Doing Business Differently: A Free Market Fable -

Written by John Horvat II
A review of Nothing is Free: The Price Only Business Leaders Can Pay to Protect Free Markets by Dave Geenens (Atchison, Kans.: Inhance Press, 2013).

* * *

Modern economics tends to reduce what happens in business to numbers and formulas. The human element is taken out, and all is left dry and lifeless. It is not without reason that economics is often called the “dismal science.”

That is why it is refreshing to read an economic book that injects the human side of things into business. Dr. Dave Geenens has done this masterfully with his book, Nothing is Free: The Price Only Business Leaders Can Pay to Protect Free Markets.

The principles he espouses are not just presented in textbook fashion. Rather, they are interwoven into a fictional story of an entrepreneur that finds herself in a dilemma over whether to put profits over principle, earnings over workers. Set in the small college town of Atchison, Kansas, where Dr. Geenens actually lives and teaches, the other protagonist in the story is a Benedictine monk from the nearby abbey. The narrative of this “free market fable” centers on the dialogue between the two main characters about work ethics and the unlikely topic of the role of God in business.

While the characters and plot of this short work are captivating, the ideas presented are much more important. Dr. Geenens makes the right connections and inserts Church teaching into the marketplace.

Thus, he concludes that money is not the bottom line in real business, but rather the human relationships that make business possible. Wealth generation is important but it only comes from proper values creation. Business may resent government intervention, but such intrusions can only be avoided by the practice of the cardinal virtues. Real business leaders are not those who increase earnings by any means, but rather those that build talent and encourage cooperation inside the enterprise.

The lessons in his narrative highlight the wrong course found in so many modern economic models. In their zeal for maximum efficiency and production, many businessmen have cut themselves off from the natural restraining influence of human institutions, especially those of morals, family, community or religion. They have severed their link with Christian tradition, and have lost the anchors of the cardinal virtues that should be the foundation for any true economy.

The result is a society where money rules. People attach undue importance to quantity over quality, utility over beauty, and matter over spirit. Free of traditional restraints, those under this rule favor the frenetic intemperance of frantic dealings, speculation, and exaggerated risks which have sent the nation’s economy into crisis and ruin.

Something needs to be done to introduce attractive new models that run contrary to many of the business practices that now prevail. The terms of the debate need to be changed. Indeed, ever since economic thought broke free from its original moorings in moral philosophy and ethics, there have been those who have sought to keep considerations like those of Prof. Geenens out of this debate. The time has come for such reflections to return. Nothing is Free is a good start.

To buy the book, click here.


Doing Business Differently: A Free Market Fable -

Four Reasons Why Private Property Is Needed -

Four Reasons Why Private Property Is Needed -

A Rosary Story to Warm Your Heart

 It happened on a freezing night in Ohio.  See, the family only had enough coal to last them until dawn.   

 

     Little Mary, huddled with her parents and eight siblings, wondered if the coal truck would come in the morning.  But there was no guarantee. 

 

     So the family decided to say a Rosary and ask for heavenly help.  

 

     As they finished, they heard the rumble of the coal truck outside and Mary’s Dad ran out to help unload.  When he came back in, he commented to his wife and said, “funny, I never saw that delivery man before.”  

 

     But the family was now safe and warm.  So nobody really stopped to think about the delivery man.

 

     But things changed the next morning when another coal delivery truck arrived. 

 

     This time it was Mary’s Mom who went out to tell the driver that they had a delivery the night before.  

 

     The driver, her cousin, chuckled, and said, “I’m the only coal man in the area…If you got a load last night, St. Joseph must have brought it!” 

 

     Mary’s family never did discover who the delivery man was, nor did they ever get a bill.  But they did learn one thing:

 

     The Rosary is powerful!   And today more than ever. 

Protest Satanic Coloring Books in Public Schools

Listen to this shocking news:

 

The school board in Orange County, Florida 

Has approved a Satanist’s Coloring Book

For children!.

