Latest Posts

August 30, 2019

In praise of ‘garbagemen’

When I was twelve my family lived on a small, dry piece of land in rural Texas. Since we lived far outside of any city limits, we couldn’t rely on services like water (we had a well), sewage (we had a septic tank), or sanitation (we had a 12-year-old boy and a 50-gallon burn barrel). Continue Reading...
August 29, 2019

Three fallacies behind population control

One of the constant refrains in economic development—and now environment issues—is the topic of population control.   Evidence notwithstanding, the claim that population causes poverty and that the planet is facing a population explosion is taught as settled science—even in the face of serious population decline in some countries. Continue Reading...
August 29, 2019

Boris Johnson’s ‘win-win’ expressway to Brexit

Boris Johnson‘s decision to prorogue Parliament has opened up two paths for the UK to make a clean break from the European Union. This holds the potential to undermine globalism and the welfare state while diffusing prosperity to the developing world, according to a new essay by Rev. Continue Reading...
August 29, 2019

Latin America falls behind—again

Economic globalization has brought many economic benefits to the planet, but it’s also true that the benefits have been uneven. One continent which has lagged behind much of the rest of the world is Latin America. Continue Reading...
August 29, 2019

Virtue and the Lake Wobegon effect

During the mid-1990s I spent a tour of duty as a Marine recruiter in southwestern Washington State. One of my primary tasks was to give talks at local high schools, but because many of the guidance counselors were not exactly pro-military, I was expected to give generic “motivational” speeches. Continue Reading...
August 28, 2019

Ignoring the invisible

I have been thinking a lot about all of the invisible things around us, important foundational things that we take for granted.  Because they don’t immediately manifest themselves to our attention we can forget about them if we are not careful. Continue Reading...
August 28, 2019

Abba Moses on the Christian vocation

Today in the Orthodox Church we commemorate St. Moses the Ethiopian, also simply known as St. Moses the Black. His life and teachings have enriched the Christian spiritual tradition for more than 1,600 years, and he has something to teach us about the concept of vocation. Continue Reading...