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Capitalism and Christianity

Enoch07

It's all a sick freaking joke.
Premium Member
does a friend do what rights towards his friends all the time? or does she only do what's right when there is no profit involved? how many friends are you going to keep when you place profit above love?

Does a friend do what's right towards his friends all the time?

No, we are human, we are not perfect, we make mistakes

Or does she do only what a right when no profit is involved?

Profit should not figure into a friend equation. If it does then your probably not friends after all.

How many friends are you going to keep when you place profit above love?

Probably not many I would wager.
 

Sleeppy

Fatalist. Christian. Pacifist.
I don't agree that God intends that all of his laws be governmental laws. For example, I believe we are commanded to pray, but God does not expect us to pass laws that require us to pray. For that matter, it's a commandment to be baptized. God does not expect us to pass laws that require baptism.

There's a fundamental problem with your premise. You're omitting this fact:

Psalm 24:1

To God, the earth and its fullness, The world and the inhabitants in it.


That's fairly straightforward. God owns every inhabitant of the Earth. He is the world's government.

1 Corinthians 10:23, 24

All things to me are lawful, but all things are not profitable; all things to me are lawful, but all things do not build up; let no one seek his own -- but each another's.

1 Corinthians 10:26

For the Lord's [is] the earth, and its fullness.

--

As for prayer, it is innate. To ask without doubt is to expect; to seek and find is trial and error; and to knock and have the door opened is to be familiar or hospitable.

Usually, for whatever reason, the Lord's prayer isn't seen for what it is: a list of redundancies. Jesus' command is hidden in this regard-- it is to trust God. If you do not understand that God knows who you are, what you need, and what you will say or do, you blaspheme; you insult God's knowledge and authority.

Psalm 50:12

If I am hungry I tell not to thee, For Mine is the world and its fullness.


Will anyone completely understand this verse?
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
please explain what capitalism is with a heart?
For a Christian, don't forget God after He has prospered you..
For Christians and capitalists with a heart, don't forget the poor, the widow and the orphans. Treat your employees well.

[/\QUOTE]
humans have hearts. either a selfish heart, stony heart, or empathetic and compassionate heart.

Revelation 2:17
Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it.

Ezekiel 11:19
I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.

Ezekiel 36:26
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
[/QUOTE]
no relevance other than you know how to use a digital concordance.

we know a person by the Spirit of their Hearts. the whole bible is about selfishness vs selflessness.
THAT is what I said. Not about capitalism but about the heart of selfishness vs selflessness.

Have we been saying the same thing without knowing?

if the seller sold it above the cost, then he/she profited. if a person loans another money, and charges interest, that is a profit.

if a person loans another money with no interest, there is no profit.
if a person sells an item at cost to them, there is no profit.
You know economics.

God has no problem with making a profit if the heart is right
 

Sleeppy

Fatalist. Christian. Pacifist.
You know economics.

God has no problem with making a profit if the heart is right

For your convenience:

1 Corinthians 10:31-33

Whether, then, ye eat, or drink, or do anything, do all to the glory of God; become offenceless, both to Jews and Greeks, and to the assembly of God; as I also in all things do please all, not seeking my own profit, but that of many -- that they may be saved.
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
For your convenience:

1 Corinthians 10:31-33

Whether, then, ye eat, or drink, or do anything, do all to the glory of God; become offenceless, both to Jews and Greeks, and to the assembly of God; as I also in all things do please all, not seeking my own profit, but that of many -- that they may be saved.
Love that scipture. A great example that it is all about heart. Kingdom mentality.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
Capitalism is a system of dealing with scarce resources. The core beliefs of Christianity imply that there's no true scarcity: God loves you, will care for you, and will provide for you.

What can wealth or the invisible hand of the market give you that God can't? Isn't using your business to meet your material needs an implicit declaration that you don't trust God to meet those needs?
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
Capitalism is a system of dealing with scarce resources. The core beliefs of Christianity imply that there's no true scarcity: God loves you, will care for you, and will provide for you.

What can wealth or the invisible hand of the market give you that God can't? Isn't using your business to meet your material needs an implicit declaration that you don't trust God to meet those needs?
I don't think so.

From the beginning God said "Tend the Garden". You can "tend your garden" and stll trust God.

Growing up is a process. Baby--parents supply needs. Young adult--leaned to supply his own needs. Adults--learns to supply the needs of others while supplying his own needs.

At the beginning, we trusted God for our daily bread--even when we had no bread. Today, we trust God to help us supply bread for other people knowing that He is the one that has supplied our daily bread.
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
Today, we trust God to help us supply bread for other people knowing that He is the one that has supplied our daily bread.
I like the "help us supply bread" part, namely that we need to do the work because that's what is commanded for us to do-- ala the Sermon On the Mount. Jewish Law requires this as well. Whole wheat or challah?

