When I think of the law of consecration, the United Order is what comes to my mind. However, while that was an attempt to put the law of consecration into effect in the community – in the physical world – there really is much more to the law of consecration.
Tangible, mortal things do play a role in living the law of consecration. Elder Bruce R. McConkie defined the law of consecration, plus the law of sacrifice, as follows:
Sacrifice and consecration are inseparably intertwined. The law of consecration is that we consecrate our time, our talents, and our money and property to the cause of the Church; such are to be available to the extent they are needed to further the Lord’s interests on earth.
The law of sacrifice is that we are willing to sacrifice all that we have for the truth’s sake—our character and reputation; our honor and applause; our good name among men; our houses, lands, and families: all things, even our very lives if need be. (Conference Report, Apr. 1975, p. 74; or Ensign, May 1975, p. 50)
What more are we to consecrate? Ourselves. Our will. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind” (Matthew 22:37). Since all that we have is given to us for a time by God, our will is all that we really have to offer anyway. By consecrating ourselves, by submitting our will to God’s will, we become saints, as the name of the Church tells us we are.
Being saintly is to be good, pure, and upright. For such persons, virtues are not only declared but lived. For Latter-day Saints, the kingdom of God, or the Church, is not a byline; rather, it is the center and the substance of their lives….
The Lord sets forth the way in which such progress is made. Said He, “Wherefore, seek not the things of this world but seek ye first to build up the kingdom of God, and to establish his righteousness” (JST Matthew 6:38). (Keith B. McMullin, “An Invitation with Promise,” Ensign, May 2001, 61)
Though we can be living what I call the mortal aspects of the law of consecration – consecrating our time, talents, and money to the kingdom of God – without consecrating themselves, we are like the righteous man who came to Christ, but was not yet ready to take the final steps by giving away all (Mark 10:17-22). There is a bit of selfishness remaining. But if our wills have been “swallowed up in the will of the Father†(Mosiah 15:7), then we will also be living the mortal aspects of the law. I imagine the order in which a person first lives the law of consecration would vary, since fully living it is something that comes incrementally.
And we are not alone as we learn to live the law of consecration.
In pondering and pursuing consecration, understandably we tremble inwardly at what may be required. Yet the Lord has said consolingly, “My grace is sufficient for you” (D&C 17:8). Do we really believe Him? He has also promised to make weak things strong (see Ether 12:27). Are we really willing to submit to that process? Yet if we desire fulness, we cannot hold back part!
Having our wills increasingly swallowed up by the will of the Father actually means an enhanced individuality, stretched and more capable of receiving “all that [God] hath” (D&C 84:38). Besides, how could we be entrusted with His “all” until our wills are much more like His? Nor could His “all” be fully appreciated by the partially committed. (Neal A. Maxwell, “Consecrate Thy Performance,” Ensign, May 2002, 36)
But as we really live the law of consecration, we receive a wonderful return. “And he that receiveth my Father receiveth my Father’s kingdom; therefore all that my Father hath shall be given unto him” (D&C 84:38). An amazing promise.
Also, in case you haven’t read it, I like Orson Scott Card’s take on the law of consecration.
Tanya: How can we be like the Law of Moses obeying man who wouldn’t sell all _and_ follow (physically) Christ? If as you suggest, we are living the mortal aspects, then we have done part I that the young man rejected. So, you are comparing physically following Christ with doing his will/subjecting our will to his?
Initially, it seems like one’s will would be changed as one consecrates their time, talents, efforts, etc. Granted, one might intentionally fake the consecration w/o real intent, which would prevent the changing of one’s will. But…without active intentional opposition, it seems like the will would naturally follow from living the mortal aspects.
I like your incremental suggestion; and often wonder if we take our covenants and the law of consecration literally, or just as a nice exhortation?
Several times, I’ve seen suggestions on life choices that would seem to be consecratory (am I playing scrabble here? lol…), yet are discarded by others as being illogical, not feasible, etc. Most likely, as you suggest, it is a process that differs for all and my ideas for consecrating might not be my neighboors. I’m thinking of the OSC suggestions in #49 and 50.
Folks don’t seem to want to live among the poor.
Is the process individually tailored? Or is there possibly a hierarchy or least common denominator of most likely steps one will take first?
Lyle, it’s true that the story in the New Testament I cited is talking about the mortal aspects of the law; however, I was taking it further in that he was not willing to subject his will to what Christ was asking him to do. In that case it was to sell all of his physical possessions, but it applies to anything we are commanded to do but don’t want to take that final step. So, yes, I was stretching it to a further conclusion.
I would say the process is individually tailored. What is easy for me to consecrate may be more difficult for another person. Your question as to the least common denominator of likely first steps is an interesting one, and I’m not sure of the answer. It seems that money (via tithing and fast offerings) and time (callings, VT/HT) are the first ones because that is what is emphasized within the church.
The issue about not living among the poor is an interesting one. I know it’s been touched on before, especially over at T&S. If I recall some tried tying it to racial issues, which I think is demonstrably incorrect.
