Ellul on the validity of economic systems

Don’t be deluded into thinking that Obama will solve all the world’s problems starting January 21, 2009. There is much we all can and need to do, although it’s probably not what you were thinking. Consider Jacques Ellul’s thoughts on the effectiveness of political parties and economic systems vs. individual actions and attitudes.

From pages 158-160 of Money and Power:

Of course we must do everything possible to relieve misfortune, approaching the poor as if we were speaking to Jesus Christ himself. Here the situation is strangely reversed. For do we approach Christ as if we were rich? Yes, of course, for we crucified him; that is, in his presence we certainly did take the attitude of the rich. But when we proceed like that, we well know what awaits us. Thus we can no longer deny our responsibility. In approaching the poor, we are required to get rid of the easy conscience of the rich. This is especially true if we see the poor as God’s personal question in our lives. Then the existence of misfortune becomes intolerable to us, and we will agree to do anything, to risk everything, to involve ourselves totally so that the situation of the poor can be changed.

But if their condition can change, does that mean we should work to turn the poor into the rich-and in so doing, cause them to pass from those who are pronounced “Blessed” to those who are warned “Woe to you, rich . . .”? For it never takes much for the poor to become rich. Once again, this is not the response asked of us. If, by extraordinary luck, we managed to get rid of all misfortune, to make everyone rich (first economically, then spiritually), then this “Woe to you” would ring out for everyone. Then we would pay for this universal happiness based on Mammon worship. There is no other possibility.

In this emergency, how should we offer the help that Christ’s compassion requires? All we can do, like what Christ himself did, is a prophetic sign of the coming kingdom. It is to bring hope and grace in material form to the poor who are indeed under the Lord’s blessing. Here we find ourselves in direct opposition to Marxism. But the ideal is not always a synthesis which unavoidably emasculates Christianity.

This opposition to Marxism is even more obvious when we consider that the Bible requires personal involvement. The question raised by the poor is not sociological but individual.

It is not an economic question either. The only place in the Bible where a person thinks that the problem of the poor is first of all a question of the distribution of money, and thus an economic question, is in the example given by Judas. For Judas the important thing is to give money to the poor. It is to settle the economic question. But he thinks this way precisely because he is Judas. And his attitude leads him with relentless logic to sell the Poor One. This judgment and this perspective are just as valid today. All who wish to see only the economic problem and restrict the poor to their lack of money are ultimately the Judases of the poor, and are led sooner or later to sell the poor to the powerful, as we observe in the Communist party.

The Need for Personal Involvement.

We do not have to respond with a sociological attitude or an economic system but by personal involvement.

Here, as in many other areas, Christianity rejects the system. The proper response to the poor will not be found in adherence to any group or program. To try to respond by joining a party, by accepting a program, by working at an institution, is to refuse responsibility, to escape into the crowds when confronted with God’s question. The solutions that we think are a response, whether social, economic or otherwise, are a dangerous lie. They are a way of getting rid of a troubling personal situation.

They are a way of turning over to the group, to others, to the collectivity, our own personal burden. “I’m not the one who’s responsible. It’s the owner, the communist, the fascist who is guilty. And it is the party, technology, the government who are responsible for putting things right. No doubt I will help out in this work. But I take nothing on myself. And I do so many things that I have done my duty toward the poor-I don’t need to know any of them because I work with others to change their situation.”

This is also a way of turning over to the future what is a question for the present. For we talk of moving toward a time (quite distant!) when there will be no more poor. We can forget the poor of today or even make them die a bit more quickly-today’s holocaust will assure better times to their great-great-grandchildren. Once again, it is a cheap way to avoid God’s question. We find again here, at the end of this long search, the ideas we put forth at the beginning.

The only attitude that Christianity can require is personal commitment. We must take personal responsibility for the state of the poor; this is being responsible before God. But we are entering dangerous territory. We must not sweeten the gospel to make it acceptable. All we can do is measure our faith against the Word spoken to us, God’s question which puts our life in question. To accept our responsibility is to enter into the spiritual and material condition of those who put God’s question to the world. It is, in fact, to become poor ourselves with the poor, with the Poor One. This is Jesus’ very attitude, joined to our own. Paul reminds us: “Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who … emptied himself…