Christian Approach to Economics

Economics is concerned with this world. When Richard Heilbroner chose The Worldly Philosophers as the title of his lives of economists, he described them well. Economists do deal with such worldly matters as food, clothing, shelter and the materialistic wants of man. Nevertheless, those who feel that economics on this account is outside the scope of Christianity, should be reminded that Jesus dealt with these materialistic matters. While he warned against the danger of wealth to the soul of the possessor, he never taught that wealth in itself is evil.

Man And His Money

Professor Lewis H. Haney in History of Economic Thought makes a point not appreciated by many economists themselves, namely, that what one believes about the nature of man and the nature of the universe determines one’s economics.

Haney chooses materialism and idealism as the two philosophical poles by which to separate the sheep from the goats. While admitting that few economists are entirely consistent in their metaphysics, he notes that the classical economists, of whom Adam Smith and Ricardo are representative, were inclined toward materialism and took the physical universe and the “laws of nature” with utmost seriousness. On the other hand, the socialists and welfare economists have been inclined toward idealism, believing that man by the power of his mind can plan a better society than any laws of nature might produce.

The idealist habitually speaks of the “needs of society,” while the materialist thinks in terms of “the demands of the market.” The first point of view leads inevitably to a police state in which the elite, who “know what is best,” make decisions for the masses. The second viewpoint leads to freedom—temporarily.

Idealism eventually becomes tyranny because it makes a god of mind and thus commits the sin of idolatry. In the end, idealistic systems make a god of government.

Materialism is able to do little better. It begins well and defends freedom with enthusiasm on the ground that free men produce more and can thus create a higher standard of living. But eventually, materialism has to face the question: “Why?” Why produce more? Why have a high standard of living? Why be free? At that point, materialism begins to mutter and grumble.

William Graham Sumner, who left the Episcopal ministry to become professor of political economy at Yale in 1872, is still quoted as a defender of private enterprise. Such he was at one time. He was also a disciple of Herbert Spencer and shared Spencer’s hatred of government intervention. Sumner applied the Darwinian laws of the “struggle for existence” and the “survival of the fittest” to society. He rejected the doctrine of natural rights, claiming that rights are not given either by God or by nature. If man gets any rights, he must fight for them. His completely materialistic view of man finally resulted in a denial of moral absolutes. For Sumner, moral values became “folkways,” the product of social evolution. If there were no moral absolutes, there was no reason why the strong should not exploit the weak in Sumner’s Darwinian society. Thus, Sumner was finally driven to the Hobbesian conclusion that might makes right and that freedom is impossible. Materialism always arrives at this conclusion in the end, for it has no moral justification for freedom.

Neither the materialism of classical economics nor the idealism of welfare economics can be described as a “Christian approach” to the subject. Christianity stands midway between materialism and idealism. Christianity does not repudiate matter in Gnostic fashion; it accepts it. It recognizes that man is a body as well as a soul and has very real materialistic needs. However, neither does Christianity repudiate the idealistic insight that man is rational, possessing a mind.

A Christian approach to economics must include both ideas: man is body and man is mind. But what is more important, a Christian approach to economics will not start with man at all. It will start with God.

We shall venture to sketch a few guideposts for a Christian approach to economics.

The Fact Of Providence

First, a Christian approach begins with the fact of the providence of God. This is basic in both the Old and New Testaments. The Ten Commandments were founded upon it, beginning with the sonorous declaration: “I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.” The New Testament rings with the joy of it, and I doubt if a free society can long exist without faith in it.

The problem of inequality is immediately solved then by the fact of divine Providence. Inequality of talent, resulting in inequality of wealth, is in the plan of God. Justice does not demand absolute equality for God does not demand it.

Moreover, equalitarianism is incompatible with freedom. No one has yet been able to blueprint a society in which everyone has equal housing, equal education (can an education ever be given?) and an equal number of shoes or suits of clothing which could at the same time be free.

Not only is equality incompatible with freedom, it is an impossible ideal on any grounds. Even equality of opportunity is impossible. Can there be equality of opportunity so long as some children are born in the mountains and some are born in seaport cities? Geography itself makes equality of opportunity an impossibility.

We either accept inequality of talent, opportunity and wealth as one of the inevitabilities of life, or we play God and pretend that we can construct a better universe. “Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?”

The quest for security, which has become the hallmark of modern youth, springs from a lost faith in the providence of God. There is no security apart from the providence of God and, when men lose that faith, they seek security in pensions and in government. Such people are candidates for a prison state.

