty with the HHS mandate, think again. At Catholic Vote, John Shimek tells us that there is a new attack on American’s religious liberty, and it won’t affect just Catholics. According to Shimek, the social media website Buzzfeed announced that the White House is drafting an executive order that will bar federal contractors from discriminating against anyone based on gender identity and/or sexual orientation. President Obama is...

[Part 1 is here.] mon reading of Western history holds that the principles of the free economy grew out of the secular Enlightenment and had little to do with Christianity. This is mistaken. The free economy (and we can speak more broadly here of the free society) didn’t spring from the soil of the secular Enlightenment, much less, as some imagine, from a Darwinian, survival-of-the-fittest, dog-eat-dog philosophy of life. The free economy sprang from the soil of Christian Medieval Europe...

Writing for Canada’s National Post, Acton University lecturer Fr. Raymond de Souza calls our attention to the 25th anniversary this year of the defeat munism and observes that “there are new questions about the unity of liberties.” In the 1980s, he writes, “when in the Gdansk shipyard the workers began to rattle the cage munism, they demanded economic liberties (free trade unions), personal liberties (speech, the press), political liberties (democracy), legal liberties (against the police state) and religious liberty (the...

Every year the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases the American Time Use Survey (ATUS), which measures the amount of time people spend doing various activities, such as paid work, childcare, volunteering, and socializing. Here are seven figures you should know from the latest report: 1. On the days they worked, employed men worked 53 minutes more than employed women. This difference partly reflects women’s greater likelihood of working part time. However, even among full-time workers, men worked longer than women–8.3...

This is the week for the annual Acton University, a unique educational experience focused on the intersection of liberty and morality. Here are five facts you should know about Acton U. 1. Acton University is a four day annual conference on liberty, faith and free-market economics held in Grand Rapids, Michigan. 2. Each even includes nine sessions in which attendees can create a customized learning path from 100+ courses taught by 55+ international, world class experts. 3. The conference is...

: a language teacher and a surrogate. She’s rented out her womb several times, as a way to help mainly gay couples have children. She says being pregnant is rather easy for her, but even she has some issues with the process. [Jessica] had a less positive experience with a third set of New Yorkers seeking her services. She signed a nondisclosure agreement, which prevents her from naming the couple, and will only say they are “well-known,” “mega rich” and...

What would it take to make a society fully just rather than merely settling for moving society toward justice? In this week’s Acton Commentary, John Addison Teevan considers that question and how we can respond to social justice demands in biblical terms. Seeking the peace and harmony (Shalom) of God as the highest good for man, Keller indicates that doing justice means “to live in a way that generates a munity where human beings can flourish … The only way...

While in college, did you ever join the Catholic Student Association, Campus Crusade for Christ, or some other student religious organization? If so, you might want to leave that off your resume. A new study in the sociology journal Social Currents found that applicants who expressed a religious identity were 26 percent less likely to receive a response from employers. For the experiment, the researchers sent out resumes panies in the South from fictional recent graduates of flagship universities located...