Or...Toward a Christian view of, “Yours, Mine, and Ours”
As I talk with my Christian brothers and sisters lately regarding charitable giving and government policy and what approach we should advocate when it comes to providing for the poor it seems that many in the church are torn between supporting “state re-distribution of wealth” and individual liberty.
I want to at least begin a discussion of this matter by looking at the origins of property rights.
Karl Marx and Max Engels in “The Communist Manifesto” state that
“…, the theory of the Communists may be summed up in
the single sentence: Abolition of private property.”
I don’t for a moment think that all who hold to Marxist ideals are Marxists themselves, however Christians are easily confused because they equate the covenant body-life described in the book of Acts which is rightly seen as a Christian ideal social structure with Karl Marx’ view of state-imposed elimination of personal property.
The first is voluntary on an individual basis. The second is accomplished by force on a collective basis.
Even though that infamous couple in the fifth chapter of Acts had joined themselves voluntarily to the Church, their giving was still a matter of individual conscience before God even to the separating of husband and wife.
The difference between Christian charity and Marxism is not a subtle one but the difference between giving and taking.
by Dan B.
If the state decides how to give someone's wealth to someone else (assuming it's monies), the generosity or stinginess of the one with the wealth would seem to be gone. Is the one from whom the state took the wealth no longer accountable to God regarding his generosity or stinginess? What happens to sin and the one with the wealth? Can the one with the wealth no longer sin regarding the command to give to the poor? Someone/Something other than God has become god in the redistribution, don't you think? Is the person with the wealth then obliged to give any more to the poor? What happens to the people with little? Do they give anything (given the climate today)? Can wealth be something other than money? Does the state then get to redistribute that not-money wealth?
ReplyDeleteThank you for commenting on the post. You have asked some good questions.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that the government taking money or anything else from me absolves me from charitable giving, to my family in Christ first, and then more generally, anymore than being mugged would, though it would certainly decrease my ability to do so.
One of the sad effects of limiting my freedom to do as I would with what is mine is to eliminate generosity and thankfulness within a culture. God highly prizes both.