The sum of the matter is, man cannot eradicate sin and the consequences of sin from human society without playing God. Frederick Hayek once said: “What has always made the State a hell on earth has been precisely that man has tried to make it his heaven.”

Foresight And Reward

Secondly, a Christian approach to economics must begin with the God of the Garden of Eden, the God who created man and gave him a free choice.

If the Bible is clear about anything, it is clear about this: man is and ought to be free to make his own choices. This is what we have in a profit and loss system. A man takes a risk in the hope of making a profit. If his decision turns out to be right, his profit is the reward for foresight. If his decision turns out to be wrong, his loss is punishment for bad judgment.

Government has the right to limit a man’s choices to protect the rights of other people, but beyond this a man should be free. No labor union has the moral right to deny a man the right to work. This is an infringement upon man’s God-given right to make his own choices.

Christianity at its best has insisted upon this voluntarism and has trusted in persuasion. What it could not do by persuasion, it left undone, believing that man should be free to reject righteousness if man so desired. In its degenerate form, Christianity has called upon government to use coercion. Such a policy is an admission that the church has failed in its prime task, and we have such an admission of failure in American Protestantism in the social gospel. Any Christian approach to economics, if it is to follow the example of the Bible, must insist upon voluntarism and limit government to a police function.

Redemption And The Individual

Thirdly, any Christian approach to economics must begin with the God of redemption and John 3:16. Since God so loved the world, people are valuable as individuals, one by one. It is not necessary to prove that the whole body of Christian doctrine implies individualism. It might be necessary to point out, however, that most contemporary economics moves in the opposite direction.

Since the days of John Maynard Keynes, there has arisen what is known as “macro-economics” which, instead of concentrating upon particulars, deals with large national aggregates which are the sum of multitudes of statistics.

Statistics are a useful tool if used with skepticism, but they must never obscure the fact that they represent people making decisions in the market place. The great danger of macro-economics is that it will forget Joe Doaks and Mary Jane.

It is an odd fact that welfare economics which pretends to concern itself with the welfare of the nation, leaves no stone unturned to avoid the suspicion of humanitarianism. It boasts its scientific objectivity as it recites its statistics and draws its charts. But can anything be objective that is as closely bound up with the hopes and fears of people as economics of necessity must be?

A Christian approach to economics must insist that we never lose sight of the individual “for whom Christ died.” We might develop a shrewder economics too, if we keep in mind that economics is nothing more than a study of human action. No gathering of statistics, nor study of “trends,” can alter the fact that economic forces come down to the choices of countless individuals.

Man’S Chief End

Finally, a Christian approach to economics must begin with a jealous God, a God who refuses to share his glory.

This has more to do with economics than one might suspect at first glance. Economics per se deals with means and not with ends. If a man asks economics how to maximize profit in the liquor business, economics will give an answer. Whether or not the liquor industry is moral or immoral would be a value judgment concerning which economics as such can say nothing.

A Christian approach to economics would have to say something about it, for Christianity is concerned with ends as well as means.

What is the end of life? Is it merely to produce and to consume? According to a familiar catechism, the chief end of man is “to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.”

A jealous God demands first place in man’s affections as the end of all life. When this principle is followed, everything else falls into its proper place. Any business activity that cannot be done to the “glory of God” is immediately ruled out. Now economics becomes not merely a matter of means, but a means under this overruling end—“to glorify God.”

Freedom becomes not an end in itself, but a means to a greater end—“to glorify God.” With this end in view, it is possible to know freedom without boredom. Ralph Barton Perry once said: “There is no boredom like that which can afflict people who are free and nothing else.”

Replace the “glory of God” by the “welfare of man,” and freedom will soon be lost. Immediately, forces go to work to submerge the individual in society and to create a collectivist state.

Christ made a profound economic statement when he said: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.…” “These things” were the basic economic wants of man: food, clothing and shelter. This is a formula for economic prosperity for an individual or a nation. This is sound Christian economics.

It begins with God and ends in a free man.

Irving E. Howard is on the staff of Christian Freedom Foundation and is pursuing doctoral studies in the Graduate School of Business Administration, New York University. He holds the Th.B. degree from Gordon College, B.D. from Gordon Divinity School, S.T.B. from Harvard Divinity School, M.A. from Clark University. He has won four Freedoms Foundation awards. As a clergyman he served North Uxbridge Baptist Church, Massachusetts, from 1941–45, and Hope Congregational Church, Worcester, Massachusetts, from 1945–54.

Have something to add about this? See something we missed? Share your feedback here.