Hypocricy
A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of being on a panel for a joint conference of the Indiana Muslim Alliance and the Islamic Society of North America. The topic of the panel was social justice from the perspective of the three Abrahamic faiths. My Muslim and Christian colleagues both gave eloquent, passionate speeches about our respective edicts to help the poor, feed the hungry, take care of widows and orphans, etc. All three Abrahamic faiths have strong social justice components – in both Islam and Judaism to do so is mandatory.
After our presentations we took some questions from the audience. The first question posed to us was ‘can you relate your faith’s social justice perspective to the war or politics?’ My colleagues were thoughtfully quiet, but I jumped t the chance to speak about something that’s been bothering me.
During this election season (which is thankfully almost over) I’ve heard much said about taxes – how both candidates will cut taxes for me (a middle classer). At the same time I hear the voices of supposed ‘people of faith’ saying we need to take care of others, but at the same time they refuse to pay more taxes. My question is, if we cut taxes, how do they suppose we take care of those who have less?
I admit, I’m a liberal, at least when it comes to social justice issues. My faith teaches me that it’s not an option to provide for those who are needy – it’s an obligation. I also understand that government is not always the most reputable source of aid and I agree with those who say we need to hold social programs accountable, both fiscally and programmatically. But what I cannot reconcile are those who purport to be ‘good people of faith,’ (especially in my own state) who uphold ‘family values’ and then flat out refuse to financially support programs that aid those in need.
Many say we need to rely on our faith communities to provide this aid. I agree. But the reality is they cannot do it and we have ample evidence of their lack of success. If churches, synagogues and mosques could provide all the aid necessary, we wouldn’t still need government programs. We do.
The Republican principle of less government is not a bad idea except when it becomes exclusionary, particularly for those least able to advocate for themselves. When it does it is elitist, exclusive, self serving and discriminatory. If that’s what people want, I advocate their right to say so. But don’t call it an expression of any faith – it’s not.
I can hear conservatives labeling me a bleeding heart liberal. If that’s so, I gladly accept their critique and will paint myself pink. When did caring for others, doing the right thing, and loving justice become a weakness or a shortcoming?
The Dark
The Dark…
By Eric Brotheridge
Important Notice: Due to recent budget cuts, and the rising cost of electricity, gas and oil, the light at the end of the tunnel has been turned off.
We apologize for the inconvenience.
Sincerely,
The Powers-That-Be
Religion is Ridiculous?
Sightings 10/23/08
— David G. Myers
Ridiculous, and worse. So say the new atheist books: In God is Not Great, Christopher Hitchens does not mince words, calling religion “violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children.” Now Bill Maher’s movie Religulous lampoons the plausibility and social effects of all religion, ominously concluding that the world will end if religion does not end. But I suggest that social science data point to a different conclusion than do the new atheist anecdotes of hypocritical and vile believers.
Many in the community of faith gladly grant the irrationality of many religious fundamentalists − people who bring to mind Madeline L’Engle’s comment that “Christians have given Christianity a bad name.” But mocking religious “nut cases” is cheap and easy. By heaping scorn on the worst examples of anything, including medicine, law, politics, or even atheism, one can make it look evil. But the culture war of competing anecdotes becomes a standoff. One person counters religion-inspired 9/11 leader Mohammed Atta with religion-inspired Martin Luther King, Jr. Another counters the genocidal crusades with the genocidal atheists, Stalin and Mao. But as we social scientists like to say, the plural of anecdote is not data.
Maher and the new atheist authors present anecdote upon anecdote about dangerous and apparently irrational religious behavior, while ignoring massive data on religion’s associations with human happiness, health, and altruism. The Gallup Organization, for example, has just released worldwide data culled from surveys of more than a quarter-million people in 140 countries. Across regions and religions, highly religious people are most helpful. In Europe, in the Americas, in Africa, and in Asia they are about fifty percent more likely than the less religious to report having donated money to charity in the last month, volunteered time to an organization, and helped a stranger.
