The Distributist Thinking of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

As a Distributist myself, I found this article at the Distributist Review about Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's prominent criticism of Socialism and Capitalism to be very apropos and well written.  Indeed, distributist thinking, in which economics is subjected to human life (and not the other way around), has completely changed the way I view contemporary politics over the years.  As my wife recently put it, we are essentially caught in a war between two fatally flawed ideologies, seemingly powerless to overcome either of them.  Yet, there is a way out, and it must begin at home and in your local community.  Here is an intro from the article:

Through books like One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and Gulag Archipelago, [Aleksandr] Solzhenitsyn exposed the cold realities awaiting those willing to stare down the Soviet regime. And he did not fail to deliver. Solzhenitsyn described the human cost of Communism: detentions, murders, lies, and forced labor camps for the innocent and the brave, including the author himself. 

For Europeans and Americans, Solzhenitsyn was a hero. 

But when Solzhenitsyn committed the sin of criticizing the West in front of the 1978 Harvard graduating class, and dismissed Western social and economic policies as false alternatives for the world, those same European and American thinkers once cheering Solzhenitsyn as a champion for freedom consequently berated his scrutiny and ignored Solzhenitsyn’s social, political, and economic analysis, as well as any of his proposed reforms. 

Read the whole article.

Faith, Reason, and Natural Law

Attention Houston area Catholics, Fr. Brian Mullady, O.P., will be visiting us this Thursday at St. Theresa's in Sugar Land, TX, to speak as part of our ongoing Faith and Reason lecture series. I began organizing this lecture series two years ago, and it has been very successful. As you know, Natural Law is a very important, foundational topic pertinent to the question of human reason -- especially relevant today as we debate questions of law, bioethics, marriage, and human life. 

"Faith, Reason, and the Natural Law"
Presented by Fr. Brian Mullady, O.P.

Thursday, January 19th, 7:30pm
St. Theresa Catholic School Library (upstairs)
705 St. Theresa Blvd., Sugar Land, Texas

Fr. Mullady is a well known professor and itinerant preacher of missions and retreats, and he has had several series on EWTN. He received his Doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum) in Rome and was a professor there for six years. He has taught at several colleges and seminaries around the country and is an academician of the Catholic Academy of Science. The lecture is free and is open to the public.

Please spread the word!