This week has seen a sudden upswing in book sales, mostly of
the Just Third Way Edition of Fulton J. Sheen’s Freedom Under God. There
also seems to be a spurt in the
works of Robert Hugh Benson, the unique novels of John Henry Newman,
and even those touching on the subject of widely distributed ownership of
capital listed on the Distributist
Books and Media website.
As the end of the year draws near, it seems that more people
are focusing on learning about the root causes of much of what is going on, so
that they can start to act, rather than merely react. It may be that 2015 will be the “Year of the
Just Third Way,” culminating in our participation in the World Meeting of
Families next September. The signs are
there:
• Guy Stevenson, whom
we labeled “The
Fulton Sheen Guy” in a blog posting last year (and which seems to have
stuck), appeared
on Al Smith’s Hungry for More show
this past Wednesday. Some of us did not
have a chance to see the show live, but it’s available in the archive. Guy gave CESJ a few good plugs, even
mentioning Capital
Homesteading for Every Citizen, and you’ll notice the “subtle” mentions
of the
Just Third Way Edition of Fulton Sheen’s Freedom
Under God. Just a few tips: Guy,
you should look directly into the camera lens, and not at yourself on the
monitor, ditch the “finger quotes”. . . . and you looked better with the
mustache, so there are two good reasons for keeping your eye on the birdie.
• Almost by
coincidence, we are working on a paper that includes some research from Fulton
Sheen. Sheen’s first book, God and Intelligence in Modern Philosophy
(1925), was a profound argument in favor of the restoration of reason as the
foundation of faith. When Sheen wrote,
the problem of “fideism,” that is, basing matters on faith alone rather than on
reason illuminated and guided by faith, was a growing problem not only in
organized religion, but in all of society.
In civil society, for example, there was the theory of the “living
constitution” by means of which sovereignty was shifted from the human person,
to the State, as chronicled by William W. Crosskey in Politics and the Constitution in the History of the United States
(1953). This was also a concern of G.K.
Chesterton in many of his books, and Msgr. Ronald Knox in Enthusiasm (1950). Sheen
was, in fact, known as “the American Chesterton.” Not surprisingly, Chesterton wrote the introduction
to God and Intelligence.
• Sales of CESJ’s
latest “Paradigm Paper,” The Political
Animal: Economic Justice and the Sovereignty of the Human Person, are still
doing well, with a small burst of sales in November. The
Political Animal, like all CESJ publications, is available in bulk at
substantial savings. With the 20%
discount applicable to bulk sales (i.e.,
ten or more copies of a single title), a full case of 50 is $400, plus
shipping. Enquire at “publications [at]
cesj [dot] org” for details and cost of shipping bulk/wholesale orders. Individual copies are available now on Amazon, and on Barnes and Noble. Please
note: CESJ does not sell retail.
• CESJ’s short paper
on “The Business Cycle: A Kelsonian Analysis,” has been submitted to the American Journal of Economics and Sociology. The article examines the restoration of Say’s
Law of Markets from a slightly different perspective, and notes some of the
contradictions inherent in Keynesian economics, particularly the “money
multiplier” developed and promoted by Richard Kahn.
• As of this morning, we have had
visitors from 48 different countries and 49 states and provinces in the United
States and Canada to this blog over the past two months. Most visitors are from
the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, India, and Australia. The most
popular postings this past week were “Aristotle on Private Property,” “Halloween
Horror Special: The Faith that Ate Reason,” “In Your Face,” “Poverty and
Freedom,” and “Thomas Hobbes on Private Property.”
Those are the happenings for this week, at least those that
we know about. If you have an
accomplishment that you think should be listed, send us a note about it at
mgreaney [at] cesj [dot] org, and we’ll see that it gets into the next
“issue.” If you have a short (250-400
word) comment on a specific posting, please enter your comments in the blog —
do not send them to us to post for you.
All comments are moderated, so we’ll see it before it goes up.
#30#