Economics uses extensively a model of rational choice to model the behavior of human beings. The model is such that it seems that the man chooses as if he or she was a machine. As a result to material constraints and personal preferences, the economic man or woman chooses very much like a computer would, automatically. Of course this is and is intended to be a simplification of reality and helps us probably to think of some aspects of human behavior more clearly, but what I think is a weakness in the model is the underlying assumption that preferences are unchangeable. Man is, according to the model, a slave of his or her given preferences.
This might even not be very far from a Christian conception of man as sinner, slave to his greed, jealousy and other bad tendencies and preferences. But Christianity also professes, even more importantly, to offer a way out. As one turns to God, his or her preferences can start becoming better. The turning towards or away God is the one truly free choice. He can be freed from his sin or he can remain a slave to it if he or she chooses.
The unchangeableness of man's preferences is a simplification that distorts reality too much. It is in the danger of taking away from economists the noble aim of making, with the help of God, ourselves and others more unselfish.
"You shall call his name Jesus, for it is he who shall save his people from their sins."
Matthew 1:21
