Reprinted from the Preistly Pugilist website:
http://home.ix.netcom.com/~pugilist/index.htm
Every time we run into financial difficulties we hear the old allegation that capitalism is unjust, immoral and certainly not compatible with Christianity, which is all about loving our neighbour - not about trying to put him out of business. Capitalism is represented as red in tooth and claw, a harsh and unfair system in which many are forced to the wall by the excessive greed of high financiers.
Before passing on to examine the justification for this view, we need to look at the main historical alternative to capitalism, which is socialism. It is probably no exaggeration to say that socialism has never worked anywhere it has been tried and in its extreme form has generally led to dictatorships, tyrannies, gulags, purges and mass murder of whole populations. Stalin is reckoned to have slaughtered forty million of his people. Notoriously he replied to his critics by saying: "One man's death is a tragedy: the death of a million men is a statistic." Mao is estimated to have killed up to twice as many as Stalin.
Socialism, even when it does not lead to mass murder, has proved again and again to be inefficient. Have you heard the one about the Soviet citizen who bought a new car? He was told to expect delivery on a Tuesday 10 years hence. He asked the salesman: "Will that be in the morning or the afternoon?" The salesman was incredulous: "It's 10 years before delivery - why do you need to know morning or afternoon?" The resigned customer answered: "Because I've got a new washing machine coming that Tuesday morning."
Marx talked about "the contradictions of capitalism". But these are as nothing compared with the contradictions of socialism. As Chesterton put it: "How is it that it is a crime for a man to own a field, but all right for the state to own an oil field?"
But apart from its renowned inefficiencies, there is another and more fundamental reason why socialism doesn't work. It is an ideal. And ideals can be operated only by people who are themselves ideal. Whereas the Christian faith teaches that we are all mired and marred by Original Sin.
This is not some weird, superstitious phenomenon; it is simply how we are. St Paul expressed it perfectly in words which even a member of the General Synod could understand: "The thing I would, I do not; and what I would not, that I do." The former Bishop of Durham, David Jenkins, put it colourfully: "Original Sin is just the buggeration factor." We all fall short of our best intentions. Who can put up his hand and say that he is all loving, kind, generous and entirely unselfish? Only a humbug would make such claims. We cannot pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. That is the heresy of Pelagianism. If we were naturally good, why would we need the Saviour? Actually it is those moral and political fanatics who do believe in their own righteousness and the perfection of their particular party who end up perpetrating the worst genocides.
Capitalism is far from perfect, but at least it has a chance of delivering moderate success. And this is because it works with the grain of human nature rather than against it. In order to enrich himself a man works very hard and invents a good mousetrap. He becomes a millionaire. But in achieving his self-interested aim he enables millions of homes to be delivered from disease-bearing vermin.
The market economy - freedom to own property and to trade under the rule of law - is an imperfect system. But it is probably the best mortal, fallen people are capable of this side of heaven. As we have seen on far too many occasions, the alternative is too ghastly to contemplate.
by Rev. Peter Mullen
