Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism.
When Jesus sent out his disciples out to the lost sheep of Israel, he advised them to proclaim the message of the Kingdom by healing the sick, raising the dead, driving out demons and many other miracles. He then stressed to them that they should not take any gold or silver with them after the good work is done. He sent them out with no bag for the journey, no extra cloth apart from what they were putting on but preach the gospel to the lost in the house of Judah (Matthew 10). It is clear from this passage that Jesus is bringing out the importance of asceticism in doing ministry by the called ministers.
It is now coming out clear that when the Quaker church started using pastors, they were not paid any salary at all. I remember my father was among the first pastors of the Quaker church in Kenya and he traveled from one place to another without any salary, but he fulfilled his mission well. We suffered economic support in the community. When he was called, he had his business, and he left everything and went as Jesus talked to his disciples in Matthew 10. It is good, and I agree that ministers should keep a focus on ministry and not wealth issues which divert attention. However, how does one take care of his family as I witnessed in my father’s case? Weber states that “wealth is thus bad ethically only insofar as it is a temptation to idleness and sinful enjoyment of life … “[1] As much as I agree with Weber’s argument over wealth and pastoral ministry? It has negatively impacted the Quaker church in Africa which is struggling with pastors doing work but no remuneration. Capitalism encouraged wealth creation. When the Quaker missionaries came to Kenya, they were called Friends Industrial Mission. Their goal was to evangelize to Africans, industrialize them to make wealth, provided education and healthcare to the surrounding communities. However, later on, ministers were not being paid or enabled to do their ministry.
I have also noticed that Weber refers to the Quaker ethic which also holds that a man’s life in his calling is an exercise in ascetic virtue, a proof of his state of grace through his conscientiousness. …. what God demands is not labor, but rational labor in a calling. [2] However, this has created a conflict between the clergy and the laity leadership in our Quaker church in Africa. The clergy is not paid well to taken care of his/her family but the laity leadership which is a volunteer one. Somebody must work hard to provide for the clergy to do his work well. It was more comfortable in the earlier days, but as the economic situation continues to be a challenge to many people and the church is focusing more and more towards capitalism than ascetic. The Catholic church has succeeded, but someone somewhere is paying the prize. However, the Catholic has applied another method of having facilities to raise money for their ministries. This is where Tourish in his book the dark side of Transformational leadership talks of introducing “Spirituality and Leadership at work” Tourish model is to create a balance in ministry and work where nobody works for the other, but we call compliments each other.
Because of the world economic hardship and churches not being able to raise enough funds to remunerate the pastors in our churches hence encouraging them to do bi-vocational ministry to survive. We are now encouraging the pastor to do business besides pastoral ministry which Weber is calling compromising the ministry of Christ and creating more and more secularism in our churches. How can we practice asceticism in the period of economic hardship? However, the balance of both ascetic and capitalism in ministry is vital for continuity. It is true that pastoral ministry is considered as work and not idling. The results are to see the life transformation of many from sinful nature to righteousness. How is this work measured economically to fit in the class of other economic activities? Capitalism is seen as an immoral and selfish method of acquiring wealth at the expense of the poor or vulnerable. At the same time, it is seen as it is seen as a method of encouraging personal potential in wealth creation and economic development. During the start of Quakerism, they were outstanding at balancing wealth and ministry. When they became too wealthy, they discovered they were being drawn from the core ministry of Christ to chasing more and more wealth. Many of them abandoned the business to concentrate on the ministry of Christ while others continued at a lower scale. This has created a big rift among the Quakers, that we have those who support the pastoral ministry and those who do not support pastoral ministry at all. This has left those who do not support pastoral ministry using all volunteers and not full-time ministers in the church. Volunteers doing bi-vocational ministry and more of the ministry is done after their regular work that brings food on the table is done.
[1] (Weber 2014)
[2] (Weber 2014)pp.93
About the Author
John Muhanji
I am the Director Africa Ministries Office of Friends United Meeting. I coordinate all Quaker activities and programs in the Quaker churches and school mostly in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. The focus of my work is more on leadership development and church planting in the region especially in Tanzania.. Am married with three children all grown up now. I love playing golf as my exercise hobby. I also love reading.3 responses to “Asceticism and the Spirit of Capitalism.”
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Wow, John, a really interesting reflection on the cross-cultural effect of capitalism, the work ethic and the profit motive on your church in your cultural context. Weber has the slightly unusual notion that capitalism fails to work outside the West because non-western countries still believe in miracles (remember he was writing well over 100 years ago). Basically he was saying mystery and capitalism don’t go well together. And there is truth in that. It is perhaps why Calvin was so ardent in his systematic rational theology and opposed to some of the mystery of the Roman Catholic world. Calvinism became the backbone of the European reformed church and economy. I guess the question for you is, ‘how to balance the culture in which you live with the economic influence from outside?’ What education do Christians need to be Kingdom People in community with unfamiliar voices that promise much but deliver little? Western Pastors should perhaps learn a little of that historic trust in God, rather than trust in the ‘bottom line’.
Thank you Digby for your comments and to answer your question. It is actually hard to respond to a very highly structured economic influence from the west that is many miles far away from us. We are trying to join and be part of that process that is complicated, but because it is global, we have to conform to the patterns. That is why African countries have continued to perform very poorly because we are trying to be on the same level as the western countries. We have never had an opportunity to build our own Africa economic trend without interference from the west. However, we are try very much but not on a level playing ground. We do not have time to learn the tricks, but when we do a new thing is out and we have to keep on jumping from one level to the other to keep with the rest of the world on course. Now Africa is a tasting ground for the Chinese and the Western economy. Will africa ever grow up to stand on its own with this fast changing world influenced by the western and chinese power? It is still more confusing that the evangelism brought by the western quaker believers are coming up dishonoring the whole process of evangelizing to the unreached communities. The same people are now preaching universalism opposite of what was there 50 years ago.
John, this would make a very good discussion for the cohort. We Westerners benefit from the capital exploitation of other colonised countries without ever thinking about the outcomes and how we continue to create economic and cultural havoc. The role of other economic superpowers coming online in recent years does not diminish either the learning to be had nor the justice to be sought from decades previous.. No doubt we will consider this material in Africa next year. Grace and peace to you.