Sunday Morning Quarterbacking
By Brent Bourgeois

I sat this past Sunday morning in church, wondering once again if too much knowledge is a good thing, wondering if I am going to Hell for thinking the way that I do, wondering if anyone else in this fairly large congregation was thinking what I was thinking. If they were, then I’m afraid they were as uncomfortable as I was.

The opening act of Sunday Morning Quarterbacking with Brent began when my pastor, as he is wont to do, asked a serviceman who was leaving for a 2nd tour of Iraq to stand and be recognized. I have nothing against this in principle; after all, this guy needs some love and prayers for the danger he is about to face. What bothers me is the wrapping up of these soldiers in the almost idolic worship of the flag from the pulpit, the unquestioning support of such a noble cause- the bringing of the holy trinity of Freedom, Liberty, and Democracy to the Satanic Muslim hordes who so desperately need our help. It is just taken as a given that we are Right because we are Americans, and thus the things we do in the name of Freedom and Democracy are Right and Good, not to mention most Christian-like. The blind support of our leaders, no matter what they do, or how much they lie, is as further assured as the passing of the collection basket. Meanwhile, visions of Lutheran churches in Germany in the 1930s dance in my head.

The main sermon was straightforward enough: a variation on "You Can’t Take It With You When You Go", a missive that I had heard from this pastor on several previous occasions. Again, I have no problem with the premise- only the most cold-hearted Scrooge would disagree that it is best not to hoard one’s treasures, and Christian theology has repeatedly stressed the point that it is better to give than to receive. We heard from Paul’s letter to Timothy, “For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it.“ And, “People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.“ And finally, "Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share." -1Tim 6:7, 6:9-10, 6:17-18. There are so many places in the gospels that Jesus talks about greed and wealth and the lust for material things that one might get the impression that it was a topic that He felt quite strongly about.

Here again, though, is where the alarm bells go ringing loudly in my head. For I have never, in all of the years that I have been attending Christian churhes, heard the link made between the greed that Jesus and Paul talk so much about and our economic system of capitalism, especially the unbridled, unfettered brand that is currently in use by the West (or the North), which systemically seems to refute point-by-point every thing Jesus has to say on the subject. Don't think that I do not understand the deep doo-doo that I am stepping in by making this statement. For Capitalism stands next to Patriotism in the Pantheon of Untouchable Ideals that we Christians dare to criticize at our own peril. Nonetheless, the sad fact of the matter is, that all of the individual donations we give to charities, and, indeed, all of the charities in this country, big and small, and all of the good and righteous deeds that they do will not begin to compensate for the damage that transnational corporations, with the help of international organizations such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization, do in our name to the economic health and well-being of the vast majority of the world's population. In this era of 'Free Market Ubér Alles', absolutely nothing is supposed to stand in the way of a corporation's right to make the most profit that it can. It is in this context that economic globalization can be seen as the New Colonialism. For where we once had Nations ruling over 'uncivilized' foreign lands by sending in civil servants to run a colonial government, we now have transnational bankers sent in to poor countries to run their economies (into the ground) and open up their markets to behemoth corporations, who swoop in and buy up all major industries, leaving the poor country to once again, as in colonial days, provide raw materials and cheap labor to the wealthy nation. This becomes easier to comprehend when it is realized that when speaking of the world's 100 largest economic entities, Wal-Mart and ExxonMobil rank ahead of Indonesia, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Denmark, Poland, and South Africa. It is said in defense of the free market that 'a rising tide lifts all boats', when it would be more accurate to say, 'a rising tide lifts all yachts, while the dinghys sink in their wake'.

While the internals of this subject are complex, and certainly not appropriate for Sunday sermons, there is a fundamental disconnect between what we the people as individuals are taught about giving to the less fortunate in the world and then what We the People, as tacit proponents of this unregulated capitalism, take away from the very same people by proxy as a nation represented by corporations. Whether it is avoidance, or lack of understanding of the issue, or deemed inappropriate by the pastor, it is this disconnect that causes my brain to spazz during sermons like this past Sunday's. Forget the fact that an American Christian missionary's message of peace is completely contradicted in most foreign lands by the militaristic and aggressive actions of our government, the poor guy/gal is undermined even more by the Haliburtons, the Bechtels, the Monsantos, the WalMarts, the ExxonMobils, the CocaColas, and the McDonalds. Corporations are amoral. They have no soul. They are neither inherently good, nor inherently evil. Their entire raison d'etre is to make money for their shareholders. They are fundamentally designed to take more than they give, the more taking and the less giving, the better. Any good that they happen to do in a community is purely a coincidence. Certainly there are good people working in corporations, but they are completely subsumed by the very nature of the beast.

Those of us who were born and raised in the shadow of the Cold War were taught unquestioningly that Communism=Bad and Capitalism=Good. Compounding this idea was the fact that Communism=Atheism, so Capitalism must =Godliness. Socialism was considered Communism's 'lesser-of-two-evils' cousin, but I could never account for the existence of Christian Socialist parties in Western Europe. It now makes way too much sense to me. People just assume that to attack any part of capitalism is to attack 'our very way of life'. Well...that's true. Our very way of life needs to be examined critically and soberly to determine without predjudice how we got where we are and how we are maintaining this 'way of life'. It is an almost impossible task, given the reflexive jerking of the knees whenever the subject is broached. People just don't want to hear about it- "Don't ask, don't tell." It would be like finding out that the way your father got wealthy was by secretly owning a porn magazine. And that's how he met your mother. We prefer daddy to tell us the more romantic version, whether it is actually true or not.

This, then, is the sad state of my mind as I listen to the Sunday sermon. To those who would say that the pulpit is no place to pierce the myths and enlighten the masses to the more unfortunate truths about our nation, I would say if not there, then where? If not our moral leaders, then whom? Pastors have a great influence over the thought processes of their congregation. Many pastors are fond of the saying, "The bible says it, I believe it, that settles it!" I'm afraid that many in the congregation believe in a variant of this that goes, "My pastor said it, he believes it, so that settles it." When pastorss promote the flag, the sheep salute. When they offer no comment on war, or the ecological condition of the planet, this is a tacit endorsement of the status quo. And when they give sermons about our obligation to give, rather than receive, and never tie in the systemic contradictions of our economic system to this obligation, then they are, in my humble opinion, abrogating their responsibility as moral leaders. This is a highly unpopular opinion, especially in evangelical Christian circles, and it is causing me to re-examine where I attend church (I won't let the door hit me on the way out), and in what setting I would be most spiritually fed. I have this unsettling feeling that it's going to be a long search. BB