In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, sociologist Max Weber states that when modern Capitalism took form in Protestant countries such as Switzerland and Germany about two hundred years ago, the ideal was to earn money and increase wealth – not to squander one’s income away on status, luxury and consumerism. The duty of the believer was to use …
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Former Pope Benedict XVI often pointed out that the secular focus on scientific and technological progress alone has created a moral vacuum in the West. The Declining West: It has produced an atheist culture that suffers from a lack of moral energy and compassion. He deemed the lack of traditional moral standards to be the greatest threat to contemporary …
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At the height of the British Empire, with its unparalleled wealth and international influence, the founder of the Salvation Army, General William Booth, wrote In darkest England and the way out (1890). General William Booth: At this time, the interiors of Africa were being penetrated by Western explorers, among them Henry Morton Stanley, who just returned from the Congo …
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To the surprise of many, Europe’s arguably most important intellectual, Jürgen Habermas (1929-) has made religion a major theme of his work late in life. The origins of Human Rights is Christian theology: Realizing that religion’s prominence in the public sphere has not diminished, rather on the other hand, is more vital than ever, Habermas is critical of his …
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