This book by Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby is one of those that so well brings together and consolidates differing major strands of my emergent (striving to be holistic) system of general thought that the best way to do a blog post about it entails buttloads of links to other books I've read, so settle in for a final paragraph more or less entirely comprised of these.
First though - the book itself: it's a very straightforward critique, from what should be a pretty uncontroversial mainstream Christian perspective, of the idolisation of money and power and materialistic status (i.e. 'Mammon') in contemporary Western society. Welby walks us, in engaging, readable and non-complicated terms, through the central knots of what is spiritually problematic about the way most people in our socioeconomic setting live: valuing only what we can materially quantify, becoming controlled by it, insisting on primacy of individual ownership, enshrining it in our hearts and minds and value-driven behaviours, losing out on the eternal and moral gains to be made from being selfless and quick to share - and so losing out on joy as we become cogs in worldly schemes designed for short-term profit without respect for people's intrinsic worth. It's a book that I think is extremely timely, and should be as widely-read among Christians (especially Conservative ones) as any book can be - Mammon is the world's most pervasive, most collective, most insidious, and most successful idol, having risen to hegemonic dominance over more or less the entire global political economy - and the fact this is so un-discussed by the Church is a matter of extreme spiritual as well as sociopolitical concern. We have a duty as servants of Christ to, in seeking and working for his glory, not only evangelise and serve others, but also to stand and testify against idols running rampant through our cultures, and while there are many of these, Mammon is one so big and dominant and unchallenged (at least in spiritual terms from mainstream Christianity) that we absolutely must reject and fight it, and work to open people's eyes.
Why is this important?
Well, let's start with God, who being in absolute and ultimate a community of love, made us to emulate this love in the way we live. This is human nature as told by the biblical narrative, and that sets Christians in a radical light in a world that is not, by and large, shaped along these lines. We live in a world where billions are left to suffer and die in poverty, ignored by the rich, who have secured so completely their grasp on power that economic 'wisdom' itself is determined by their interests, enabling richer nations to bully and exploit poor ones as they strive for global dominance, even to the degree that our short-term economic endeavours threaten to dangerously destabilise the self-regulating biosphere. And for what? This materialistic striving doesn't make us happier, it just makes us competitive and angsty - allowing our individual and communal spiritual lives to wither, neglected, as we're all too busy chasing the gravy train, all the while finding our societies' ills perpetuated by the socioeconomic insecurities internalised by those living in highly unequal systems. In the Bible, we repeatedly see idolatry and injustice entwined together - and the same is true today. To be truly loving requires that we engage people spiritually and pragmatically: our pursuit of cohesive justice and our witness of gospel truth to others must go hand in hand. People forget that economics originated from moral philosophy - the social systems of production, distribution and exchange today are so complex, interdependent and verging on incomprehensible that trying to take a moral or religious perspective on them seems almost absurd - yet this we must do. But first we must disentangle ourselves from the web of apathy, misconception, and unquestioning conformity that surround Mammon: as salt and light in the world, we must not allow ourselves to be reshaped by the values of our idol-saturated culture but only by that which we know to be developing us as we help build each other up in the likeness of Christ - and having been socialised into accepting as natural and inevitable the machinations of a social order that glorifies affluence and marginalised those who do not, or cannot, attain it, that means first sharpening our critical thinking. Question things; question each particular usage of political or economic power as they are often neither moral nor legitimate, and do not be afraid of open reasonable discussion - as this is the life-support soil of civil society in which much intellectual Christian evangelism takes place and in which the seeds of progressive change are sown. Consider the impact and optimisation of your work for the service of these ends; educate yourself about the yes-complex-but-oh-so-important fields in which change needs to occur; open your eyes to actual circumstances of less-well-off communities; as an individual and through your influence on political decision-makers (am assuming most readers of this blog are lucky enough, like me, to live in democratic societies) try to promote the pursuit of an agenda that is inclusive and abundant rather than focused on hierarchy and scarcity - reframe your moral priorities around helping and empowering those most in need, rather than enabling those least in need to continue helping themselves. Oh, and if voting for this doesn't work, there are lots of other ways of making a robust point...
