What the Incarnation Does to Consumption



Richard Aleman has taken over the helm of The Distributist Review, arguably one of the most famous English-speaking web magazines on the economic outlook known as distributism, advocated by the likes of GK Chesterton in the early twentieth century and who still has advocates and practitioners today (notable examples include the Mondragon group of cooperatives in Spain). 

The site had been on an extended hiatus, but has seen a revival in late 2015 under Aleman's editorship. The Divine Wedgie's Matthew Tan is included among the list of contributing editors, which also includes writers from the American online thinkspace Solidarity Hall (edited by Daniel Schwindt), such as Susannah Black of Radio Free Thulcandra, John Medaille, Jack Ryan, Thomas Storck and Dale Ahlquist.

While distributism continues to be a central focus of the magazine, it has nonetheless broadened its scope to include articles in other areas that have a bearing on the distributist outlook. An example is an article on the weight the doctrine of the Incarnation of the Word would have on one's attitude to the material world and, by extension, the act of consuming the goods of this world. With all the denunciation of a wasteful consumerist culture as "materialist", the article submits that what is actually at play is a kind of dematerialised gnosticism (a point made in William Cavanaugh's Being Consumed), and the waste can only be countered by a proper materialism, with the Incarnation as a central informing principle.

The article can be found by clicking here

Another article that gives a sense of the new direction of the revived Distributist Review is an article on the thought of the German theologian Romano Guardini on the power of humility in a technocratic age, which can be found by clicking here.

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