Invoking “natural law” in debates over human rights does not necessarily lead to privileging religious rights over others, denying people’s rights to express their sexual or gender identity, or refusing to acknowledge economic and social rights.

The recent cheating scandal in college admissions underscores the anxiety even the wealthiest, most famous parents feel about their children’s future – an anxiety aptly described and predicted by Reinhold Niebuhr, among other mid-twentieth-century theologians, and one whose effects we can and should mitigate by political means.