I think one big issue seems to be the unfortunate correlation of poor neighborhoods with poor peership. That is crime, drugs, dysfunctional families and the like. Since peers for children appear to have even more of an effect on kids than parents, controlling peers seem one of the more important things we can do. But how can we do that without neglecting the poor? Further many of the poor are not dysfunctional but are hard working, law abiding, faithful good people. Is it fair to leave them in such environments?
This conflict between our duty for the less fortunate and our duty to our family has long troubled me. I don’t know what the answer is.
Well if you think there is tension Clark, I certainly feel better about it; i.e. my inability to come to a good resolution. I think Tanya is spot on regarding first steps. Currently, I don’t even have an official HT assignment, because they keep changing them, in part because the ward is only semi-solid in membership permanency (large number of grad students). However, I’ll admit that I could take a further step of being an official HT and/or reaching out more as a newer ward member. Any solutions to permanently changing ward membership are welcome; I’ve posted a thread about it today.
For temple endowed members, the Law of Consecration is something we have covenanted to live. For all members, it is something the scriptures and the Prophets have always taught.
We often discuss what this means in ‘our day and age’ because we have trouble disconnecting it with the United Order. Before I go any further, I would like to point out that there is no reason we do not currently live by this Order, or have Zion established on the earth other than our own unrighteousness. We aren’t waiting for a prophet to tell us to do it, we are only waiting for the membership of the church to live it, like in the days of Enoch and for those years in the BOM after Christ visited.
We often try to figure out what the law of consecration means outside of the United order, and as mentioned above, it is specifically outlined. I personally feel, that in general, we try to rationalize away the money aspect by emphasizing the consecration ‘of our time’ or ‘of ourselves’. I personally feel humans tend to do this because it is a broader less concrete form of consecration. HOwever, it is so important to realize how important the consecration of our money is. The Lord has never put a limit on what we should do. But I question in these latter days, with the knowledge we have and the convenants we’ve made, why we dont give more. This has been greatly emphasized lately by the brethren. We seem to be giving less and less. Yet our houses are getting bigger, our cars higher in price. My parents ward offers an extreme example, where in the parking lot you will find porshes, hummers, and even a ferrarri! I mean, how many people could we send on missions, how many could recieve higher education, how many could feed their children while seeking employment with the collective amount of just those 3 cars.
We are getting richer (Im speaking for the US, excuse my ethnocentricity). And we are giving less. You find wards as mentioned above within spitting distance of wards where many of the members struggle to provide the basic necessities for their families. When we live in a stake with members like this (when we live in the world with those who are less fortunate then ourselves), we are OBLIGATED and have COVENANTED to provide for them. This sort of inequality should not exist within the church. In Zion, all things will be common among them. In Zion, there will be no poor. And in Zion, there will be no rich. There is nothing preventing us from establishing Zion today.
We justify these situations, shutting ourselves off from the poor, unwilling to admit to ourselves that they exist. We drive around ‘their’ neighborhoods not through, refuse to buy a house in ‘their’ neighborhood. We make excuses that they are unsafe, that they are criminals or illegal immigrants or have brought their awful situations on themselves and so somehow deserve it (how wrong is this idea: IM rich cause IM blessed, your poor cause God has punished you) I get scorned by people in other wards for the area I live in because its ‘not safe’, yet my ward is the closest experience to Zion I have ever experienced, and that will surely be something that will teach and bless my (future) children in deeper ways than having 60 other youth and being ‘safer’.
Make no mistake that living the law of consecration means avoiding -at all costs- conspicuous consumption, it means making sure there are no poor among us, and yes, this means often sacrificing things we want (and convince ourselves we need), this means not buying things for ourselves or our kids even if we can afford it, and it means going out of our comfort zone.
(sorry for the extra long post)
Thank you, Tanya, for a wonderful post on an important topic, and one that can be tricky to pin down. I agree with all the points you made.
Re the question of material goods brought up in Another Julie’s comment #5. Avoiding “conspicuous consumption” sounds easy, but as one who has lived in many different countries over the years, I have seen that in many places “conspicuous consumption” could well include having running water, more than two sets of clothing, a washing machine, a refrigerator, etc. It may be relatively easy for us to judge those with more things than we have as having too much. It seems harder to decide how much is too much for ourselves.
How much is “enough” to give away? At times, members have been asked to give all to the Church, but it seems that nowadays we are expected to save to be self-sufficient over our entire lifetime.
I have known many couple missionaries who have contributed enormously to building church leadership and aiding humanitarian and educational efforts in developing countries. They could only do that because they had put aside enough money to support themselves on their missions after retirement. If we have more than enough for our daily needs, do we save to support our children in college? Do we allow for the possibility that we might have to pay for nursing home care? Are these kinds of things “wants,” or are they needs?”
Perhaps we can make this subject a matter of individual (and family) prayer, thought, and discussion. We can then try to be sensitive to promptings of the Spirit for our own situations. Those of us of modest means can make extra official contributions, or put money in an envelope to slip into the purse of someone we know is in want, or give it to the bishop to disperse anonymously outside the regular channels.
