For God and profit : how banking and finance can serve the common good / Samuel Gregg ; with a foreword by George Cardinal Pell.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Gregg, Samuel, 1969- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Finance--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Finance.

Finance, Personal--Religious aspects--Christianity.

Finance, Personal.

Christian life.

Physical Description:

xii, 223 pages ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Spring Valley, NY : Crossroad Publishing Company, [2016]

Summary:

From Christianity's very beginning, it has had a difficult relations worlds of money finance, and banking. For God and Profit illustrates the profound ways in which Christians contributed to the development of the financial tools that we take for granted today. It also shows how Christian faith and reason can help restore integrity to our troubled financial systems so that money serves Us true master: the common good. Book jacket.

Contents:

1 Introduction 1

Knowing before Judging 2

Faith, Morality, and Money 5

Renewing a Tradition 7

The Way Ahead 12

Some Caveats 13

Going Backward to Go Forward 16

2 Detestable to God and Man 21

Scandal Time 23

Hellenes, Latins, and Money 24

Israelites and the Poor 28

Premedieval Christianity, Money, and Interest 31

Zero-Sum Economies, Zero-Sum Economics 34

A New Economic World 37

Further Reading 38

3 Financial Revolution 39

From Stagnation to Growth 42

Finance and the New Economy 43

Institutionalizing Capital 44

The Not-So-Dark Ages 47

Back to Aristotle-and Rome 49

God's Time, My Time 52

Work, Creativity, and Money 53

Partnership and Investment in a Growth Economy 54

Just Titles to Interest 56

Spreading the Risk 58

Money Markets, and Speculation 60

Toward the Full Justification of Interest 62

Tradition and Innovation 65

Further Reading 66

4 Caesar's Coin 67

Measurement and Stability 69

The State and Debasement 71

Debasement as Economic Injustice 72

Money, Power, and Tyranny 76

Debt, Bonds, and Public Finances 78

Bankers and Princes 81

Against Monopolies 83

An Uncultivated Part of the Vineyard 85

Further Reading 87

5 Freedom, Flourishing, and Justice 91

Doing Good, Avoiding Evil, and Human Flourishing 93

Sociability and the Common Good 95

Material Goods: Common Use and Private Ownership 97

Surplus and Essential Wealth 100

Finance's Ultimate Legitimacy 101

Getting Justice Right 105

From Theory to Practice 109

Further Reading 109

6 Understanding Capital, Civilizing Capital 113

Speculators and Speculation 114

Speculators and the "Real Economy" 118

Speculation, Currencies, And Financial Crises 121

Short Term versus Long Term: A Detached Financial Sector? 126

The Knowledge Issue 129

Just and Unjust Compensation 131

Rewards, Justice, and Equality 134

Finance, Regulation, and the State 137

Further Reading 139

7 The Common Good, the State, and Public Finance 140

Hazardous Lending, Evading Responsibility 142

To Bail or Not to Bail 144

Regulation and Its Limits 148

Regulation and Virtue 151

Central Banks and Monetary Stability 155

Monetary Policy, the Poor, and the Wealthy 157

A World Central Bank? 159

Humility and a Higher Calling 162

Further Reading 162

8 Finance as Vocatio, Finance as Magnificentia 163

Understanding vocatio 164

Making Money Good 167

Building Trust, Pricing Risk, Enabling Opportunity 170

Growing Capital 172

Credit, the Poor, and Loving Our Neighbor 176

Debt and the Developing World 179

Greed, Virtue, and Life in Christ 182.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 189-211) and index.

ISBN:

0824521889

9780824521882

OCLC:

950891257