I agree and identify with the pronouncements of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York on the present financial meltdown. One can use all kinds of fancy language to name the “virus” that has taken over our economic life – but one stands out. And it is not new: it is age old and sums up the capacity for human shortcomings. It is greed – the inordinate desire for more (at any cost) that goes unregulated and becomes an end unto itself.
It is easy, however, for churches, religious leaders and pundits to pontificate on the sins around us. The present dilemma will provide sermon sound-bites that will make Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos and all the unnamed prophetesses sound extremely tame. Yet, if greed is a culprit, churches, religious organisations and faiths need to watch out for another deadly virus: that of hypocrisy.
This may have been the reason why the staff writers of Ekklesia quickly kicked back the ball into the playing area of the Archbishops with their challenge of putting the churches money “where its message is”. Their call reveals what most of us who are associated with churches know fully well: Churches are not “saints” when it comes to how their assets are invested. The people commissioned to do the investing, while they may be guided by the ethical policies of their respective body, largely operate with designed unawareness when it comes to speculating, and unregulated and deceptive practices. God, Jesus and Holy Spirit may be three in one, and Jesus may have provided for 5000 and more, but these do not secure pension funds and increase the assets to run the firm.
And those of us who think that we can just point to what Jesus said and how the early Christian lived and shared as the way out, need to be aware that there is no blueprint from biblical sources for running our complex economic lives. There are, however, numerous insights into values that should be core to the way we shape our economic lives. And, neither Christians nor our sacred texts should claim any monopoly on such shaping values.
While moral pronouncements such as the appropriate intervention of the Archbishops are timely, we also need to work hard on the faithfulness of our faith/moral pronouncements. After all, to remove that speck that has skewed the vision of global economics, demands of us to also work on the log of our own myopic lives. Making moral judgments is a good opportunity for self-reflection and confession.
And may I add, that perhaps Churches may be best placed to teach the markets and global economic about “regulating” and “controlling”. We have been doing this ever since Jesus rose and went his way: regulating Jesus, the Divine and Grace!
© copyright Jagessar September 27, 2008
image credit: e-watchman.co.uk