We don’t need to worry too much about what those around us are doing. We may see only ostentatious living in those who have expensive cars; but through the years I have learned that many of those who live in large houses are also giving enormous amounts (many times, anonymously) to help the poor in a variety of ways. There are apparently many individuals who are “on call,” in the sense of being ready and willing to give high sums of money to a worthy cause when the Church informs them of a special need. Whether we have much or little to give, we can all be “on call;†and as we progress in having “our wills increasingly swallowed up by the will of the Father,†we will help to build a Zion society. We will increasingly “be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of [our] own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness.†(D&C 58:27)
Another Julie’s post reminded me of a story from the time Salvador Allende took over as the Communist President of Chile. The story is that Communist officials descended on this farmer to explain to him how the Communist society would work.
“If you have two houses”, said the official, the Party will take one of the houses and give it to the poor.”
“That is very wise”, said the farmer.
“And if you have two cars”, said the official, “the party will take one of those cars and use it to help the poor.”
“That shows great compassion,” said the farmer.
“And if you have two cows…
“Wait a minute,” said the farmer, “I HAVE two cows.
Jefe, I usually think your posts are boss, really boss. But as you know there’s a difference between a Socialist/Communist system where the government takes everything and truly theocratic consecration, where one makes a conscious choice to give to the Church. Viva la diferencia!
Jefe/Geoff,
When I hear Socialist/Communist uttered in a single breath by an American, I know that what he is really suggesting is that the when a people choose through their elected representatives to coordinate a modicum of their concern for the poor through their government, it is the moral equivalent of Stalinist mass murder.
It isn’t.
The military, the courts, the police, the foreign service, even the legislature—all of these are entitlement programs, as is the Bill of Rights. If you don’t believe this, imagine who would react and why if one or other of these things were taken away.
God also appears to be interested in these things. His idea of inalienable rights appears to be rather broad, and includes provision for widows, orphans, the poor, and the sick.
It is important to establish some context for “Thou shalt not steal”, since it is frequently used as an argument against using taxes to benefit the poor and the sick, rather than just the police, the prisons, and the military.
Consider, for instance, the argument of the Diggers or True Levellers, from England in Cromwell’s day, as Gerard Winstanley addresses the aristocracy :
Put more briefly :
How could it be more blunt? Inequalities of wealth or power are bad.
Americans usually think of some unspecified notion of freedom as primary, and economic inequality as its inevitable price. This seems to me spectacularly wrongheaded. Look at the sequence in the following passage—conversion, peace, justice, equality and freedom—remembering particularly that the original revelation came without punctuation :
Conversion leads promptly to the practice of honest, patient, helpful discussion all round (unless there is another proper way to banish “contentions and disputations”). The mutual understanding gained in the process opens everybody’s eyes to dealing justly—not mercifully, justly—one with another, with the natural result that they had all things common among them. This made them all free, and grateful for the Lord’s gift.
Well, our own Orderville is still fondly remembered although it lasted only about ten years; by contrast the Hutterites (or Hutterian Brethren), having only a few references in the New Testament for guidance, have had all things common for the best part of 5 centuries now—but as they freely admit, they’ve been terrible missionaries. They don’t have the Doctrine and Covenants, the Book of Mormon, the endowment, or the Quorum of the Twelve.
So what’s the holdup for us? For my money, it is the widespread belief among American Mormons, both folk and elite, in the know-nothing ultra-Americanism common among Republicans of the American South and West.
I don’t think much United Order stuff will happen until American Mormons start really wanting it. Perhaps God will arrange for an appropriate transformation of the social landscape to make it more inviting. That is what he did in Third Nephi, and not entirely through preaching.
–ATW
RoAnn, what you are saying is all well and good. But it is exactly what I’m talking about and ATW better explained. Conspicous Consumption IS easy to define. It consumption for the purpose of being conspicous. To further my previous example of cars, well, you need a car thats perfectly justified. Does a, say, civic get you to work as well as a, say, corvette? The corvette is for looks.
We American Mormons go to great lengths to justify that what we are curretly doing IS living the law of consecration, whatever it is we are doing. But but but…we have to save money (for good causes!) and we have to have big houses (for our big families!)….and those big families have to have excessive wardrobes (they can’t look stupid at school!) and we have to drive excessive cars (I have an image to maintain at my job, which I have to provide for my family!). The fact is if in our hearts we were truly filled with Charity we would be doing SO MUCH MORE than any of us are. I never said it has to be through “official channels”. I dont care if you personally give some cash to someone or donate it to the humanitarian fund and I dont think Heavenly Father does either.
We have a tendency in the US (as ATW pointed out) to say that our money, whether it be taxes or tithing or personal gifts, is OUR money, and that it is the ‘American Way’ to ‘get your own’. I gained this success from nothing, why can’t they! I was poor once too you know! We believe in being self-sufficient, those lazy [Admin Note: removed inappropriate word] shouldn’t rely on me! I have to save for retirement, and I couldn’t possibly live in a smaller house when my kids leave home! We only worry about ourselves and justify it at all costs.
Why, helping the poor, thats Communism! Socialism! Stalinism! Dude, [Admin Note: removed inappropriate word], Im moving to Cuba.
