In North America, we tend to see a free market economy as being as natural as the birds in the sky. We also tend to identify it with the economic system we today have in place. Both assumptions are perilous.

I am blessed to have several friends who are or who have been small businesspeople. All of these people are very service-oriented. They don't work 9 to 5 and they will always go the extra mile to ensure things are taken care of.

The Judeo-Christian understanding of wealth and poverty has vacillated between two attitudes. One attitude, rooted in Old Testament Wisdom literature, sees abundance as a sign of God's favour and poverty the result of laziness. "A slack hand causes poverty, but the hand of the diligent makes rich" (Proverbs 10:4).

The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church is a book replete with footnotes referring to previous Church documents. That's the way it should be. As a compendium, the book pulls together relevant Church statements and sorts them by topic.