This finding – that the religious tend to be more human than heartless – expresses the help-giving mandates found in all major religions, from Islamic alms-giving to Judeo-Christian tithing. And it replicates many earlier findings. In a Gallup survey, forty-six percent of “highly spiritually committed” Americans volunteered with the infirm, poor or elderly, as did twenty-two percent of those “highly uncommitted.” Ditto charitable giving, for which surveys have revealed a strong faith-philanthropy correlation. In one, the one in four Americans who attended weekly worship services gave nearly half of all charitable contributions.
Is religion nevertheless, as Freud supposed, and Maher’s film seems to assert, an “obsessional neurosis” that breeds sexually repressed, guilt-laden misery? Anecdotes aside, the evidence is much kinder to C. S. Lewis’s presumption that “joy is the serious business of heaven.” For example, National Opinion Research Center surveys of 43,000 Americans since 1972 reveal that actively religious people report high levels of happiness, with forty-three percent of those attending religious services weekly or more saying they are “very happy” (as do twenty-six percent of those seldom or never attending religious services). Faith (and its associated social support) also correlates with effective coping with the loss of a spouse, marriage, or job.
Maher would surely call such religiously-inspired happiness delusional. But what would he say to the surprising though oft-reported correlations between religiosity and health? In several large epidemiological studies (which, as in one U.S. National Health Interview Survey, follow lives through time to see what predicts ill health and premature death) religiously active people were less likely to die in any given year and they enjoyed longer life expectancy. This faith-health correlation, which remains even after controlling for age, gender, ethnicity, and education, is partly attributable to the healthier lifestyles (including the lower smoking rate) of religious people. It also appears partly attributable to the communal support of faith communities and to the health benefits of positive emotions.
These indications of the personal and social benefits of faith don’t speak to its truth claims. And truth ultimately is what matters. (If religious claims were shown to be untrue, though comforting and adaptive, what honest person would choose to believe? And if religious claims were shown to be true, though discomfiting, what honest person would choose to disbelieve?) But they do challenge the anecdote-based new atheist argument that religion is generally a force for evil. Moreover, they help point us toward a humble spirituality that worships God with open minds as well as open hearts, toward an alternative to purposeless scientism and dogmatic fundamentalism, toward a faith that helps make sense of the universe, gives meaning to life, opens us to the transcendent, connects us in supportive communities, provides a mandate for morality and selflessness, and offers hope in the face of adversity and death.
David Myers is a professor of psychology at Hope College and author of A Friendly Letter to Skeptics and Atheists: Musings on Why God is Good and Faith Isn’t Evil (Jossey-Bass, 2008).
do we really realize how important this election is?
Early voting in Evansville
from Politico, http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1008/Early_voting_in_Evansville.html
Here’s an early voting story from a medical student in Evansville, Ind.:
I squeaked in just before the 7pm deadline to find two very frustrated poll workers and a line of a couple dozen people, due to problems with the computerized voting system not accepting people’s driver’s licenses. It was taking about 7-10 minutes per person just to get the computer to accept them as valid and to print out their ballot, causing very long delays.
For me the most moving moment came when the family in front of me, comprising probably 4 generations of voters (including an 18 year old girl voting for her first time and a 90-something hunched-over grandmother), got their turn to vote. When the old woman left the voting booth she made it about halfway to the door before collapsing in a nearby chair, where she began weeping uncontrollably. When we rushed over to help we realized that she wasn’t in trouble at all but she had not truly believed, until she left the booth, that she would ever live long enough to cast a vote for an African-American for president. Anyone who doesn’t think that African-American turnout will absolutely SHATTER every existing record is in for a very rude surprise.
There were about 20 people in front of me but remarkably not a single person left the room without voting over the 2 hours it took to get through the line.
Wonderful new website
Check out www.g-dcast.com. Kudos to Sarah Lefton and team for making Torah accessible and interesting!
Dear red states…
Dear Red States…
We’ve decided we’re leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we’re taking the other Blue States with us.
In case you aren’t aware, that includes Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and the entire Northeast. You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. We get stem cell research and the best beaches. You get Ken Lay.
We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Dollywood. We get Intel, Apple and Microsoft. You get WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole’ Miss. We get 85 percent of America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Alabama. We get two-thirds of the tax revenue; you get to make the red states pay their fair share.
Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a bunch of single moms.