Alma: When I hear Socialist/Communist uttered in a single breath by an American, I know that what he is really suggesting is that the when a people choose through their elected representatives to coordinate a modicum of their concern for the poor through their government, it is the moral equivalent of Stalinist mass murder.
Alma, I’m not sure that’s true. I do think though that there are valid concerns about excessive redistribution of wealth by many. But to characterize it the way you do seems unfair to say the least.
Alma: How could it be more blunt? Inequalities of wealth or power are bad.
But of course it doesn’t follow that all solutions are ethically justifiable or wise. The ends don’t always justify the means.
BTW – Art says hi. (He’s sitting here beside me)
Another Julie: Conspicous Consumption IS easy to define. It consumption for the purpose of being conspicous. To further my previous example of cars, well, you need a car thats perfectly justified. Does a, say, civic get you to work as well as a, say, corvette? The corvette is for looks.
Doesn’t that presuppose that one’s only use for a car is to get you to work? For instance if I decide to cut back on luxuries like going to movies, work extra hours, and then buy a Porsche because I like to drive fast and accelerate, am I engaged in Conspicuous Consumption? Yet if I eat out, go to movies, don’t try to advance in work, and don’t have the Porsche, I am somehow better?
These are the sorts of situations that make my head spin.
This is, of course, a different situation from what Alma talked about – providing a base level for the poor. Further it avoids the “obvious” cases of Conspicuous Consumption like rappers buy platinum caps for their teeth and running around wearing millions in jewelry. All designed to show how powerful they are. I’m not at all convinced that all or even most things labeled Conspicuous Consumption fit into that.
Alma,
Are you the same Alma Wilson I knew in the BYU Foreign Language Housing Ward? If so, Nice to hear from you! My wife, Chastity, and I remember you and your family with fondness.
So your saying if we aren’t as bad as p diddy its not conspicous? Has 50 Cent covenanted to live the way we have? I mean, there will always be someone who is worse, but, that doesn’t justify bad behavior. Seriously, are you hearing yourself? And guess what, buying a porsche for the reasons you gave are still conspicous. You aren’t buying cause you need it. And do you seriously think that eating out or going to movies too much is the equivalent of buying a $400,000 car? When you cut back on doing those things, instead of saving up for a car, why don’t you give that money to someone who is struggling ot pay rent or put food on the table, or simply giving for Fast Offering? And since we are splitting hairs, can you really justify needing to buy a car if you dont need it to get to work or transport to school or some such mandatory place? But, lets not get to hung up on cars here. That was just an obvious example. Do we need someone to count the steps, so to speak?
The reason debt and bankruptcy are skyrocketing in america is because we buy too much – we over consume(oh but that helps the economy! Im helping my country when I buy my kid $150 sneakers and $70 jeans!). The poor are getting poorer, the rich richer, and sadly this is true in the church as well. Yet, we have all covenanted to live a lifestyle that should prevent this from happening.
No. I’m saying there are obvious places we’ll agree are conspicuous consumption but many more that seem ambiguous without knowing a lot about the motivations of the people.
Another Julie, are you saying that if one is living, or trying to live, the law of consecration, that means any spending of time or money for something pleasurable (assuming it isn’t something specifically sinful) is automatically wrong if not everyone has the resources to do that?
The point of the story about Chile was that it is easy to criticize others for conspicuous consumption, but OUR ways of spending the money is justified.
I happen to know of someone who was donating $10,000 a month to fast offerings. Was he doing all he could for the poor? I have no way of knowing, but members of our ward were not aware of how much he gave. I guess maybe some would have judged his lifestyle as conspicuous consumption although it did not appear all that different from his neighbors to me. And in the eyes of many who live in third world countries, most of the expenditures that Americans make could be viewed as luxuries, even those that live at the poverty level.
No, I am addressing the justification of wastefulness and over-consumption. Once again, this is not about having our steps counted for us. Its about looking at our own life and saying, do I REALLY need that? As well as prayfully considering how you can curb your spending and saving to give more in fast offerings.
I will share an example. I know a lady whos husband is a highly succesful lawyer in Atlanta. They are extremly wealthy. She had closets and closets full of clothes and shoes. She spent thousands of dollars decorating her home for Christmas. She had enough jewelry to fill a dresser drawer. She wasn’t trying to not give to the needy, she was simply living as the others of ‘her station’. One day (after reading about Mother Theresa in combination with the scriptures) she looked at her life and realized it wasn’t in harmony with Christ’s example. She gave all her clothes to the poor (she limits her wardrobe drastically: a couple sunday dresses and enough clothing for a week or two). She gave away her christmas decorations. Most of her kids were grown. She adopted special needs orphans from third world countries. She monetarily supports a lepor community in India. She walks the walk.
THIS woman lives the law of consecration. We know that with blessings comes responsibility, and to the wealthy members of the church, the responsibility is great. For those who aren’t wealthy the principle is the same and our responsibility is equal to our measure.
