The free market is the economic model that seems most consonant with biblical teaching, but the global economic crisis demonstrates that, without moral values, the market economy can implode, said Great Britain’s chief rabbi. Sir Jonathan Sacks, chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, traveled to the Vatican to speak with Pope Benedict XVI about united efforts to bring morality back to the marketplace and to deliver a major speech at the Pontifical Gregorian University.
Speaking to reporters after both events, Rabbi Sacks said he and the pope focused “on principles we share about the need for moral markets and a people-centered approach to economics that His Holiness set out two years ago in his document, ‘Caritas in Veritate’ (‘Charity in Truth’)” and that the Jewish community shares.
“My real concern is that a clear voice be heard” in the midst of the global economic crisis, “a strong religious and moral voice,” he said. Asked if he and the pope discussed the ongoing tensions between Israelis and Palestinians in the Holy Land, the rabbi responded, “I believe in trying to solve only one impossible problem at a time.” Rabbi Sacks began his speech at the Gregorian by recounting a quip in England that says if the chief rabbi visits you in the hospital, you know you are really sick, and added, “if the chief rabbi delivers a lecture about the economy in Europe, that, too, must be in need of a speedy recovery.”
VATICAN CITY (CNS)