A problem of definitions

When I feed the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor are hungry, they call me a communist. — Dom Helder Camara

“When ecclesiastic love waned, when waves of capitalistic greed surged across Christian Europe, when starving masses cried out bitterly in the slums, the promise of their salvation came not from heaven but from the earth. Its name was communism. Christianity, though it professed the love of God, had degenerated into a dead body of clergy trailing empty slogans. It was then only natural that a banner of rebellion would be raised, arguing that a merciless God who would allow such suffering could not exist. Hence, modern materialism was born. Western society became a hotbed of materialism; it was the fertile soil in which communism flourished.” — Sun Myung Moon

“Socialism only works in two places: Heaven where they don’t need it, and hell where they already have it.” … “How do you tell a communist? Well, it’s someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It’s someone who understands Marx and Lenin.” — Ronald Reagan

“I have spent all my life under a Communist regime, and I will tell you that a society without any objective legal scale is a terrible one indeed. But a society with no other scale but the legal one is not quite worthy of man either.” — Alexander Solzhenitsyn

I deliberately collected four quotes from a wide variety of sources, from heretics, from politicians, and from a godly man. They are an interesting mix, but I deliberately put that good Orthodox man, Solzhenitsyn, as the last one. The first two quotes taken together make an interesting point. In our political battles, we have sometimes forgotten that the care of the poor and needy is part of that to which we are called. But, we are called to it out of love. If one side has a tendency toward loveless programs, the other side has a tendency toward loveless avoidance of responsibility. One side does not wish its programs questioned, but the other side does not wish questions about root causes to be asked. They both vilify the person who asks questions.

But, notice what the heretic Pastor Moon says. Interestingly enough, like the last couple of Popes, he hits out strongly against both “capitalistic greed” and “materialism … communism.” I think this is one of the very rare places where he has something to say. Notice his point. It is when love waned in Europe, and capitalistic greed flourished that Europe began its slide that led not only to communism on one side of the old Berlin Wall, but to ennui and bureucratic correctness on the other side of that Wall. The loss of love trumps any claims to be a Judeo-Christian society. And, that is the great danger of those who are cultural warriors but forget to express God’s love in extremely practical ways.

As I quoted Metropolitan Nicholas the other day, “What the Church needs is not more professors, but more confessors!” We can be in great danger of returning to a conception of a Judeo-Christian society that somehow redefines helping the poor “too much” as something that we ought to be cautious about. Thus, we could easily end up in the England of which Charles Dickens wrote, a Christian England with an Empire, but an England in which children could be starving, child pickpockets could be hanged, and people were sent to debtor’s prisons.

This is the danger that Solzhenitsyn saw when he came here from Communist Russia. Many were upset with him because he criticized this society as well. He was called ungrateful because he did not offer unqualified support of American society. But, his warning was almost prescient. A society “with no other scale than the legal one is not quite worthy of man either.” We have become a society in which “law and order” are such battle cries that any leaning toward mercy is decried as being somehow against what God desires. When love and mercy are removed from constant and active consideration, we become less than “worthy of man.” When all is law and order and correct economic policy to maximize profits, we quickly become every bit as materialistic as the communists whom we despise. As Solzhenitsyn pointed out, a capitalism devoid of active love and mercy is not worthy of man. Both Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI have tried to warn capitalist countries about a consumerism that strips humans of their humanity and turns them into mere objects of advertising.

But, let me quote a very conservative gentleman to perhaps point back to a phrase that used to be used much, but is barely heard anymore. That term is “compassionate conservatism.” Though I am a moderate, let me leave you with this quote:

“It is compassionate to actively help our citizens in need. It is conservative to insist on accountability and results.” — President George W. Bush

It is not necessarily a program that is the problem. It is the failure to “insist on accountability and results.”  Let us not go to the extreme that too many have taken, which is to eliminate all programs as though only private individuals and private companies may engage in practical acts of love. A government that only engages in infrastructure, defense, and criminal matters is not worthy of man.