Pop quiz:
What prophet, worshipped 2000 years and counting, who preached non-judgment and forgiveness, who forgave prostitutes and murderers, absolutely condemned a specific group of people and physically assaulted them with a whip? And who was that group?
Hint: He said “love of money (greed) is the root of all evil.”
Hint: He said “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for [such a person] to enter the kingdom of God.”
Answer: The Prince of Peace. “When he had made a scourge of small cords, He drove [those who were selling oxen and sheep and doves, and the money changers] all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers' money, and overthrew the tables.”
Of all that Jesus preached, none is more relevant to our times than his utter, violent condemnation of commercial greed and the rich. Capitalism is founded on and driven by greed. Wall Street is institutionalized “love of money.”
There’s a great overlap between poorer, less educated minorities the “too big to fail” Wall Street banks still prey on with home loans designed to ensure foreclosure, triggering the Great Recession, and devoted Christian church-goers in those target neighborhoods. And the near collapse of the economies of nations from those frauds brought loss far beyond the housing market, with millions of jobs lost while the rich got richer—and still do.
Furthermore, those that capitalism is enriching increasingly are using their wealth to buy our electoral system—from billionaires backing candidates, to armies of corporate lobbyists shmoozing elected officials at all levels once they’re in office, to obscenely lucrative lobbying jobs awaiting them when their “public service” careers are over.
Most abhorrently, the profit-driven fossil fuel industry is aggressively fighting, with money and hired liars, urgent reduction of fossil fuels that are poisoning our planet. We're talking about an absolute end of all life on Earth here. How much more evil can humans get?
Fundamentalist Christians: Your Lord and Savior was a rabid anti-capitalist.
If you truly believe the Bible is the literal Word of God, and that Jesus is the Son of God whom you should follow in your daily life, you should be taking to the streets in spiritual outrage against the greedy rich, whom he proclaimed universally and absolutely barred from Heaven and eternal life. They unjustly crush your voting rights, civil rights, livelihoods; your homes, freedom and hopes; and your grandchildren's futures.
Ministers, preachers, pastors and priests should be railing to their congregations against those who don’t have a camel’s chance of entering the Kingdom of Heaven. And devout Christians should rise up as one, demanding a stop to corporate pursuit of profits on the backs of the marginalized masses and the future.
