November 20 was established as Universal Children’s Day in 1954 by the United Nations. The UN has imagined this as a day of building fraternity between children and raising awareness for children’s welfare. If we really care about children’s welfare, we need to stop pretending. We need to stop pretending that it’s not in the best interest of children to have a mom and a dad who are married and live together. We need to stop pretending that children are...

In an interview forChristianity Today, Joseph Gorra, founder and director of Veritas Life Center, talks to Acton’s president and co-founder Rev. Robert Sirico about economic life and human flourishing: At this year’s Acton University conference, you spoke on how love is an indispensable basis for economic life. To some, that might seem odd if economic life is viewed as the maximization of utility and material well-being. We can’t enter the marketplace as something other than what we really are, and...

My mother, a registered nurse, worked for years for our small town doctor. She would drive around the countryside, going to check on elderly folks or those who didn’t drive. We had a number of people who came to our house regularly for things like allergy shots. She kept their vials of medication, rubbing alcohol, cotton balls and syringes in our kitchen cupboard. The doctor (who was the sort to exchange his services for things like eggs and fresh meat)...

What is the connection between private property and conscience rights? “If there is no private property,” says Michael Novak in this week’s Acton Commentary, “there is also no independent leg to stand on in speaking for one’s conscience — and not only one’s individual conscience.” In Poland and elsewhere, munities had inspired and led the nations for hundreds of years. In such places, people were not imprisoned solely in their own individual power, which was little. Sometimes they acted through...

Sometimes the current decisions we make today can affect the options that e available to us in thefuture time. For example, I may spend less money today in order to be able to spend more at a future point in time, such as duringretirement. The name for this economic concept is “intertemporal choice.” What we expect or desire to happen in the future can affect the choices we make now. While this concept may appear obvious, it can have significant...

Taylor Swift recently made waveswhen her record label pulled her entire catalog off Spotify, apopular music streaming service. Fans and critics responded in turn, banging their chests and wailing in solidarity, meming and moaningacross the Twitterverseabout the plight of the Struggling Artist and the imperialism of mean old Master Spotify. Yet as an avid and thoroughly satisfied Spotify user, I couldn’t help but think of the wide variety of artists sprinkled across my playlists, a diverse mix of superstars, one-hit-wonders,...

In the latest edition of his monthly newsletter, Economic Prospect, John Teevan offers three keys to cultivating a flourishing middle class, as excerpted below: e and Jobs: America looks at jobs and es alone and can only explain fading middle class by blaming rich people. We can do better than just focus on money. Isn’t life more than your job and what it will buy? …Marriage and Family. The middle class would swell and poverty would be decimated if all...

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...

By the end of this month, a grand jury is expected to hand down a decision in the case of the shooting of Michael Brown by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri. One ofthe most frequently considered questions related to the case is, “What exactly is a grand jury?” Although seemingly shrouded in mystery, grand juries are an essential part of the protections of our liberties within the legal system of the United States. Here is everything you ever...

What is the best way to help the the global poor? One group attempting to bring innovative thinking to that question is PovertyCure, an initiative of the Acton Institute. PovertyCure brings together an international coalition to encourage entrepreneurial solutions to poverty that are rooted in a Christian understanding of the person, who is created in the image of God. Michael Matheson Miller, the director of PovertyCure, was recently interviewed about the project by the National Catholic Register: What are some...