Why then do we think that this [hoping for change in the pagan faith] is sufficient and do not observe how the kindness of Christians to strangers, their care for the burial of their dead, and the sobriety of their lifestyle has done the most to advance their cause?…
For it is disgraceful when no Jew is a beggar and the impious Galileans [Christians] support our poor in addition to their own; everyone is able to see that our coreligionists are in want of aid from us.
”Julian the Apostate, Roman Emperor, in a letter to Arsacius the priest, AD 360
Those pesky Christians…being kind to strangers, taking care of the pagan poor, their high regard for life. Sounds like a lot of work. Couldn’t they have found some doctrine to fight over or some network to boycott?
Excellent short article on the current unrest in Western Europe and the US.
What all the Indignant have in common is the refusal to address squarely the problem that nearly all Western countries face. That problem is that the welfare systems that evolved in the mid-20th century are unaffordable under the demographic and economic circumstances of the 21st century. The financial crisis has merely exacerbated what was already a severe structural crisis of public finance, boosting deficits while slowing growth. The scale of the challenge ranges from the really, really hard to the absolutely impossible.
Uh oh. Current social welfare systems becoming unaffordable? Does this mean the government is going to have to stop doing the church’s job? Who will look after the poor and the sick and underpaid? What about kids in state custody?
What are people of faith to do?
(I’m clearly not talking about early retirement or government pensions here)
In looking at the logs of my legions dozens of readers, I found someone came to the blog by searching for:
can a christian be poor
So in case you, curious web surfer, ever return to this blog (or anyone searches for that phrase again), there is a short answer to your question:
Yes.
I assume from your question that you’re not too familiar with the Christian faith. Or maybe you are, and the question reflects familiarity with Joel Osteen, the Prayer of Jabez, Ken and Gloria Copeland, etc. Or perhaps you’ve read certain Psalms and the like.
But there’s a more pressing question taking the entirety of the biblical witness into account: Can a Christian be rich?
Probably; but she’d need to be careful.
And so on.
To be rich implies accumulation of wealth, or at least having a sizable surplus. And it’s hard to read the New Testament and conclude that saving large amounts of money or acquiring possessions is a worthy Christian goal, at least if it’s merely to have them or for selfish purposes. The Old Testament exhoratons of saving money little by little or ensuring your heirs have an inheritance are absent in the New. When money is mentioned in the New Testament, people are either giving it to the cause of the kingdom, or find that it’s a stumbling block between them and God.
And yes, I’m talking to myself. You’re reading this on a blog from someone who has leisure time, can afford internet access, has not non-volunatily missed a meal, and is in the top few % of global wage earners (per http://globalrichlist.com/).
A few days ago, I posted a link to a post Are we calling this a “win-win”? from a missionary in Costa Rica. Here’s my reply (but you can only read if you’ve read her post).
I’ve got an idea.
I’m going to tell my kids about poverty and the injustice in the world and their [Christian, moral] imperative to do something about it.
But I don’t want them to get too serious about it or to be too inconvenienced.
So here’s the plan: we’re going to sit down and look and pictures on the internet depicting poverty and 3rd world conditions, either across the globe or, sadly, in our own nation.
I’ll tell them the house they see is smaller than the room we’re in now and that the floor is actually dirt and not, as in our home, brown carpet.
Or maybe we’ll stay up late one night after watching a movie and eating popcorn on the couch to see some 2 minutes commercial of starving children and a toll-free number for donations to an organization we’ve not heard of staffed by first-world white people.
We might even zoom into the poor countries using Google Earth. Yeah, geography and compassion FTW.
Fortunately they’ll get the message: Looking at ads on the mounted flatscreen HDTV or viewing images of kids on a $1,200 desktop over an internet connection that costs more than their families make each month taken by well-meaning westerners with photographic equipment that costs more than my car has to sink in. Plus they won’t have to smell the smells or experience the weather extremes or hear the different languages or deal with the hassle of traveling.
We may talk about systemic social structures or inequity or imperialism. Fortunately, their worldview won’t be threatened [much]. This will last until they get distracted by the lures of suburbia, and they’ll go back to staying cool and playing with their toys and feeling good about their life.
Plus, it’ll save me a lot of money and time.
The above is a bit of satire. I’m largely sympathetic to the point of the original article, but wrote the above both as Devil’s advocate and because when I linked to it a friend asked for a rebuttal. Here’s where I differ from the original post (or at least what I perceived to be its intent from the tone).
My kids are currently too young for such a trip, though I hope to take them someday. But they need to realize the trip is not for them. It’s not for them to feel good, nor to feel fortunate, nor to pander. If they were to come home and only feel lucky to be American, then we’ve failed.
I want them to think socially, be responsible, and have a global worldview. This means noting the inequality in the world and being determined to do something about it. It means having a view of the world that transcends their daily experiences. It means treating others — especially the less fortunate — with respect and dignity. It means being committed to equality and justice.
It means living simply with more gratitude and finding ways to share and shorter Christmas lists. It means less nationalism. It means continuing to support Kiva and Wishing Well It means a realization that we’re not American middle-class by choice or worth.
So I realize how things can be misguided and how thousands of dollars can be wasted on trips where the money may be better spent donated to those on the ground. But there’s also something invaluable about seeing the world first-hand and realizing your place in it.
We don’t need more people going to resorts in poor countries, giving funds to multi-national companies, and shunning/ignoring the reality of life around them. We need people who want to make a difference.
Then the world, in a prison of dispair and postmodern confusion, heard about people of faith, they send messengers to ask “Are you the answer to the existential angst in our lives and the pain in this world, or should we expect something else?”
