'TIS THE SEASON TO BE GREEDY? 

Catholic author and blogger Mark Shea offers a pithy and timely comment on materialism and capitalism in the Season Formerly Known as Christmas on his Facebook page: 

":...Capitalism, like fire, is a useful tool if it is subjected to the Holy Spirit and profits take a firm back seat to more important goods like the love of God and Neighbor. Allow it to be the primary good (in other words, worship it as an idol) and it becomes, like all idols, a mortal enemy of God and man as it burns and rages out of control with greed and envy (among other mortal sins)...There's a reason Leo XIII wrote Rerum Novarum..." 

Rerum Novarum was Pope Leo XIII's encyclical on the rights and duties of both labor and capitol. Written in 1891, it's often cited by historians as sparking early and widespread Catholic participation in the American labor movement.