But Julie, when you ask, “do I REALLY need that” doesn’t that presuppose that we should only have what we need? i.e. no TV, no movies, no climbing gear, no books, no computer for the internet at home, etc.
I just don’t buy that.
We can always find the people who aren’t helping the needy, who are living beyond their needs, and so forth. But it seems to me you’ll find little argument over such people. The more interesting cases are regular folk like us.
Kudos to your friend from Atlanta, Julie. I think it is wonderful. But each of us has to make that decision for ourselves, and we should not be too quick to criticize others. One interesting thing about the law of consecration is that you donate all to the Lord, and you receive back a stewardship. Included in this stewardship is what you need to live on.
But no one tells you how to spend it. If you decide you want to eat steak and croissants, that is your choice. If you decide you will eat hamburger and spaghetti, and use what you save to buy a boat, that is also your choice.
When President Hinckley announced the PEF, they had a monetary goal. That goal has been met several times over. The members of the Church opened up their hearts and their wallets and responded to the call of the prophet. The are still doing so. We should not be too judgmental about what others are doing with their means.
Another Julie,
It seems to me that the Law of Consecration we covenant to live says that we will consecrate (consecrate. tr.v. 3. To dedicate solemnly to a service or goal) our time, talents, property, and lives, to 1 ) building up the Church and 2 ) establishing Zion.
You seem to want to equate giving our non-essentials to the poor with living the Law of Consecration. I disagree.
Giving to the poor and avoiding excess are only part of the Law of Consecration inasfar as they build up the Church and help to establish Zion (The Pure in Heart and the City).
Is it possible to give to the poor in ways that do not help build up the Church? I think so. While letting go of our extravagances may help us become personally more “pure in heart,” is it possible to give them up without it contributing to the common goal of establishing Zion? I think that it is.
We live the Law of Consecration when we dedicate all we have, not to the cause of the poor, but to the cause of the Church. We help the cause of the poor only in as far as it coincides with the cause of the Church.
As long as we are willing to give whatever the church has asked or whatever it may ask of us in the future, we are living the Law of Consecration. What has the Church asked us to do in relation to the poor? We have been asked to give a generous fast offering, to contribute to the humanitarian aide system of the church, and to support the Perpetual Education Fund.
Anything beyond that is between the individual and the Lord. If he asks us personally to sacrifice more, we should be willing to do so; but we should not demand that others sacrifice more just because we feel the Lord want us to.
As long as they are willing to do whatever the Church asks, and are submissive to whatever additional promptings the Lord may give to them personally, they are living the law of consecration and keeping their covenant–even if they have wealth beyond their needs.
Another Julie,
I admire your desire to not live in “better” areas. I think that is great. I also admire your ability to see those in need around you and feel the obligation is yours to help all you can.
I would like to say though that it IS difficult to determine was is conspicuous consumption. My best friend took her children school shopping at the D.I. Should I also be required to only shop at thrift stores because that is all she can afford? I can afford to buy $15 JC Penney shirts. Someone else I know can afford to buy $50 shirts. And we know there are others in the world who don’t buy clothing every year.
Which of us is spending too much? It is all relative.
No matter how little you spend, you have more than others. If you have 3 cars you could have 2. If you have 2 cars you could have 1. If you have 1 car you could take the bus. If you spend $ on the bus, you could walk…..etc.
I think we should pay our tithing.
I think we should live within our means.
I think we should look for ways to help others, included financially.
I think we should never let our possessions own us.
Tithing lets us give 10% happily to the Lord. It shows that us if he asks, we could give 11%, 15%, 20%.
It helps us think about the concept. If he asked us to give it all, would we do so without hesitation?
But until he asks for it all, shouldn’t we be wise stewards? If you have no savings account then when a crisis happens you have to turn to payday loans and then you waste your future money on fees and interest and it is not a wise use of your future funds.
It is not money that is evil, but the love of money or the love of possessions. You may hate the Porsche, but how do you know where the heart of that person is? Could that person really have purchased 10 porsches, but decide one would be enough? Does that person give 10x that amount in other donations?
I don’t think spending $15 on a shirt is too much. If someone else spends $50 on a shirt, I hope it is because they could spend $100 but decide that $100 wasn’t being wise in their stewardship and here was a great looking shirt for $50. And if someone else spends $100 on a shirt, I hope it is becuase they really could spend $200 on a shirt….
That is the only way you can justify your:
Running water
Vehicle of any kind
Furniture
Meal at a restaurant
Gifts
Piano lessons for your child
Books for your children
Plane fare to see your family
etc.
J Max Wilson
Good points. Thank you.
I thought about the fact that the Church has funds, but they try to be very careful with those funds. They are their for the building of the kingdom of God and church need to be built, utilities need to be paid, etc. Not all the tithing money or resources of the church are used for humanitarian aid or the welfare system.
The welfare system of the church is great, and I think we can remind ourselves to look at our fast offerings and think about whether we can be more generous. I think I can.
We can look at whether we could give to the PEF. I think I can do that also.
Another Julie,
The average cost of Internet access in the U.S. is about $20 per month, so I’ll guess you pay that much.
For less than $18, you can supply 37 Ethiopian children with sight-saving antibiotics.