BTW, references to "bread" in the scriptures do not seem to refer as much to wheat bread but to barley bread instead because the archaeologists have found much more barley than wheat pollen in the soil of eretz Israel going back 2000+ years ago. Now you can get this right if it's asked in Trivial Pursuit! Made your day, eh!
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
I like the "help us supply bread" part, namely that we need to do the work because that's what is commanded for us to do-- ala the Sermon On the Mount. Jewish Law requires this as well. Whole wheat or challah?

BTW, references to "bread" in the scriptures do not seem to refer as much to wheat bread but to barley bread instead because the archaeologists have found much more barley than wheat pollen in the soil of eretz Israel going back 2000+ years ago. Now you can get this right if it's asked in Trivial Pursuit! Made your day, eh!
Woooo!! **inside--childish excitement** I'm going to my son and saying "I know something you don't know" :D

Thank you Metis. Always open for learning more... and, once in a LOOOOONG while, be corrected.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
I don't think so.

From the beginning God said "Tend the Garden". You can "tend your garden" and stll trust God.

Growing up is a process. Baby--parents supply needs. Young adult--leaned to supply his own needs. Adults--learns to supply the needs of others while supplying his own needs.
How do you reconcile that with this?

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t there more to life than food and more to the body than clothing? 26 Look at the birds in the sky: They do not sow, or reap, or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you more valuable than they are? 27 And which of you by worrying can add even one hour to his life? 28 Why do you worry about clothing? Think about how the flowers of the field grow; they do not work or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these! 30 And if this is how God clothes the wild grass, which is here today and tomorrow is tossed into the fire to heat the oven, won’t he clothe you even more, you people of little faith? 31 So then, don’t worry saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ 32 For the unconverted pursue these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But above all pursue his kingdom and righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 So then, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Today has enough trouble of its own.


At the beginning, we trusted God for our daily bread--even when we had no bread. Today, we trust God to help us supply bread for other people knowing that He is the one that has supplied our daily bread.
What's your basis for this? When the Lord's Prayer asks God "give us this day our daily bread," it doesn't mention any middlemen.
 

Fool

ALL in all
Premium Member
Not if you can't even justify your use of two scriptures.

Your two scriptures still remain either irrevelant to your question or grossly taken out of context, and you're still dodging taking responsibility for that by not even attempting to justify them.



Why would you? You didnt ask if wealth and selfishness was incompatible with christianity. You asked if capitalism was incompatible with christianity. But capitalism by your own definition has nothing to do with selfishness, but is by definition merely the ownership of property. You're in logical checkmate unless you change your definition of capitalism.


Ah, now we're getting somewhere. That's what I was looking for.
Your idea of capitalism is not even compatible with the link you posted to it's definiton.

You are basically calling capitalism theft. Which is why you posted a scripture that deals with theft in your first post. A scripture that would make no sense unless you thought of capitalism as theft.

You just proved that I was right to assume the things I did about your implied assertions, and was not jumping the gun.

This is also why I said you cannot expect to ask this question unless you are willing to define what you think capitalism is. Because we can tell by your original misuse of scripture that you either didn't understand scripture or your don't understand economic terminology - we just needed to establish which one to diagnose where the logical problem was.

i reject your starting premise as a baseless and unfounded assertion, the idea that capitalism by definition always requires someone to lose for someone else to gain. The onus is on you to prove your claim that capitalism must necessarily result in such a dynamic and therefore is inherently wrong, especially since your claim goes against commonly accepted defintions of free market capitalism as a mutually beneficial and willing exchange between free peoples.

Unless your can first validate your claims about capitalism as inherently wrong, and demonstrate with reason why that is true, there is no point in trying to talk about how it compares to scripture.

the first scripture speaks about wealth en lieu of love. the second speaks about the poor vs a thiefs indifference to the money bag that was for the poor.

i'll cut to the chase. what is the goal of capitalism?
 
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Fool

ALL in all
Premium Member
This has no continuity.

you said capitalism with a heart. then please explain what capitalism with a heart is?


the heart is considered the center of something; especially with fruit stones.


a tree is known by it's fruit.

stone
b :the hard central portion of a drupaceous fruit (such as a peach)

heart
2.
the central or innermost part of something.


so....................

Proverbs 4:23
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

Proverbs 24:12
If you say, “But we knew nothing about this,” does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who guards your life know it? Will he not repay everyone according to what they have done?

we reap what we sow
 
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Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
How do you reconcile that with this?

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t there more to life than food and more to the body than clothing? 26 Look at the birds in the sky: They do not sow, or reap, or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you more valuable than they are? 27 And which of you by worrying can add even one hour to his life? 28 Why do you worry about clothing? Think about how the flowers of the field grow; they do not work or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these! 30 And if this is how God clothes the wild grass, which is here today and tomorrow is tossed into the fire to heat the oven, won’t he clothe you even more, you people of little faith? 31 So then, don’t worry saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ 32 For the unconverted pursue these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But above all pursue his kingdom and righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 So then, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Today has enough trouble of its own.
The key words here are "worry" vs "faith". Has nothing to do with working as working has been a commandment from the beginning.

