The business faith and common good Institute kicked off their speaker series for this fall with a talk by Dr. Bonnie Wilson, Economist at St Louis University. The title of Dr. Wilson’s provocative talk was “Economics: A Theology of Scarcity, Or Something More?” Drawing on the notion of Economics as human exchange, focusing on the human encounter in such scenarios, she challenged us as Christians or people of Goodwill to resist the tendency to act with fear and a mindset of scarcity wherein we look at a business exchange as a situation where I must win and the other loses, but the rather to look with eyes of faith which attempt to see business exchanges as opportunities for win-win outcomes.

In a world where economic indicators show great progress for humanity, we find that people are less satisfied, more fearful, and in fact think things are getting worse, not better, Dr. Wilson pointed out.  So it is easy for us to seek to protect ourselves, and to see the other as a threat to our well being and financial security, which then plays out in our business interactions.  But people of faith and goodwill are called by the words of Christ to “fear not” and to not lose sight of the human encounter which we participate in when we are engaged in business.  Our presence is a gift to others, their presence is a gift to us, and with faith we should practice business with a theology of abundance, not scarcity, and generosity, not fear.

This was a great start to our speaker series, and the Business, Faith and Common Good Institute is grateful that Dr. Bonnie Wilson was willing to come share her insights with us.