A Little Note of Clarification

Someone asked me after hungry sunday night if I was a communist... so I thought I better clarify something I said.

This was in the context of talking about cultural barriers to true community and describing our world as a broken world, with the manifestation of that brokenness coming in the form of selfishness. I said that our economic and political systems in America depend on people being broken. Capitalism depends on people being selfish and most concerned about their own interests. Properly regulated, the system tends to bring out the best of people's work ethic and creativity because they are given the opportunity to satisfy their needs and desires. Nothing wrong with the system, it's a really smart idea and the guys that founded our country took God at His Word when He said we are inherently broken and selfish. They set up a system that plays to it and keeps it in check at the same time.

I believe communism fails because, in my limited understanding of it, it depends on people being good. It depends on individual sacrifice in favor of the community. It depends on consolidated power not being abused. And we as a people aren't good, we're broken.

In the context of the message, capitalism doesn't do much to foster community, however. In fact, it probably feeds our selfishness and inhibits us from experiencing real community. We're trained to focus on our own needs/desires. We're bombarded with messages that distort the meaning of the word 'need'. There a disincentive to materially help the people around us because it takes away from our own accumulation of stuff. The American Dream is to have more and better than the generation before. It's our birthright as Americans.

But it doesn't say anything about sacrificing stuff we 'desire' so that our neighbor can have stuff they need, and that's part of community. And it contributes to the epidemics of busyness, superficiality (is that a word?), individuality, and the desire for instant gratification that effect us all more than we probably realize. I believe this gives the church the chance to be truly counter-culture if we could live out the form of community that God designed us for.