It seems to me that neither Benedict nor “Spengler” are trashing the free market but rather a particular ideological interpretation of it as something self-regulating. But of course the political or ethical must always provide the frame to any marketplace. They are merely pointing out the anthropological truth: that all economic behavior rests on ethical understandings and organization.

To me, the free market – ideally, the place where everyone gets the same price, whatever his social relationship, or lack thereof, to the seller – is inconceivable without recognizing the centrality of a Christian sensibility (though it may be possible to have a sustainable “secular” form thereof). This is because the free market depends on trust in the sacredness of decentralized individuals, in the potential of each person to share in the personhood of Christ – to act meaningfully and usefully on his own account – and not be reliant on deferring to institutionalized status systems.