In House Speaker Paul Ryan s Ayn Randish views, the way to fix the economy is by starving the poor to death. It s also totally going to help the poor   somehow. Ryan, a Catholic, was challenged by a nun during his first town hall in two years on Monday evening. After angry constituents filled the room, Sister Erica Jordan, a Dominican nun and retired school principal took Ryan s faith and his actions toward the poor to task. I know that you re a Catholic, as am I. And it seems to me that most of the Republicans in the Congress are not willing to stand with the poor and working class, as evidenced in the recent debates about health care and the anticipated tax reform,  Sister Jordan said.  So I d like to ask how you see yourself upholding the Church s social teaching that has the idea that God is always on the side of the poor and dispossessed, as should we be. In response, Ryan said,  Sister, you may   this may come as a surprise to you, but I completely agree with you. Where we may disagree is on how to achieve that goal. As you know, we all exercise prudential judgment in practicing our faith. And for me, the preferential option for the poor, which is something that s a key tenet of the Catholic faith, that means upward mobility, that means economic growth, that means equality of opportunity,  he continued.  That to me means working with this guy over here at Gateway Tech to make sure that we can close the skills gap, to make sure that every person who wants a career and job can get the benefits. Except that Ryan is wrong but at least he s consistent. Republicans do not want to make higher education affordable so the  skills gap  claim doesn t hold water. The poor are being marginalized and misaligned, in many ways, because a lot of the programs that we have, well-intentioned as they may be, are discouraging and disincentivizing work,  he continued. I think we need to change our approach on fighting poverty,  he said without one bit of irony.  Instead of measuring success on how much money we spend or how many programs we create or how many people on those programs, let s measure success and poverty on outcomes. Watch:The budget produced by Ryan s House Of Representatives would cut education and job training programs by 25 percent.Math still matters, Mr. Ryan.Featured image via screen capture