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By Bishop John, June 19, 2012 11:22 am

Ever since the bitter struggle over raising this country’s debt ceiling, there has been an enormous amount of verbiage expressed over the 1% and the 99% as to who possesses the wealth of this country. It is referred to so frequently that it seems to have almost lost its meaning.

It doesn’t matter whether the figures are actually accurate. Do 1% of the people have the vast majority of wealth and the 99% get along with the remainder? Don’t get tied up on the math! There can be no doubt that there is an extraordinary concentration of wealth and therefore power in the hands of a very small portion of the American population. This situation existed throughout the 19th century but began to change when economic and social reforms were enacted in the 1930’s and for nearly half a century there was dramatic improvement in regards to the distribution of wealth in the United States. Regretfully, for the last twenty years we have been sliding back into that 19th century format which leaves such a sizable portion of the country in dire straits, desperately poor and terribly vulnerable while the wealthy 1% increased not only their wealth but the power that naturally comes with that wealth.

Whenever a political and economic system concentrates power and wealth in the hands of a small minority, it guarantees the existence of a permanent underclass whose members live without capacities of decent living, whether it be employment, housing, proper education and health care. In our democratic society, massive programs have been developed to respond to each one of these pressing needs, but the fact is that the concentration of wealth creates these problems and no amount or number of do-good organizations or programs are going to change that until there is a more equitable distribution of our nation’s economic production.

Regretfully, the history of the human family does not reflect many situations where the wealthy segment of a population freely steps forward to share its vast wealth with those who are in need. This usually does not happen at all and when it does, it is often brought about by a violent revolution. I thank God that our country has developed a system where we could develop a more equitable means of sharing the benefits of our extraordinary economic system, but in the summer of 2012, the scene is grim.

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By Bishop John, August 2, 2010 4:04 am

Those poor rich guys! In His preaching, our Lord referred several times to the difficulties of very wealthy people achieving salvation. I wont digress by delving into all of them, such as the “camel through the eye of the needle” reference, for example. Suffice it to say that we live in a very wealthy country, and though we have more than enough poor, the vast majority of us would be considered wealthy by the standards of three of the five continents. Where does that leave an American family, who are by anyone’s measurement, quite wealthy?

The key is for all of us who are affluent to see wealth as a material gift that can be used to help others, (whether by direct charity or through  taxation.) In other words, having wealth is not an evil. It is seeing wealth as the purpose and goal of our existence that is wrong.

There is no doubt that affluence does provide extra temptations in our lives. Wealthy people sometimes are not as generous as they could be, or as concerned for those in serious need simply because they do not see them; they don’t come in contact with them.

When our local newspaper spotlights individual, concrete situations of suffering, the outpouring of help is truly marvelous! However, when we lump the poor together in our minds as an amorphous mass, it does not trigger the same response in our minds and hearts.

Churches can do much more to constantly remind their members of the pressing, ongoing needs in this country and around the world.  Let’s keep putting a real face on poverty by highlighting specific needs. Is the virtue of generosity in your day to day living exercised in proportion to your resources?

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