Does that mean you value the luxury of having your own Internet access more than saving the eyesight of 37 children every month? After all, Internet access can hardly be considered a necessity, considering that humanity managed to survive several thousand years without it.
If we asked the parents of those children whether they felt you, Another Julie, should spend money on Internet access or on drugs to save their children from going blind, what do you think they would say?
Is there a rational reason why it’s OK for you to spend money on Internet access instead of helping the poor, but not OK for someone else to spend money on a different non-necessity instead of helping the poor?
Another Julie, what does “counting the steps” mean? I have never heard/read that term before. What evidence do you have (statistics, studies, etc) that the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer specifically within the church? How and why exactly are the poor in the church getting poorer as you claim? I don’t know about you, but in our ward we are often flooded with a deluge of talks on “preparedness” a.k.a. financial fitness, budgeting, spending, saving, etc. It’s not as if bishops aren’t desperate to help these people find a ways to improve their situation.
I come from an average middle-class family, not a lot of extra money growing up, and I have financially supported myself since I was 16-years old, but I have always seen it as a blessing to the church when it’s members make more money. More money equals more tithing and donations. Yes, the wealthy and well-to-do run the risk of becoming worldly, but I’m not going to be their judge. As far as I’ve seen in my short life, the only person I can even hope to make slightly more perfect is me.
I can’t donate buckets of money to the church, but I do (after a long pause to see if anyone else raises their hand) admit to playing the piano when the need arises.
My, what a lot of invective against the idea that any of us might be using any of our worldly stewardship in less than celestial ways!
To the question of why there are “worse neighborhoods” and “better neighborhoods”- who is going to attract more theft, the ancient hatchback with the puppy’s toys and the kids socks in the seat, air condidioning by rolling down the window and heating if your lucky, or the porche with the ultimate in sound systems and all the bells and whistles? Ok, so why is crime more prevalant in the hatchback’s neighborhood? It wouldn’t be – but who is the city council going to listen to when they show up (or phone) unhappy because “unsavory types” have started hanging out on the corner- the hatchback’s owner or the porche’s? Who’s going to get more detectives put onto the theft of their only vehicle, the porche’s owner or the hatchback’s? How about the poor students who only have a bicycle to get to work and to school – how many detectives will be put on that?
As I read the scriptures, the Lord has no objection to anyone having wealth – just more wealth than each other (“wherefore, the world lieth in sin”-Doctrine and Covenants 49). If I have a piano and you have a horse (didn’t Chastisty do horseback riding, Jon? – Hi from all of us!) we’re all wealthy. But if I use my resources to the extent that I cannot help you – for example, buying grand pianos when I know you need groceries- it seems to me that that is being unrighteous.
Also, the Lord has placed no restrictions on who we are to give to – stating, instead that we should not turn away the beggar, even if they have brought their troubles on themselves, because turning them away constitutes serious sin (see Mosiah 3). No, we aren’t asked to do without anything that gives us joy (look at ‘thank offerings’ in the Old Testament) but we are supposed to elevate those around us to our own level of material wealth – and then the Lord has promised and shown that he will lift us all together.
I was trying to say- and don’t think I was clear- that when those of us with money and power to live in better neighborhoods care as much about our brother’s neighborhood as our own, we won’t have better and worse neihborhoods any more – just neighborhoods.
> As I read the scriptures, the Lord has no objection to anyone having wealth –
> just more wealth than each other (“wherefore, the world lieth in sin”-
> Doctrine and Covenants 49).
Nancy, income per capita for the world is about $5500 per year. Please feel free to distribute to the poor of the world whatever income you have above that (unless, of course, you believe that the poor in other parts of the world aren’t as deserving of your charity.)
Look, I’m not trying to argue that we shouldn’t help the poor. I’m just trying to show that it’s not simply a matter of redistributing money.
Hello again Jon, Chastity, Clark and Art,
Good to run into you all again; it brings back many pleasant memories.
Are you all living in Utah at the moment? I find the politics of Utah uncongenial in many respects. Nevertheless, one little-known fact pleases me greatly.
One measure of income inequality is to take the ratio between the average income of the top fifth of the population, and divide it by the average income of the bottom fifth. The bigger this ratio, the greater the income inequality between these two layers, according to this measure. Guess how Arizona and Utah compare on this measure? Well, Arizona consistently scores near the top (high inequality) and Utah consistently scores near the bottom (low inequality).
For years, I have been told, Utah had by this measure the lowest level of inequality of the 50 states. Last time I looked, which was a couple of years ago, Utah had been bumped out of that spot by Indiana, but Utah was still second.
I have long thought that this result should be consternating alike to Democrats and Republicans, if for different reasons.
Clark
Fair enough, Clark. I know as well as you do that reasonable people aren’t going to conflate Sweden and Stalin when fully conscious. My objection to the ‘socialist/communist’ conflation used so freely by ultra-Americanists—and by no-one else—is that people who habitually conflate socialism and communism in speech also conflate them in thought and argument. They take an immensely broad tradition that includes non-statist pacifist agrarian Christian Hutterites, the British Labour Party, Scandinavian Social Democratic Parties, and Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge, and reduce it to a single pole, which they then characterize by its worst exemplars.