First though - the book itself: it's a very straightforward critique, from what should be a pretty uncontroversial mainstream Christian perspective, of the idolisation of money and power and materialistic status (i.e. 'Mammon') in contemporary Western society. Welby walks us, in engaging, readable and non-complicated terms, through the central knots of what is spiritually problematic about the way most people in our socioeconomic setting live: valuing only what we can materially quantify, becoming controlled by it, insisting on primacy of individual ownership, enshrining it in our hearts and minds and value-driven behaviours, losing out on the eternal and moral gains to be made from being selfless and quick to share - and so losing out on joy as we become cogs in worldly schemes designed for short-term profit without respect for people's intrinsic worth. It's a book that I think is extremely timely, and should be as widely-read among Christians (especially Conservative ones) as any book can be - Mammon is the world's most pervasive, most collective, most insidious, and most successful idol, having risen to hegemonic dominance over more or less the entire global political economy - and the fact this is so un-discussed by the Church is a matter of extreme spiritual as well as sociopolitical concern. We have a duty as servants of Christ to, in seeking and working for his glory, not only evangelise and serve others, but also to stand and testify against idols running rampant through our cultures, and while there are many of these, Mammon is one so big and dominant and unchallenged (at least in spiritual terms from mainstream Christianity) that we absolutely must reject and fight it, and work to open people's eyes.
Why is this important?
Well, let's start with God, who being in absolute and ultimate a community of love, made us to emulate this love in the way we live. This is human nature as told by the biblical narrative, and that sets Christians in a radical light in a world that is not, by and large, shaped along these lines. We live in a world where billions are left to suffer and die in poverty, ignored by the rich, who have secured so completely their grasp on power that economic 'wisdom' itself is determined by their interests, enabling richer nations to bully and exploit poor ones as they strive for global dominance, even to the degree that our short-term economic endeavours threaten to dangerously destabilise the self-regulating biosphere. And for what? This materialistic striving doesn't make us happier, it just makes us competitive and angsty - allowing our individual and communal spiritual lives to wither, neglected, as we're all too busy chasing the gravy train, all the while finding our societies' ills perpetuated by the socioeconomic insecurities internalised by those living in highly unequal systems. In the Bible, we repeatedly see idolatry and injustice entwined together - and the same is true today. To be truly loving requires that we engage people spiritually and pragmatically: our pursuit of cohesive justice and our witness of gospel truth to others must go hand in hand. People forget that economics originated from moral philosophy - the social systems of production, distribution and exchange today are so complex, interdependent and verging on incomprehensible that trying to take a moral or religious perspective on them seems almost absurd - yet this we must do. But first we must disentangle ourselves from the web of apathy, misconception, and unquestioning conformity that surround Mammon: as salt and light in the world, we must not allow ourselves to be reshaped by the values of our idol-saturated culture but only by that which we know to be developing us as we help build each other up in the likeness of Christ - and having been socialised into accepting as natural and inevitable the machinations of a social order that glorifies affluence and marginalised those who do not, or cannot, attain it, that means first sharpening our critical thinking. Question things; question each particular usage of political or economic power as they are often neither moral nor legitimate, and do not be afraid of open reasonable discussion - as this is the life-support soil of civil society in which much intellectual Christian evangelism takes place and in which the seeds of progressive change are sown. Consider the impact and optimisation of your work for the service of these ends; educate yourself about the yes-complex-but-oh-so-important fields in which change needs to occur; open your eyes to actual circumstances of less-well-off communities; as an individual and through your influence on political decision-makers (am assuming most readers of this blog are lucky enough, like me, to live in democratic societies) try to promote the pursuit of an agenda that is inclusive and abundant rather than focused on hierarchy and scarcity - reframe your moral priorities around helping and empowering those most in need, rather than enabling those least in need to continue helping themselves. Oh, and if voting for this doesn't work, there are lots of other ways of making a robust point...
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