There are many people who are working and worrying whether they will get the next pink slip, if the economy is going to tank, if they are going to loose their insurance and it manifests itself in lifestyles.

What's your basis for this? When the Lord's Prayer asks God "give us this day our daily bread," it doesn't mention any middlemen.
Daily bread is all encompasing. Daily bread for eating... daily bread to pay all the employees,.. daily bread of sales... and daily bread of the Word of God for man shall not eat bread alone... daily bread to help the poor

Working with faith is when you aren't worrying.

The whole of the prayer is quite helpful. It reminds us of who God is and that it is He who gives us our daily bread. Otherwise we will start thinking that it is by our hands that we have done this when, ultimately, life itself which enables us to work is from God Himself.
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
you said capitalism with a heart. then please explain what capitalism with a heart is?


the heart is considered the center of something; especially with fruit stones.


a tree is known by it's fruit.

stone
b :the hard central portion of a drupaceous fruit (such as a peach)

heart
2.
the central or innermost part of something.


so....................

Proverbs 4:23
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

Proverbs 24:12
If you say, “But we knew nothing about this,” does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who guards your life know it? Will he not repay everyone according to what they have done?

we reap what we sow
Where love is the central and innermost part of capitalism where you give the fruit of good works
 

Sleeppy

Fatalist. Christian. Pacifist.
Sounds like capitalism with a heart.

I have something better you might prefer:

Isaiah 65:17-25
For, lo, I am creating new heavens, and a new earth, And the former things are not remembered, Nor do they ascend on the heart.

But joy you, and rejoice for ever, that I [am] Creator, For, lo, I am creating Jerusalem a rejoicing, And her people a joy.

And I have rejoiced in Jerusalem, And have joyed in My people, And not heard in her any more Is the voice of weeping, and the voice of crying.

There is not thence any more a suckling of days, And an aged man who doth not complete his days, For the youth a hundred years old dieth, And the sinner, a hundred years old, is lightly esteemed.

And they have built houses, and inhabited, And planted vineyards, and eaten their fruit.

They do not build, and another inhabit, They do not plant, and another eat, For as the days of a tree [are] the days of My people, And the work of their hands wear out do My chosen ones.

They labour not for a vain thing, Nor do they bring forth for trouble, For the seed of the blessed of God [are] they, And their offspring with them.

And it hath come to pass, They do not yet call, and I answer, They are yet speaking, and I hear.

Wolf and lamb do feed as one, And a lion as an ox eateth straw, As to the serpent -- dust [is] its food, They do no evil, nor destroy, In all My holy mountain, said God!


--

Everyone can have enough. Capitalism, which demands that we incur debt, is not efficient for that purpose. The command is that we forgive debtors. If you can imagine that, you would not:

Luke 6:34
Lend to those of whom you hope to receive back.

What grace have you? For also the sinful lend to sinners -- that they may receive again as much.

Instead:

Luke 6:35
Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again, and your reward will be great, and you shall be sons of the Highest, because He is kind unto the ungracious and evil.
 

9-10ths_Penguin

1/10 Subway Stalinist
Premium Member
The key words here are "worry" vs "faith". Has nothing to do with working as working has been a commandment from the beginning.
All the stuff about "worry" speaks to motivation for working.

But in any case, it did talk about working:

Think about how the flowers of the field grow; they do not work or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was clothed like one of these! 30 And if this is how God clothes the wild grass, which is here today and tomorrow is tossed into the fire to heat the oven, won’t he clothe you even more, you people of little faith?


There are many people who are working and worrying whether they will get the next pink slip, if the economy is going to tank, if they are going to loose their insurance and it manifests itself in lifestyles.
So they worry about what they'll eat or drink, or what they'll wear? What did Jesus say about that?

Daily bread is all encompasing. Daily bread for eating... daily bread to pay all the employees,.. daily bread of sales... and daily bread of the Word of God for man shall not eat bread alone... daily bread to help the poor
Apparently, "daily bread" is one of those terms like "smurf" that can mean whatever you want it to mean.

Working with faith is when you aren't worrying.
Then why are you working?

When you take away all your needs that you have faith God will meet, what's left that you feel you need to work to meet for yourself?

The whole of the prayer is quite helpful. It reminds us of who God is and that it is He who gives us our daily bread. Otherwise we will start thinking that it is by our hands that we have done this when, ultimately, life itself which enables us to work is from God Himself.
But if your hands do the work, then it is your hands that have done it.
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
The bad thing about capitalism is that money is by far the main driving force. not fairness. not compassion. money. And what do we read in Revelation about the what will supposedly happen near the "end of times" that relates to this?

This is why the CC could not endorse capitalism at first because there was no safety net set up to take care of people as there was within the feudal system itself (the nobility had a responsibility to take care of the serfs/peasants). It only came around after countries began to create these nets.
 
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