     

Instead of opposing the Satanists, the Public School Board Of Education CAVED in to the Satanists and, without a legal battle, has:

• Given permission for the Satanic Temple to distribute literature to their school children
• And this includes a children’s Satanist “coloring book.” 

Click here and send your instant E-PROTEST message NOW

 

We must not turn away and surrender our school children to the Satanists.  Just listen to this:

 

Page 1 of the coloring book has two almost identical pictures of a teacher and children in a classroom. A Satanist little girl is called Annabel. The caption reads: 

 

“Annabel is spreading knowledge and helping to dispel fear and ignorance by demonstrating her Satanic ritual for her class…”

 

Page 3 of the coloring book shows a picture of a cozy study with fireplace and book shelves. Annabel is sitting in a chair with a smile on her face reading a book with a pentagram on its cover.

 

 A large family picture hanging over the fireplace shows her Satanist mother with two large horns protruding from her head, and the bald-headed father Satanist sitting in an equally horned chair with an Anton LaVey Satanic ‘goat’tee, and Annabel is  holding what seems to be a chalice or wine glass.

 

 The caption reads: “Color Annabel’s study filled with Satanic literature and philosophy.”

 

Page 8 of the coloring book has a “secret code” for the children to de-code, with the caption:

 

“Annabel sent Damian a note in class, but it’s SECRET! Help Damian break the secret code to find out what Annabel wants to say to him.” 

 

The answer is even more shocking: Audi Preces Meas: [Hear my prayer:] Satana Blessed Be.
 

Click here and send your instant E-PROTEST message NOW

 

But here is even more that the Satanists say. (With the permission of the Orange County School Board!)

 

Page 5 of the coloring book says:

 

“Whopper is big and sometimes scary because he has trouble saying what’s on his mind. Help Damian and Annabel use their patience and open-mindedness to decipher what he wants to say.”

 

And on and on and on.  Is this educating the children, or introducing them to the Satanists?  Exposing them to paganism? 

 

Will you send the following protest, and express your indignation that a Satanist coloring book has been approved by the Orange County schools:    

 

To: William Sublette; Chairman, OCPS Board

Kathleen Gordon; Vice-Chair, OCPS Board

 

Your Petition Message will state:

It is with incredible dismay and disappointment that I have read press reports announcing that your school board is allowing or plans to allow, without any legal resistance whatsoever, the Satanic Temple to distribute its “literature” to the school children in Orange County Public Schools.

 

Shame! To setting such an evil precedent you should be heroically opposed!

 

Satan is the vile and eternal enemy of humanity’s welfare, both temporal and spiritual; and has no place in a civilized society, much less in its schools exerting an insidious corruption of society in its germ.

 

All educators are charged, in loco parentis, to protect their students.

 

I urge you, with all my heart, to at least try to save the children from this horror!

 

All you have to do to send this protest is just:

 

Click here and send your instant E-PROTEST message NOW

 

School children are too young and too innocent to be exposed to the evils of Satanism.  I urge you to help us protest this.

 

It’s a terrible precedent. It must be stopped! Before it spreads!

 

Click here and send your instant E-PROTEST message NOW

 

Your protest is urgently needed.

 

And may Our Lady reward you and protect our nation’s school children from the wiles, deceits, wickedness, and snares of the Devil and his Satanist fellow travelers. Thank you!

Why Did God Establish Inequalities in Society? -

Medieval men saw the inequalities that exist in nature as a cause of unity not division in society. Their realistic approach was far from the individualist mentality of the modern world that holds that each individual is a self-made and autonomous being in competition with others.

Typical of the medieval conception is this explanation by a theologian Ralph of Acton:

“When God could have made all men strong, wise, and rich, he was unwilling to do so. He wished instead that these men should be strong, those weak; these wise, those foolish; these rich and these poor. For if all were strong, wise and wealthy, one would not be in need of the other.”

The Dominican Giordano of Pisa, preaching in Florence in 1304, suggested that even the rich need the poor since by their generosity, the rich “might earn eternal life through them” (Diana Wood, Medieval Economic Thought, Cambridge University Press, 2002, p. 43).

Why Did God Establish Inequalities in Society? -