No Longer Ignoring the Economy, But…

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This Christianity Today article holds out some hope for those of us who have been railing for years about the American Church’s stunning silence on economic issues: “How the Economy Became a Family Issue.

Someone with a national voice is finally speaking out. Finally!

But wait…darn!…the speakers frame the conversation entirely within a political context (based on the snippets reported in CT), despite the “family issue” rhetoric. If that’s the case, then we will continue to lose this battle, as the means of correction go far beyond politics.

We Christians have forgotten that community and economy go hand in hand. If we do not rethink our practice of community and move beyond a “every nuclear family for itself” mentality, then we will NEVER fix our economic problems, no matter which chad we punch in the election booth.

OK, so let’s pray this is a baby step in the right direction and not a tangential slide into voting into office a herd of status quo, talk-talk-talk Republicans. The track record is not good (think The Contract with America).

We can only hope that the conversation turns into a self-examination by Christians concerning our own complicity in creating the mess we now find ourselves in. Perhaps then something glorious will rise from the ashes of our broken communities and shattered economy.

7 thoughts on “No Longer Ignoring the Economy, But…

  1. Dire Dan: “OK, so let’s pray this is a baby step in the right direction and not a tangential slide into voting into office a herd of status quo, talk-talk-talk Republicans”

    Have you read Angelo M. Codevilla’s essay yet?

    I think it’s fair to say that most of the time, Dan, you blame the Church for being the cause of problems A, B, C, W, X, Y, and Z. As blameworthy as it is, maybe, just maybe, that’s not the entire story and there are other big factors in the equation. For example, there is the Ruling Class. It’s not monolithic, since the Upper Crust do fight among themselves on getting the Top Dog position, ambitious as they are. But the Republidemocanicrats are just various heads growing off the same Hydra.

    • Jeremy

      Although these are other factors I do not think that they are the main ones. If anything the uprise of the Ruling Class and the Progressives is due to the silence of the Church as a whole. They are symptoms of the true problem Dan has mentioned above. Let’s face it, the Evangelicals have been close bed fellows with the Republicans for some decades now because they supposedly stand for our values. In the meantime the Republicans have thrown us a bone here and there to keep us desperately satisfied while giving us the allusion they were working with us.

      The Church should be speaking out and voting out “the chosen ones.” We have the numbers but we have allowed ourselves to be seduced especially by the Republican party. We have allowed them to set the odds and the stakes. We need to speak out in unifying force and oppose these greedy monsters and raise up from within our own ranks those we want to lead. Not these collegiate appointed professionals.

      The Church in this nation has always been blessed with the power and ability to change the tide of politics and economics but we would rather have the elite do it for us because we are not bold or secure enough in our faith. We cower like children everytime someone is offended. We need to stop being so obsessed with relevancy in our culture and begin to be counter-cultural once again. This monster Codevilla speaks of in his most splendid article has been allowed to arise rather unopposed by the Church. Sure we whine and belly ache but what real alternatives and solutions have we offered? After all it was the Church that yielded it’s high ranking theological seminaries and universities to secular liberal culture…they didn’t just take it from us.

      Jeremy Kelly

      • Jeremy,

        While I do not blame evangelicals for jumping on the GOP bandwagon in the Reagan era, we learned zilch about that experience. We keep thinking that supporting the GOP will get them to one day do what we want. Thirty years of futility have proven our naiveté. I get tired of hearing how we need to vote for prolife Republicans to get Roe overturned. We’ve had GOP dominance at several points since Roe, yet the inaction is deafening. Yet we somehow think that voting for one impotent GOP candidate after another will somehow get the job done. Fact is, nearly 40 years later and the abortion mills grind on.

        It’s time we vote all these do-nothings out, both Democrat and Republican.

        • Headless Unicorn Guy

          I get tired of hearing how we need to vote for prolife Republicans to get Roe overturned.

          A lot of that is because each prolife organization has tunnel-visioned into the dogma that their way and their way alone is The Only Pro-Life.

          “Put a Republican in the White House who’ll appoint Supreme Court Justices who’ll overturn Roe v Wade” is the NRLC’s One True Way. Same for American Life League, BUT IN ALL CAPS AND EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!! While Operation Rescue’d One True Way was “If You Don’t Go To OUR Rescues and Go To Jail With Us, You’re Not Really Pro-Life and God Will Hold You Accountable (Exekiel 33).

          It ended up like the shtick in the Charlie Brown summer camp movie — when the girls had a decision to make, they proposed ideas and voted on them. Every time — five girls, five proposals all of which tied at one vote apiece.

          I finally said to hell with it and went with HLA — the only prolife organization which DIDN’T high-pressure or guilt me.

    • Oengus,

      I don’t hold the American Church responsible for all the world’s problems. My biggest challenges to us are to

      1. Better anticipate problems, prepare for them, and have answers
      2. Better educate our people
      3. Offer grace more abundantly
      4. Think and act more counterculturally
      5. Stop fooling ourselves about our deficiencies and start fixing them

      I think that just about covers most of what I touch on.

      As to politics, all I can ask is why so many supposed “Christians” in positions of power sold themselves to the ruling class elite. All these people who wrap themselves in the flag and pledge themselves to the Almighty, yet they get to Capitol Hill and bow down to petty gods and their lobbyists.

      I stopped voting for the ruling elite back in 2000 and I have not looked back.

      BTW, the article by Codevilla was great, but he makes a few economic assumptions that simply can’t work, especially as globalization and capitalism collide. His lack here seriously undermines a good chunk of his argument. If a politician combining the best of Reagan and Goldwater rose in the ranks in the mid-Eighties, he could not have prevented the great industrial flight and the rise of cheap world labor that have devastated this country in the last 25 years. The ruling elite theory does not account for anything but government creep, saying nothing about the wastelands created by modern business practices.

      • Thanks for the reply. I hope you get Codevilla’s book, now out, read it, and write your thoughful review. I’ve got the book just today, and I will see how it expands upon his original essay.

  2. Winky

    I believe we are where we are because we have placed self above all, especially God and others. As a people, we do not live out a love of God with all our heart nor do we love others as ourselves. Put simply, we are practicing idolaters with self being the center of our worship – a sure fire recipe for individual and community implosion.

    And creation groans…

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