Please be aware that Nuevo California will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we will want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they’re apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don’t care if you don’t show pictures of their children’s caskets coming home. We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, but we’re not willing to spend our resources in Bush’s Quagmire.
With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country’s fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation’s fresh fruit, 95 percent of America’s quality wines, 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools, plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.
With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.
Additionally, you will enjoy those 38% who believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent who believe life is sacred unless we’re discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44% who say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you believe you are people with higher morals than we lefties.
Peace out, Blue States
anonymous… someone brilliant!
The Business Panic of 33 ACE
Students of history are smiling. My thanks to Steve Finn for this post.
Lest we think that the current situation is something new.
In 33 AD, there was a small outbreak reported in Judea, which was resolved by the crucifixion of a malcontent. The much larger news was a credit crunch which wiped out many wealthy people. There was a run on the banks and lenders, foreclosures and auctions were rampant, and many people went bankrupt.
The basic problem was that too much credit was extended to too many people, and when the collateral requirements were enforced by the Senate (some Senators being among the primary guilty parties), a credit crunch ensued. It’s not exactly clear what the initial cause was, but as more and more people demanded return of their capital, the overextended credit system began to unravel. It was finally resolved when Tiberius took $4,000,000 from the treasury and loaned it at 0% interest for 3 years to those who had land as collateral. This allowed private lenders to rebuild and reestablish themselves, and the credit crunch gradually resolved itself.
The Business Panic of 33 A.D.
published in New York, 1910
Of the year 33 A.D. it may possibly have been recorded in the diaries of certain Roman business men, that there was a disturbance in the remote province of Judaea a tumult quickly quelled by the energy of his excellency Pontius Pilate, the governor, who seized and crucified one Christus, the chief malcontent, and two bandits, his accomplices. It is more probable, however, that they only remembered this year as marking one of the severest panics which ever shook the foundations of Roman credit.
As with most panics, the causes of this were not obvious. About a year before, the firm of Seuthes & Son of Alexandria, lost three richly laden spice ships on the Bed Sea in a hurricane. Their ventures in the Ethiopian caravan trade also were unprofitable, ostrich feathers and ivory having lately fallen in value. It soon began to be rumored that they might be obliged to suspend. A little later the well known purple house of Malchus & Company (centered at Tyre, but with factories at Antioch and Ephesus) suddenly became bankrupt ; a strike among their Phoenician workmen, and the embezzlements of a trusted freedman manager being the direct causes of the disaster. Presently it became evident that the great Roman banking house of Quintus Maximus & Lucius Vibo had loaned largely to both Seuthes and Malchus. The depositors, fearing for their money, commenced a run on the bank, and distrust spread because men, experienced on the Via Sacra (the first century Wall Street), said that the still larger house of the Brothers Pettius was also involved with Maximus & Vibo. The two threatened establishments might still have escaped disaster had they been able to realize on their other securities. Unfortunately the Pettii had placed much of their depositors’ capital in loans among the noblemen of the Belgae in North Gaul. In quiet times such investments commanded very profitable interest; but an outbreak among that semi-civilized people caused the government to decree a temporary suspension of processes for debt. The Pettii were therefore left with inadequate resources. Maximus & Vibo closed their doors first; but that same afternoon the Pettii did likewise. Grave rumors obtained that, owing to the interlacing of credits, many other banks were affected. Still the crisis might have been localized, had not a new and more serious factor been introduced.