Those of faith replied, “Go back and tell what world what you hear and see: The needy are clothed, the widows and orphans are looked after, inequality is opposed, the sick are cared for, and unwanted babies are taken in. Cups of cold water and free meals are given in Jesus’ name…”
The world looked hopeful.
“…and the homosexual community is vilified, violence is condoned in the name of country, healthcare is denied to the poor, the planet is being abused, economic inequality is growing, and tens of millions of dollars are spend to advertise the end of the world. Blessed are those who do not fall away on account of us.”
And the world went away, saddened and confused.
In light of my few scattered thoughts on parenting and DHS a few days ago, I wonder if the church were the church, would we need DHS?
(Source: twitter.com)
What do Jeff Buckley, Rob Bell, and Qohelet have in common? They’ve all helped formulate and crystalize some ideas in my mind regarding the nature of life and how we are to live it.
Qohelet, another word for Ecclesiastes, speaks of God’s hand at work in the daily lives of people:
Go, eat your bread with enjoyment, and drink your wine with a merry heart; for God has long ago approved what you do. Let your garments always be white; do not let oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life that are given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun.
Jeff Buckley, the singer/songwriter best known for his enthralling cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, speaks of the spirituality of intimate relationships, and experiencing grace (the title of his best-known album) and eternal life (a song title). To listen to Buckley sing his passionate lyrics is to hear someone whose spirit and life is infused with a recognition of the otherness that invades and pervades life in a mysterious way, so infusing that all he can do is sing passionately.
Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church, and author of Velvet Elvis speaks frequently of the differences between Christianity as a thought process (Western) and a way of life (Eastern). Bell speaks of the presence of God in daily life; in breaking bread and sharing drink with neighbors, watching children play, doing service, sitting doing nothing, grocery shopping, etc.
One of the unfortunate legacies of the Enlightenment is the compartmentalizing of life. People talk about their personal life, work life, love life, and so on. While the validity of these divisions may be debated, one segment of life that it doesn’t apply to is one’s spiritual life. To say that a person has a spiritual life is to imply that there is a segment of a person’s psyche that is characterized by faith or spiritual things.
But faith doesn’t shouldn’t work like that.
As the biblical writers describe a person’s life, there is no word or concept of Spiritual as opposed to other components of life. There is just life. Life lived before God with an understanding of his role and presence in the world. Life that incorporates the mundane elements of existence with the realization of deeper overtones and meanings within all.
When the NT writers use spiritual, it refers to a mindset or gift from God rather than a component of life that is somehow separate from the physical. The OT writers do not use spiritual at all because their conception of God and his work is more integrated into the national consciousness than the NT writers who have to combat paganism and Greek dualism in their writings.
I’m not talking about pantheism or panentheism here, but rather a deep recognition of the work and hand of God in all we do, say, and experience. I feel this has been neglected in the expressions of Christian faith that I have been exposed to. To quote Bell:
This is not just the same old message with new methods. We’re rediscovering Christianity as an Eastern religion, as a way of life. Legal metaphors for faith don’t deliver a way of life. We grew up in churches where people knew the nine verses why we don’t speak in tongues, but had never experienced the overwhelming presence of God.
Thanks Rob, Qohelet, and Jeff for helping me recognize the Spiritual in everyday life.
From an athiest’s blog that I read talking about a TV show pairing an atheist with a Christian family:
On the pleasant surprise side, I felt that the show clearly exposed that one can be a good person and have a moral, happy life as an atheist. Belief in the supernatural is not necessary for morality, effective parenting, kindness, or any other positive qualities. The show effectively conveyed this truth.
I have no doubt that atheists or agnostics could be moral, sound people. The question I have is why? Is there some intrinsic good in living a moral life with no sense of the value of man above other animals or no recognition of a purpose or divine intent behind it all? Is there some long-term genetic survival value in forgiveness? alturism? charity? marital fidelity?
When Nietzsche wrote his famous “God is dead,” he meant that since God (or a cosmic being) is no longer a viable belief option for people, there are no absolute laws or standards by which we should subject ourselves. Nietzsche critiques the people of his day for not recognizing the significance of these events; a critique that still holds true today.
My desire and goal to live a moral life comes not only from my belief in God, but also from an inner sense of morality and justice that I attribute to God. I would be a hedonist and live for myself if I didn’t believe in God, but the fact that I recognize a greater sense of value feeds my belief in God.
So I don’t understand moral atheists. I would think atheists would not care for anything but themselves. If they felt that wasn’t right, I would think they’d ask themselves why.
Again, it’s not that non-theists can’t be good, moral people (sometimes, sadly, putting people of faith to shame). It’s that such actions don’t derive from their beliefs.
As Kurt Vonnegut noted: I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anyone tell you any different.
Since I originally wrote this, I read an article from an [honest] atheist renouncing his belief in morality. The implications of this are chilling, as he notes, but he’s willing to accept them as the natural outgrowth of his “born-again amoralism”.
So was I, until I experienced my shocking epiphany that the religious fundamentalists are correct: without God, there is no morality. But they are incorrect, I still believe, about there being a God. Hence, I believe, there is no morality.
…
A helpful analogy, at least for the atheist, is sin. Even though words like ‘sinful’ and ‘evil’ come naturally to the tongue as a description of, say, child-molesting, they do not describe any actual properties of anything. There are no literal sins in the world because there is no literal God and hence the whole religious superstructure that would include such categories as sin and evil. Just so, I now maintain, nothing is literally right or wrong because there is no Morality. Yet, as with the non-existence of God, we human beings can still discover plenty of completely-naturally-explainable internal resources for motivating certain preferences. Thus, enough of us are sufficiently averse to the molesting of children, and would likely continue to be so if fully informed, to put it on the books as prohibited and punishable by our society.
Well that’s good news. Aversion to child molestation (and the like) will keep our society pleasant enough (for the majority at least) for a while to come