There is a long anticommunist tradition in the US, and it invariably conflates social insurance of health or basic income with socialism, socialism with communism, communism with violent revolution, violent revolution with permanent dystopia, and all of these things with atheism.
Have you tried talking about universal health care with Americans? Up from their limbic systems pops the phrase ‘socialised medicine’. They aren’t thinking about thinking about Saskatchewan, let alone Sweden or Japan or Costa Rica, all of which offer models worthy of at least a glance. No. The ghost of Stalin is rattling back there somewhere.
The ‘socialist/communist’ conflation really is peculiar to ultra-Americanism, where it often seems more common than either of the individual terms. It is otherwise so uncommon that I have never seen it elsewhere.
What is the use of so unwieldy a term? The ideological usefulness of this much-repeated conflation, which makes Stalinism and social legislation immediate neighbors in the mindspaces of those who mouth it, should be apparent to anyone even passingly familiar with the uses of obfuscated language.
You are welcome to offer any explanation that you find more convincing.
We’re in different, but perhaps congenial, brainspaces here.
I’m not much fond of “solutions” let alone “ethical justifiability” or the “ends/means” variant of cost-benefit analysis. All of them reek of the willingness of one group of people to avoid seeing another group of people as interesting and befriendable fellowbeings, but rather to regard them condescendingly as a problem that needs solving. (I slip into this easily myself when I get to arguing.) It is priestcraft. And it doesn’t work with even our own young children–how can it possibly work anywhere else?
There are many ways to “possess that which is above another”. The difficulty lies not in our divers gifts, but in our will to control.
There must be countless opportunities for humility, true ways to let go of ‘that which is above another’. There must be countless opportunities for pride, ways to grasp after or to hold ‘that which is above another’. There must be countless opportunities for self-righteousness, where we can feign one kind of humility, even to ourselves, the better to retain or secure another kind of pride. Satan’s only tool is the lie.
Inequality is the outward sign of an inward disgrace. The root is not inequality but the love of it. We often conceal that love oh especially from ourselves; we plug our ears, we shut our eyes, we dull our hearts, but it shouts from our rooftops.
But hey, at least by one horribly crude measure of inequality, Utah does well compared to most states in the Union. Unfortunately, by the same measure, it does not do all that well compared to most other countries.
Alma, by the same measure as your comments on “ultra-Americans” I can paint a similar picture of “ultra-Europeans” who see Americanism and Fascism as the same. The point is, so what? In all reality precious few people fit into such categories. Why attack jingoism with jingoism?
BTW – when you talk socialized medicine, I think most Americans do think Saskatchewan (or rather Canada). I’ve never met anyone who thought of Lenin or Stalin. Rather they think Britain and Canada. Coming from Canada I can assure you I’d not want a Canadian styled system. At the same time though I think something needs to be done about the uninsured. It just has to be a system that allows choice and encourages conservation.
My complaint in these sorts of debates, is the the discussions tend to hinge on the meaning of equality in a way that I just can’t figure out. As the example I gave suggests, people can have different wants and allocate resources differently. Is the thrifty person who saves up for a Porsche really worse than the person who doesn’t work extra and who eats out?
None of this is to deny that peoples *needs* must be taken care of. However I think it a fair point to suggest that we haven’t agreed upon what the needs are nor how best to meet them. Yet those assumptions are often taken for granted – usually by simply bringing up an extreme case everyone agrees upon. (i.e. the starving family)
Clark,
I spoke only of ‘ultra-Americanism’, not of ‘ultra-Americanists’, and certainly not of ‘ultra-Americans’. People are usually more interesting and lovable than the political creeds they profess. Even when they aren’t, their faults are human rather than philosophical.
(As a small grammatical point, ‘ultra-Americanist’ would be the correct way to refer to an adherent of ‘ultra-Americanism’; an ‘ultra-American’ could only be a caricature.)
To reduce someone to a political philosophy or other personal detail is uncomfortable to me—I get embarrassed when I hear ‘blonde’ used as a noun.
Nor do I find the term ‘ultra-Americanism’ jingoistic. There has to be some way refer to that distinct, well-recognized cluster of ideas. Of the terms that occured to me, ‘ultra-Americanism’ was kinder than any equally accurate and more accurate than any equally kind. If you have a better term, I’d be happy to hear it.
As for national health coverage, I have lived in New Zealand, Australia and the United States, and I much prefer the medical care I was given in New Zealand and Australia. If I were living there, Canada’s medical system would probably seem more congenial to me than to you; I expect that having Canadian medical education integrated with American requirments probably makes is very easy for American medical employers to drain Canadian-trained medical people.
American medical care is vastly overpriced, and market rational rather than plan rational.
Thus, for instance, health insurers in the United States routinely make certain diagnostic procedures difficult or unaffordable even though early detection would improve prospects and lower aggregate long-range costs. They do this because, even though the overall cost would be lower, by the time the disease becomes obvious it will be the responsibility of some other insurer…
I fail to see why protecting people generally from possible external aggressors and the hazards of war by paying for and arming a national military is philosophically different from protecting people generally from possible internal diseases and the hazards of sickness by paying for and equipping a national heath service.