In a laudable desire to support the Italian agricultural interest then in a most declining way the Senate, with the assent of Tiberius, the emperor, had ordered one third of every senator’s fortune to be invested in lands within Italy. Failure to comply with the ordinance invited prosecution and heavy penalties. The time allowed for readjustment had almost expired, when many rich senators awoke to the fact that they had not made the required relocation of their fortunes. To find capital to buy land, it was necessary for them to call in all their private loans and deposits at the bankers. Publius Spinther, a wealthy nobleman, particularly was obliged to notify Balbus & Ollius, his bankers, that they must find the 30,000,000 sesterces he had deposited with them two years before. Two days later Balbus & Ollius had closed their doors, and their bankruptcy was being entered before the praetor. The same day a notice in the Ada Diurna, the official gazette posted daily in the Forum, told how the great Corinthian bank of Leucippus’ Sons had gone into insolvency. A few days later it was heard that a strong banking house in Carthage had suspended. After this all the surviving banks on the Via Sacra announced that they must have timely notice before paying their depositors. The safe arrival of the corn fleet from Alexandria caused the situation at the capital to brighten temporarily; but immediately afterward came news that two banks in Lyons were “rearranging their accounts,” as the euphemism ran; likewise another in Byzantium. From the provincial towns of Italy and the farming districts, where creditors had long allowed their loans to run at profitable interest, but were now suddenly calling in their principals, came cries of keen distress and tidings of bankruptcy after bankruptcy. After this nothing seemed able to check the panic at Rome. One bank closed after another. The legal 12% rate of interest was set at nought by any man lucky enough to possess ready money. The praetor’s court was crowded with creditors demanding the auctioning of the debtor’s houses, slaves, warehouse stock, or furniture. The auctions themselves were thinly attended, for who could buy? Valuable villas and racing studs were knocked down for trifles. Caught in the disaster, many men of excellent credit and seemingly ample fortune were reduced to beggary. The calamity seemed spreading over the Empire, and threatening a stoppage of all commerce and industry, when Gracchus, the praetor, before whom the majority of the cases in bankruptcy came, at his wits’ end to decide between the hosts of desperate debtors and equally desperate creditors, resorted to the Senate-house; whence, after a hurried debate, the Conscript Fathers dispatched a fast messenger with a full statement of the danger to their lord and master Tiberius, in his retreat at Capri.
While the Caesar’s reply was awaited, the business world of the capital held its breath. Four days after the dispatch from the Senate, an imperial courier came pricking back from Campania. The Senate assembled in the Curia with incredible celerity. A vast throng slaves and millionaires elbowing together filled the Forum outside, while the Emperor’s letter was read, first to the Senate, then from the open Rostrum to the waiting people. Tiberius had solved the problem with his usual calm, good sense. The obnoxious decrees were for the time to be suspended; 100,000,000 ses. were to be taken from the imperial treasury and distributed among reliable bankers, to be loaned to the neediest debtors; no interest to be collected for three years; but security was to be offered of double value in real property. The law being relaxed, and the most pressing cases cared for by the government loan, private lenders began. to take courage and offer money at reasonable rates. Dispatches from Alexandria, Carthage and Corinth indicated that the panic had been stayed in those financial centers. The moneyed world of the Via Sacra began to resume its wonted aspect. A few banking houses and individuals never recovered from their losses, but the majority escaped permanent suspension and so the panic of the “Consulship of Galba and Sulla,” i.e. of 33 A.D., passed into half-forgotten history.
Such a little expanded from Tacitus and Suetonius is the tale of the great panic under the third Caesar. A narrative like this would have no verisimilitude unless placed in a society extending over seas and continents, with a great internal and foreign commerce, rapid means of communication, complex and vast credit transactions, an elaborate system of banking; in other words, with conditions not unlike many of those of the twentieth century. Great was the Roman Empire in its military glory, its system of law and administration, its preservation of the artistic and intellectual heritage from Greece, its elimination of clan patriotism and local prejudices but it was also great, in that it fostered the development of an economic life such as has not come again to the world until very recent times. It is of this Roman commerce, communication, banking, credit, and of a society largely founded on such a “money basis,” that we propose to write.
the internet as a force for democratization
I’m going to leave the decision of who won the 2nd presidential debate to the politicos. However, there was a fascinating experiment going on during the debate. NPR teamed with Plodt to use Twitter as a tool for gathering immediate feedback on each candidates performance. Confused? Well, me too and I was part of it!
But, despite the confusion, it was a fabulous social science experiment, enabling those of us twittering the debate to give and get immediate feedback on the candidates. I would add it was far from representative of the American populous – NPR listeners tend to be more liberal (and intelligent… ooh, did I say that?). I know it kept me engaged in a way I’ve not been for past debates.
I hope this sets a precedent for future public conversations. Viva la internet!
P.S. If you’re interested, the final tally… Obama 8, McCain 4 and you can read my comments at http://plodt.com/rebaaron
Ma Hamatzav? (Was' Up?) 