Page 31: Apostles and Markets, continued

The Judas (St. Matthias) lesson looks at corruption from a religious and economic perspective. The power yielded by insights from Church teaching (on flawed human nature, personal concupiscence, and the reality of social sin) combined with the analytical tools of Douglass C. North’s new institutional economics, may capture student attention. The main activity in the corruption lesson asks students to consider cheating in school settings. Why is cheating wrong? The moral answer is that it is stealing. The economic answer is that it is "rent-seeking," and a betrayal of implied contractual agreements between students, teachers, and parents. Rent-seeking refers to reaching for a bigger slice of the pie, such as academic reward in the form of grades, without doing anything to enlarge the size of that pie-- in this case, learning. Cheating does not simply harm cheaters; it damages schools. It has a social dimension. This is the pernicious connection between individual sin and institutional corruption. Recognizing this connection, scrutinizing its consequences morally and economically, strengthens people’s capacity to oppose the corruption in question. And opposing sin, in all forms, helps put us back on track, back on our route home to God.

Some might argue Apostles & Markets tries to squeeze Catholic social teaching into a neo-classical economics straight jacket. It does not. I acknowledge in hindsight that the project began as a somewhat arrogant attempt to "educate" high school theology colleagues about economics. It quickly became, however, a lesson in humility for me, and as it evolved I came to see it as a tribute to the truth and beauty of Catholic social teaching.

A&M pairs the truth of Catholic social teaching with economic analysis in twelve lessons named after the Apostles to make both more accessible to high school teachers and students. To the extent that economic literacy assists teachers and students in the presentation of Catholic social teaching, while also promoting moral reasoning with economic trilateration, the lessons in Apostles & Markets may be considered an ally of the Catholic high school curriculum.

Stephen J. Haessler is a Senior Fellow with the Robert and Marie Hanson Foundation.  He was recently awarded his Ph.D. in Education with a minor in Economics.  For more information on this curriculum, please contact The Robert and Marie Hansen Foundation at 520-219-5407, or sjhaessler@hansenfoundation.org.