Economics

A report from Wells Fargo Securities shows a “record drop” in consumer credit this summer. “Despite the cash-for-clunkers program starting in the last week of July, nonrevolving credit fell at a staggering 11.7 percent annualized pace,” analyst Yasmine Kamaruddin wrote. Indeed, much of the decline was attributed to a spike in charge offs, which points to the ongoing, widespread distress in economic life.

But here’s the thing, and it’s very simple. The reason that major sectors of the economy such as autos and housing have suffered historic declines — indeed in some cases been on the verge of collapse — is that consumers suddenly stopped buying what companies were selling. Certainly, much of this pull back can be explained by growing joblessness and fear about the future. But I suspect that there’s also a cultural shift going on, which may continue long after the economy bounces back. In the future, we may see less consumption, especially for things like the McMansions and oversized SUVs, because people are learning about what they really need. Now in fact, you may have a large family and good reason to live in a large house. Or you may be a rancher or a tradesman have a perfectly suitable need for a large truck. But too much of what the American consumer was buying in recent years was inexplicably “super sized.” So, if we are indeed undergoing a shift in priorities, learning to live within or below our means, that can only be a good thing in the long run.

This cultural shift is in the hands of consumers and is vastly more powerful than if “nanny state” government officials had attempted to manage it from the top down through legal mechanisms such as luxury taxes or excise taxes, which often have a moral rationale. Whether you agree on the moral justification or not. So, why not a “sin tax” on soda pop, as President Obama is suggesting.

At any rate, the people who are running government in Washington right now aren’t the sort of tutors we need for learning how to live within our means.

The Church has a role here. By teaching us that asceticism can be practiced not just on a mountain top, but in every day life, we can learn shed those material things that threaten to enslave us. And we do this freely and powerfully — without demonizing and scapegoating abstract impersonal forces like “the market” or “globalization” as the sources of materialism.

A good exposition of the power of every day ascetism is found in Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew’s 2008 book, Encountering the Mystery, in the chapter on “The Way of Ascesis.”

When we think of ascetism or discipline, we imagine such things as fasting, vigils, and rigorous practices. In the words of Abba Isaac the Syrian (ca. 700): “No one ascends to heaven with comfort.” There can be no ascent without ascesis. That is indeed part of what is involved; but it is not the whole story. Ascesis involves a display of what in The Philokalia and other classics of the Orthodox spiritual life is called frugality or self-restraint (enkrateia). We are to exercise a form of voluntary self-limitation in order to overcome self-sufficiency in our lifestyle, making the crucial distinction between what we want and we we in fact need.

Only through self-denial, through a willingness to forgo and say “no” or “enough,” will we be able to rediscover what it means to be truly human. Ultimately, the spirit of ascesis is less a judgment on the material goods of the world than a way of liberation from the stress and anguish that result from the desire to “have more.” It is the key to freedom from the gridlock of consumerism (cf. 1 Tim. 6:9-10)

One would think that, having established a worldwide reputation as the Green Patriarch, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I — and his advisers — would approach the writing of a statement on Orthodox Christian stewardship of the environment with a certain gravitas, a sense of responsibility to those in the Church searching for answers on the weighty and complex problem of how to live in this Creation, deeply troubled but still productive and beautiful. One would also hope that these environmental statements from the Phanar would be informed with the sort of intelligence and insights that display some familiarity with environmental science, economics, public policy, the political realities of living in advanced democracies, and the awareness that these problems are often technical and leave ground for well-meaning Orthodox Christians to debate or even disagree on the particulars. This sort of approach to understanding environmental problems does not in any way undermine the non-negotiable demand to practice stewardship of the environment in a sacramental, liturgical and ascetical way that is truly Orthodox. We are, after all, called to be “priests of creation.”

Unfortunately, the latest brief “message” on the environment from the patriarch amounts to little more than pious Sunday School affirmations (“We need to bring love into all our dealings”) and simplistic denunciations of capitalism and globalization that, in effect, indict just about anyone with a job in today’s market economy as an accomplice to the destruction of the planet.

We do get a blessing for a forthcoming environmental conference sponsored by the United Nations, an organization led by a man who recently warned that we have only four months to act if we are to save ourselves. I believe that is what’s known as alarmism.

This patriarchal statement does not portend well for the forthcoming “symposium” at various locales along Mississippi River in October. What will Orthodox Christian young people learn about environmental stewardship from this event? What witness will we offer to the wider culture?

This brief message is notable for its really one sided “exhausted Earth” view of stewardship (which really isn’t a guide to stewardship but to despair). There’s not a word about how exactly we are to help the poor if we replace “big business” with something else. But what?

Having endured, for the past year, one of the worst financial crises in decades, with much attendant suffering, and endless analysis as to its root causes — again a subject on which Orthodox Christians can charitably find room to disagree — we are now told that the market economy is “failing.” Certainly, the rapid rise of unemployment in the United States in the last year has caused a lot of anguish and suffering. We have an obligation as Christians to take this problem seriously. But we did not get a serious statement from the Phanar on the subject.

It seems not to have dawned on those composing this message that you cannot begin to address the very real problems of pollution and environmental degradation, including what goes on in lesser developed countries, unless you first create wealth. Things like solar power technology, hybrid vehicles, energy saving appliances, and thousands of other products and services designed to be green, are really luxury goods. They are, by and large, created by the same market economy that the patriarch condemns without qualification.

This statement is also mute on the question of social and human development. Which economic model is best suited to lift people out of dire poverty? Or is that a problem that can be cured by aid from rich countries — as is hinted at in the text? If simply throwing more money at the problem of dire poverty solves it, we would have “cured” poverty long ago. Whoever worked on this encyclical should buy a copy of Dead Aid, by Dambisa Moyo, for circulation at the Phanar. Continue reading →

“Then he who had received the one talent came and said, ‘Lord, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you have not sown, and gathering where you have not scattered seed. And I was afraid, and went and hid your talent in the ground. Look, there you have what is yours.’
“But his lord answered and said to him, ‘You wicked and lazy servant, you knew that I reap where I have not sown, and gather where I have not scattered seed. So you ought to have deposited my money with the bankers, and at my coming I would have received back my own with interest. So take the talent from him, and give it to him who has ten talents.
‘For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away. And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’

Matthew 25:24-30

Let me offer an admittedly radical, and maybe even frightening, thought experiment.

What if Orthodox parishes  and dioceses in the United States were to surrender their non-profit status and instead incorporate themselves as profit, or at least not for profit, institutions?

Continue reading →

This was originally posted on my own blog and then posted here in the comments section.  I thought for ease of those who read and comment here I would simply repost  it here for your comments.

In Christ,

+FrG

My post on the implication for the Orthodox Church of Novak’s understanding of capitalism (for the original post, click here)  has inspired an interesting, if not always edifying, conversation over at the American Orthodox Institute Blog where I cross posted the piece (for the post and comments, click here).

As I mentioned on the AOI blog, my interest in Novak’s work is not a technical interest (I am not primarily interested in how his understanding compares with who other scholars view capitalism) but on the anthropological vision that he says  contributes to the extraordinary success in capitalism (or a free market approach to the economy) is raising the standard of living for the vast majority of people on the planet.

This all came to mind when I read Matt Cavendon’s post (“Sowell and Benedict XVI on Economics and Culture“) on the Acton Institute‘s blog, Powerblog.   Continue reading →