While the University of Notre Dame has decided ply with the HHS mandate requiring employers to cover contraception, abortifacients and abortions in employee health insurance, the University of Dallas continues to fight the mandate. The University of Dallas, a Catholic institution founded in 1910 by the Vincentian Fathers, received a preliminary injunction on January 2, 2014, that would relieve the university of the necessity ply with the mandate. In issuing the injunction, the court exempted the university plying with the...

Reading this profile of UPS’s “Mr. Peak,” Scott Abell, is an enlightening exercise, particularly after the close of this holiday season. Mr. Peak is the guy in charge of making sure that the thing you ordered the Friday before Christmas gets there by Christmas Eve. Or as Devin Leonard puts it, “It’s e so easy for people to shop puters and smartphones that they frequently delay their purchases until the last minute. Mr. Peak’s job, in effect, is to fulfill...

The following is a letter written in response to a post from my friend Brad Littlejohn on the topic of the minimum wage. Dear Brad, Thank you for your thoughtful and substantive engagement on the question of the minimum wage. I don’t think the conversation we had on Twitter earlier did justice to your work here, so I’m offering this response in hopes of furthering the conversation. I hope you find it fruitful. I certainly have. I should also note...

The saga of e inequality” stretches on. The young people of the Occupy Wall Street movement now have a website, and President Obama has proclaimed it the “defining issue of our time.” But what IS it exactly? Does it mean that a teacher, a brain surgeon and a garbage collector should all earn the same wage? Does it mean the wealthy entrepreneur should simply give away her money, rather than investing it or leaving it to her heirs? American Enterprise...

You may have heard that Ayn Rand really disliked C.S. Lewis. But do you know what happened when Saul Bellow met Whittaker Chambers? Bellow’s biographer James Atlas provides the anecdote. The context is that Bellow has very nearly gotten a reporting job at Time magazine via Dana Tasker, an editor there. It a gig that would mean a real windfall for the struggling author: There was just one hurdle–a formality, Tasker assured him. He would have to see Whittaker Chambers,...

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has declared January 5-11, 2014 as National Migration Week, with the theme of “Out of Darkness.” The USCCB states that this “vulnerable” population needs support, protection and prayerful ministry in order to thrive. The USCCB outlines four major groups of immigrants: migrant children, undocumented immigrants, refugees, and victims of human trafficking. Each group has very different needs; the most vulnerable, the bishops say, are migrant children. Dependent on others for food, shelter,...

Over at NRO, Thomas Sowell takes on what he calls the “lie” of “trickle-down economics.” Thus, writes Sowell, “the ‘trickle-down’ lie is 100 percent lie.” Sowell cites Bill de Blasio and Barack Obama as figures perpetuating the “lie,” along with writers in “theNew York Times, in theWashington Post, and by professors at prestigious American universities — and even as far away as India.” But we should also note that “trickle-down theories” get a mention in Evangelii Gaudium, too: “some people...

One of the most popular blog posts at Gentlemen’s Quarterly Magazine (GQ) in 2013 was mentary giving men 10 reasons to stop viewing pornography. On GQ’s website the piece registered 24,000 thousand “like” on Facebook in just a few weeks. The popularity of the post could be a signal that Americans really are interested in discussing moral issues and perhaps GQ should take advantage of this opportunity to include more posts that offer moral direction even if some might ultimately...

What is the key to improving education in America? Stuart Buck says that Barker Bausell’s book, Too Simple to Fail: A Case for Educational Change, provides the answer: His main thesis: that the only thing that improves education is spending more time on instruction at a given child’s level. In his words: All school learning is explained in terms of the amount of relevant instructional time provided to a student. That’s it: more time + suitability for a child’s level....

Christian’s Library Press has released a new translation of Wolfgang mentary on Psalm 15, which includes two related appendices on the topics of oaths and usury. Released at the end of 2013, On Righteousness, Oaths, and es on the 450th anniversary of Musculus’ passing. The book is part of CLP’s growing series, Sources in Early Modern Economics, Ethics, and Law. Musculus (1497–1563)was a second-generation reformer in the cities of Strasbourg, Augsburg, and Bern, and produced a variety of works, including...