The fact of the matter is that in most well-off countries and some not-so-well-off countries, people have a national health service and prefer it that way.
As for quibbles about definitions, inequality may indeed be difficult to specify, but then so is pornography. But are the world’s grossest inequalities really so indiscernable? As Upton Sinclair famously said :
Clarity comes through struggle.
Inequality is part of the price we pay for progress and freedom. China had fantastic equality when the Communist aristocracy, few in number, lived like kings, and the shortage was divided amongst the peasants. So too in Cuba today.
Now that China is growing its economy at an exponential rate (8-12% a year), the inequality has become enormous. China does not have political freedom, but they have freed their economy substantially.
Under our political systems, we can have equality and stagnation, or inequality and dynamism. Most of our political arguments are based on how far we think the middle point should be between these two extremes.
In the city of Zion, if we are a perfected people, I presume we can have both equality and dynamism. There will be no poor, no aristocracy, and no envying of the rich.
There is a misconception, in my mind, respecting consecration.
Since the relationship between God and man is designed to be personal and indidvidual, why would any of us condemn what any one else would wear, drive, eat, or live in.
Abraham was a wealthy man, but he still had servants.
D&C 59:5-24 seem to me to better define what our attitudes and feelings should be, than condemning someone for not fitting our personal mold of a consecrated person.
President Benson was as committed a person as I know, but he would only recommend one type of vehicle to his friends and family, and it was not one most of us could afford.
Hi one and all,
A few comments as food for thought.
Firstly, I’ve lived as both a wealthy man and a poor man. Both lifestyles have had their traps–but I preferred being rich, sometimes for the shallowest of reasons (e.g. because my clothes just smelled better being washed in liquid Tide, my air conditioning could be run shamelessly, and, frankly, and this is even more to my shame, the nanny just took care of some of the menial stuff that took up so much of my time.)
And then there were the shackles of my past. The reality that I had enshrined my poverty, presenting it as a reason why others were to feel guilty–like Columbo I lived beyond the shackles of the pressed shirt and tie. However, as sense (or was it dollars) set it, I tolerated too well the cash that was bulldozed into my living room. It seemed more fulfilling than the rantings of a poor man looking to feel better about himself. And anyhow, old cars almost cost as much in repairs as newer ones cost in payments. And reliable transportation is vital in my line of work, rationalization 3, 4, etc.
But now I’m staying at a friends house (or I became his friend as I got needier). He has a recliner rocker that’s comfortable, but made of vinyl. I dream of leather–it breathes against the back.
And I am no longer living on the hill, outside city plumbing limits, but deposit waste in the same sewer systems as the rest of you now. Life is truly difficult.
Actually, the answer to the question isn’t equality, per se. Neither is it 42. Believe it all not it’s closer to the enthronement of ALL man. We are to become like God and inherit all he has and become comfortable with wealth and power…BUT IN ALMOST ALL CASES, NOT NOW. Faithfulness to the gospel of love, then the resources to promote that same gospel.
In fact only when the master returned did he give double portions to the men who’d doubled their talents (yes, and I am aware that means something like moral stewardship in this context).
But sometimes people are born to it–should they badger their parents into giving away their family possessions? Yes, but they can’t. Because the process anesthetizes their young, who are usually as blind to their own folly, as are the poor. And yes, you heard me right.
The power to expand goodness is dependent on money (time, energy, friends, greased hands, brown nosing, but NOT kowtowing). May be you have a groundbreaking book on inequality but can’t pick up a commercial publisher, what then? Do-it-yourself publishing with a 5000 book run, and you selling less than ten percent of them? Great way to change the world. (You see, because you are poor you don’t generate the connections, charisma and passion that well-to-do movers and shakers can). And that book should have changed the world. Should have.
But I know a little bit about money and although their are more plums on a westerner’s tree for the poor to reach and grab (businesses will start tomorrow, a few of them will succeed, some very well), the poor usually can’t figure out how to influence others and position resources successfully.
Those with a lot of money (esp. those born to it) wear it like a sub context, a nearly imperceptible language to the rest of us. Many seem to be able to look you in the eyes and sniff out your credit score and approximate net worth without even looking in the parking lot. And then they won’t talk to you. Not necessarily because you have lice, but because you are not a worthwhile business contact (or, yeah, and might snatch their purse.)
Father’s share secrets to sons, but if your father was poor…your chances really are slim. But its the land of the free and we are enslaved by it.
And finally, Nancy Wilson said something about neighborhoods and theft. Yes, she’s probably right on most her points. But let me say something else. The wealthy are often not robbed because their neighborhoods seem unapproachable, a reminder to the crack addict that his life is unworthy. Add that to the anxiety of being caught and his heart might seem to approach arrest faster than the rest of him. Yes, I’d venture its years of subliminal deference to wealth and power that keeps their stealing downtown.
More at some other time, perhaps.