Last week, Pope Benedict XVI addressed the annual conference of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, and expressed particular concern over rising food prices and the instability of the global food market. In his 2009 encyclical Caritas in Veritate, the pope issued this challenge: “The problem of food insecurity needs to be addressed within a long-term perspective, eliminating the structural causes that give rise to it and promoting the agricultural development of poorer countries.” Acton’s Director of Research Samuel Gregg...

The future of corn ethanol is up in the air, and while the Senate gave signs of repealing both the subsidy and the tariff on imported ethanol, the bill the repeal was attached to failed and Congress is back to square one in the ethanol debate. The uncertain future of corn ethanol has brought forth discussion on the possibility of importing sugar cane based ethanol from Brazil. Before the U.S. begins importing ethanol from Brazil, a broad cost benefit analysis...

Earlier this year I was invited to participate in a seminar sponsored by the Institute for Humane Studies and Students for a Free Economy at Northwood University. In the course of the weekend I was able to establish that while I wasn’t the first theologian to present at an IHS event, I may well have been the first Protestant theologian. In a talk titled, “From Divine Right to Human Rights: The Foundations of Rights in the Modern World,” I attempted...

I wrote a piece on the Church’s response to disaster relief in the Spring issue of Religion & Liberty. The article for R&L is in part an extension of mentary “Out of the Whirlwind: God’s Love and Christian Charity” after a tornado hit Joplin, Mo. in May. Being a Katrina evacuee myself, I returned to the Mississippi Gulf Coast for a time after seminary and the devastation of so many things I was familiar with and had known was simply...

This year’s Acton University was very successful, and we are still seeing its effects through blog posts, tweets, and Facebook messages. Some of our PowerBlog readers may be wondering what they missed out on, or would also like to think back a few weeks to their favorite Acton University moments. To listen to a favorite lecture, or to find out what was missed, remember that Acton University 2011 lectures can be purchased and downloaded for $1.99. Joe Gorra of the...

Religion & Liberty’s spring issue featuring an interview with evangelical scholar Wayne Grudem is now available online. Grudem’s new book is Politics According to the Bible (Zondervan 2010). It’s a great reference and I have already made use of it for a mentaries and PowerBlog posts here at Acton. “I am arguing in the book that it is a spiritually good thing and it is pleasing to God when Christians can influence government for good,” Grudem declared in the interview....

I cannot permit the death of His Imperial and Royal Highness Otto von Habsburg at age 98 on July 4th to pass unnoticed. To look into his face was to gaze into the map of the 20th Century, and to hear him recount his ideas, insights and encounters was worth more than an entire course in European history in most universities. Only slightly acquainted with the man (his father Emperor Karl was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 2004),...

Political news changes quickly, and now reports ing out of Washington DC that Senator Dianne Feinstein, who has been leading the way in killing the ethanol subsidy and tariff, has struck a deal with Senators Amy Klobuchar and John Thune, two stalwarts for protecting ethanol. While the rumored deal does not indicate the repeal of the blending mandate it is a step in the right direction. However, while we wait on Congress and the President for action, the Brazilian ethanol...

Space shuttle Atlantis lifts off the launch pad for the final space shuttle mission. Image credit: NASA TVImagine you’re eight and you’re given a dog. The first thing your parents say is that you need to take care of him: feed him, play with him in the backyard, and train him so that he doesn’t do bad things in the house. You and the new dog quickly e “the dog and his master.” That well-worn phrase can tell us something...

Many politicians have talked of repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”). Mitt Romney has said nullifying the healthcare law would be one of his first actions if he was elected president. However, rather than just repealing the law and going back to the status-quo, with minor changes, the American people should demand true reform. In 2001, Milton Friedman, the famed, Nobel-prize winning economist, published an article titled “How to Cure Health Care.” (Although worthy of serious consideration,...