Author: David Cloutier

I think, in my 13 years of primary and secondary education, I never once even imagined being threatened by a school shooter. It wasn’t that Chicago was some kind of nonviolent place during my childhood years of the 1980’s (quite the opposite), or even that my schools (or at least my K-8 school) were particularly sheltered. It just wasn’t something you imagined happening. Indeed, there WERE images of real violence in schools at the time – but these were associated with inner-city Chicago schools, and everyone acknowledged the same thing: what was happening there was not normal. A common...

Economic inequality is a stubborn problem. In a recent interview, economist Angus Deaton offers some very insightful comments about the complexity of the problem. Deaton, who is pro-globalization, but whose work with Anne Case documented the rising mortality rates among working-class middle-aged people, presents a model for the kind of engagement we really need in order to address economic problems in their complexity. As the blog of the Stigler Center at the University of Chicago writes: …[Deaton] suggested in a recent piece for Project Syndicate, it’s possible that the term “inequality” itself might be ill-fitting. A better term might be...

The following is a guest post from Dr. Joshua Hochschild, Msgr. Robert Kline Professor of philosophy at Mount St. Mary’s University. Germain Grisez, philosopher and theologian, died yesterday.  I expect tributes to pour in, as his influence on Catholic intellectual life has been strong for six decades.  His students and collaborators, and even many of his critics, will have things to say about his momentous contributions.  I want to add something from the perspective of the place he called home for thirty years. For many people, the first thing they knew about Mount St. Mary’s is that Germain Grisez...

The following is a guest post about our friend and charter blogger, Beth Haile, written by Dr. Brian Matz, currently the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet Chair in Catholic Thought at Fontbonne University. Brian was Beth Haile’s colleague when they both taught at Carroll College in Helena, Montana. If you are interested in helping support the medical expenses of the Haile family, please consider donating at the GoFundMe page set up on their behalf. The world of Catholic moral theology is losing a good friend. Dr. Beth Haile, a founding member and longtime contributor to this blog, has...