Christian Economic Ethics: History and Implications

21 Conclusion

21 Conclusion The aim of this volume has been to investigate the history of Christian views of economic life so the reader can better decide how to apply the insights of that tradition to economic life in the twenty-first century. An unfortunate byproduct of this focus is that many other important moral problems remain in the background, from biomedical and life issues, to sexism, racism, immigration, and many others.1 The solutions considered have most frequently been those available to public policy and personal economic lifestyle, largely ignoring the important role of regular prayer and an active worship life in the church, both essential for adequate engagement with contemporary issues. HOW THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION MEANS Most of the chapters have focused on what that tradition has actually said. However, just as important has been attention to the question of method: How is it that one should decide what this tradition means today? As we phrased it in Chapter 2, we need to be attentive to how a living tradition means. There are two methods that will not work. The first assumes that the teachings of the Christian tradition on economic life have been unchanging and exist independent of the contexts in which they were first articulated. We have seen ample evidence that several teachings have changed, particularly concerning usury, slavery, and the use of the language of human rights. But a second method is also unacceptable: that Christians today can simply reject any part of the tradition they find inconvenient. Such an approach grants the tradition little or no authority in our lives and thinks of tradition simply as a museum where we might choose a piece to put on display—or not—depending on whether our preexisting view of what should occur in life is helped or hindered by it. All too many scholars writing on Christian economic ethics engage in this sort of irresponsible “cherry picking” of the tradition. 383 An authentic Christian understanding of our faith is rooted in the same living tradition that our spiritual ancestors in every age inherited, a tradition that both constrained and enriched their lives. They in turn passed on an even richer tradition to their spiritual descendants in later centuries. Instead of those two counterproductive methods, we must rely on the insights depicted by the hermeneutic circle we first saw in Chapter 2. Figure 4. Today’s Situation for Christians We recognize that these ancient texts have authority over us and yet simultaneously we understand that we must be critical in our appropriation of them. We are thus left with difficult but promising conversations: between Christians today and the economic world in which we live and between Christians today and their predecessor communities throughout earlier history. Consider, for example, the plight of the poor today. We recognize that we should not attempt to replicate the Israelite Jubilee and return land to its original owners after forty-nine years, something that makes no sense in an industrialized world. At the same time, however, we are not simply free to ignore the ancient Hebrew concern to establish structures designed to ensure that everyone has the means to participate in normal economic life, in order to guarantee that the needs of all are met. The ancient gleaning laws no longer apply, and even the notion of a just wage is difficult to implement in a globalized market economy. But the implication of the tradition is that we must find structures that will accomplish the same underlying goals, both to assist those whom the market leaves with unmet needs and to enable each ablebodied worker to support self and family through gainful employment. 384 | Christian Economic Ethics To complicate matters further, we must be attentive to the difference between morality and causality. While a moral critique might seem to require some particular change in economic life today, Christians must exhibit what theologian Paul Tillich once called “humility before the fact.” That is, although science bears its own biases that we must be attentive to, it provides insights into how the world operates, both the natural and the social worlds. We must be attentive to what science has to say about the likely results of our attempt to make the world a better place. The conclusions articulated in these final chapters will be contested by some commentators: on the left, for being too supportive of the market system, and, on the right, for...