Are Capitalism and Christianity compatible?

[punisher73]

Just saw this on the news today, see what everyone else thinks on here.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/religion/2011-04-21-Christian_Capitalism_20_ST_N.htm?csp=34news

 

[SFC JeffJ]

Something about a rich man, a camel, and a needle.

Jeff

 

[LuckyKBoxer]

Who did they poll?
If they polled non christians I have a feeling they would say no its non compatible.
I would be more interested in seeing a poll conducted just using christians to see what they think. that would interesting.
I am just so sceptical of people and their intentions that I think that to many people would try to slant the poll results on purpose to make others look bad, or something look bad.
/shrug

 

[Flea]

Something about a rich man, a camel, and a needle.

Jeff

Rarin!

The first time I learned about John Calvin in a high school history class I slapped my forehead. Predestination is a closed logical circle. I'm entitled to what I have because I'm one of the anointed. How can you tell I'm anointed? Because I'm rich! That's why I'm entitled, you know ... The corollary to that being that the poor are entitled to their poverty because they're not anointed, and there's nothing they can do about it. Sorry. Have fun with your off-brand mac'n'cheez.

Yes, Calvinism and its subsidiaries were the economic breakthrough that fueled the industrial revolution and the middle class, so I'll give him that. It's a rising tide that did indeed lift all boats, at least in first and second world regions. But theologically? FAIL.

 

[punisher73]

Something about a rich man, a camel, and a needle.

Jeff

Elaborate please. The sentence and parable had meanings to what it was talking about.

 

[punisher73]

Rarin!

The first time I learned about John Calvin in a high school history class I slapped my forehead. Predestination is a closed logical circle. I'm entitled to what I have because I'm one of the anointed. How can you tell I'm anointed? Because I'm rich! That's why I'm entitled, you know ... The corollary to that being that the poor are entitled to their poverty because they're not anointed, and there's nothing they can do about it. Sorry. Have fun with your off-brand mac'n'cheez.

Yes, Calvinism and its subsidiaries were the economic breakthrough that fueled the industrial revolution and the middle class, so I'll give him that. It's a rising tide that did indeed lift all boats, at least in first and second world regions. But theologically? FAIL.

Not all Christians believe in "predestination", so is the predestination a theological fail or that capitialism and Christianity are a theological fail?

 

[punisher73]

Who did they poll?
If they polled non christians I have a feeling they would say no its non compatible.
I would be more interested in seeing a poll conducted just using christians to see what they think. that would interesting.
I am just so sceptical of people and their intentions that I think that to many people would try to slant the poll results on purpose to make others look bad, or something look bad.
/shrug

I agree with this. I think the article discusses who was interviewed and the breakdown of political views and economic status.

When I first heard this on the radio, they had interviewed an evangelical pastor and he stated his opinion that it was not compatible. But, HOW he defined "capitalism" was not a mainstream definition, he basically said that capitalism was competing for limited resources without any regard to any other person in which you only think of yourself. Hmmm, yep I can see how THAT definition doesn't fit.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Are Capitalism and Christianity compatible?

Yes and no depending on your perspective

But frankly it is the only one that even comes close to working with Capitalism

 

[Sukerkin]

Except that Islam does too. They have to do a little dance around some of the semantics of the Koran in places but they manage just fine. Plus, they actually manage to not have usury pillaging the finances of the poor, unlike the 'Christian' West.


Warning - anything below the following line are emotional words of someone fed up with organised religion and those words are likely to raise ire in religious people reading them ...

-----------------------------------------------

Actually, it's all safe now ... I had a few paragraphs of vitriol and venting but decided there was nothing to be gained by posting them. The Delete key is your friend .

 

[granfire]

Actually, it's all safe now ... I had a few paragraphs of vitriol and venting but decided there was nothing to be gained by posting them. The Delete key is your friend .

but typing it out sometimes helps, too, even if it falls victim to the 'delete' monster.

 

[fangjian]

All of those books get interpreted however people want to.

Take for instance, 'The 10 ( 613 ) Commandments'

Some Christians say, " I totally lead my life by these!!!!!"

Other Christians say, " Half ( of the 10 ) of them are so stupid. 'Thou shalt not kill', is ok, I guess "

I say, " Here where I live, our laws are so evolved compared to the commandments. Do people still take these seriously?! hahahahahaha Yeah? Oh. "

 

[elder999]

In some American evangelical circles, there’s an idea that goes something like this: progressive taxation = socialism, and socialism = satanic. Never mind the fact that both Thomas Jefferson and Adam Smith (the founder of modern capitalism) favored progressive taxation, I’m wondering where we got the idea that political structures aiming for economic equality—or at least some semblance of economic equality, true equality being unlikely if not impossible—are a bad thing?

Early Christians in the book of Acts practiced a form of voluntary socialism.Ponder what the apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 8:13-14:

“Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. The goal is equality … “

 

[billc]

Elder 999, it's the "voluntary" part that is important. Charitable giving needs to be of your own free will, not taken at gunpoint by the government as an excuse to line the pockets of politicians and government officials who hide behind social programs, and helping the poor simply to justify stealing.

 

[elder999]

Elder 999, it's the "voluntary" part that is important. Charitable giving needs to be of your own free will, not taken at gunpoint by the government as an excuse to line the pockets of politicians and government officials who hide behind social programs, and helping the poor simply to justify stealing.

While the issue is really whether or not "Christianity" is compatible with "capitalism," and that argument needs those terms more clearly defined, there is this:

Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is
to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the
higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they
rise." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1785.

“A heavy progressive tax upon a very large fortune is in no way such a tax upon thrift or industry as a like would be on a small fortune. No advantage comes either to the country as a whole or to the individuals inheriting the money by permitting the transmission in their entirety of the enormous fortunes which would be affected by such a tax; and as an incident to its function of revenue raising, such a tax would help to preserve a measurable equality of opportunity for the people of the generations growing to manhood.--Teddy Roosevelt, on progressive property and inheritance tax

“At many stages in the advance of humanity, this conflict between the men who possess more than they have earned and the men who have earned more than they possess is the central condition of progress. In our day it appears as the struggle of freemen to gain and hold the right of self-government as against the special interests, who twist the methods of free government into machinery for defeating the popular will. At every stage, and under all circumstances, the essence of the struggle is to equalize opportunity, destroy privilege, and give to the life and citizenship of every individual the highest possible value both to himself and to the commonwealth……
“No man should receive a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned. Every dollar received should represent a dollar?s worth of service rendered?not gambling in stocks, but service rendered. The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size, acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes, and in another tax which is far more easily collected and far more effective, a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against evasion, and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the estate.”-Teddy Roosevelt, on progressive income tax

 

[bushidomartialarts]

Who did they poll?
If they polled non christians I have a feeling they would say no its non compatible.
I would be more interested in seeing a poll conducted just using christians to see what they think. that would interesting.
I am just so sceptical of people and their intentions that I think that to many people would try to slant the poll results on purpose to make others look bad, or something look bad.
/shrug

For the Win

 

[elder999]

Elder 999, it's the "voluntary" part that is important. Charitable giving needs to be of your own free will, not taken at gunpoint by the government as an excuse to line the pockets of politicians and government officials who hide behind social programs, and helping the poor simply to justify stealing.

.

"The true measure of a man is not his intelligence or how high he rises in this freak establishment. No, the true measure of a man is this: how quickly can he respond to the needs of others and how much of himself he can give."
— Philip K. Dick