Catholic economics

Abstract

It takes a bright mind, and a solid education in all that is true and good and specific about men and their economy. But most of all, to develop Catholic economics, it takes a mind which is not hampered by the intellectual, cultural, and affective luggage and symbolism which protect sinful lifestyles. Such a mind could reside in the thick skull of a “noble savage”, but the odds are much better that it sits between the frontal and occipital of a genuine Catholic saint.

Christians for Freedom talks about these saints and their followers, and delights in presenting the reader with the freshness, power, and novelty of what they had to say. Michael Novak's Foreword is baked in a glee, which is also most contagious. The bottom line is the teachings of this book are hundreds of miles above the latest bishops' Pastoral in its conclusions as well as in wisdom displayed.

The highest star in the firmament of our saints and scholars of the economy is St. Thomas Aquinas. He is the powerful (again, truly powerful because unstained) mind who could study the Fathers of the Church on one side and the Greek philosophers on the other, and, in spite of pressures within the Church and the culture of his time, merge the elements of truth obtained from both sources into a harmonious whole.