{"id":16484,"date":"2018-02-15T20:23:59","date_gmt":"2018-02-16T04:23:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=16484"},"modified":"2018-02-15T20:23:59","modified_gmt":"2018-02-16T04:23:59","slug":"am-i-really-that-shallow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/am-i-really-that-shallow\/","title":{"rendered":"Am I Really That Shallow"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I picked up\u00a0Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire<\/em>\u00a0by William T. Cavanaugh two thoughts entered my mind. The first, thank God it is a short book, after the first few books this book seemed to be a breath of fresh air. Two, was this another book crushing the capitalists?\u00a0 On both counts I was pleasantly surprised. This book was a great read, and I found myself wanting it to be longer (I am crazy I know), and in his book Cavanaugh did not seem to be bashing any particular type of economy, he delved into what our lifestyles make us, and how we react within our religious tribes.<\/p>\n

There are some who would call Cavanaugh’s book a waste of time as an academic work, such as John-Paul Spiro who writes, “At the end of the first chapter, Cavanaugh writes, \u201cthe churches should take an active role in fostering economic practices that are consonant with the true ends of creation\u201d (32), and Being Consumed often reads like fodder for social justice-themed sermons. It is not an academic book and should not be judged as such.” [1] I will respectfully disagree, while this book is probably aimed at the Catholic faith, it is not necessarily just for Catholics. In his discussion of what a consumeristic society creates he argues something that speaks to my heart. When he writes “But the detachment of consumerism is not just the willingness to sell anything. The Detachment of consumerism is also a detachment from the things we buy.” [2] His idea is that we are not a greedy society, but that we are so addicted to the shopping that we have a detachment from the things we buy. They do not bring us happiness, it is in the pursuit that we find ourselves fulfilled. So, we fill landfills with the junk we buy, just so we can buy more. When I read his idea I had to sit back and decide is that what I do. In the church I served at previously, I was the youth minister, missions minister and technology director for most of the time. It was up to me to upgrade everyones computers, the sound system in the youth department, and all shoot and make all videos for the church. You might say to yourself wow, that is too much for one plate, but here is the rub, I loved the searching for the new technology. I would agonize over which video camera would work best, who I could get the best deal from, I loved shopping for all of the computers in the church, it took up way to much time but I loved doing it. Sometimes I would get what has been called paralysis by analysis, I could not decide between products. When I did purchase a system or whatever it was, I always was disappointed when the process was done. In hindsight, after reading this book, I was addicted to the chase.<\/p>\n

Cavanaugh’s argument that we have become so detached from what we purchase that we have no attachment to those who provide, in fact, in our search for the best price and the best value, we have come to a point that to make the profit the company desires at the price point to make me buy the product has driven production overseas in search of the cheapest labor, with no concern of the impact on those who ultimately make the product. His argument is we may spend an hour or so in church we spend so much more time being fed information from T.V., internet, etc. The things we are fed are not morally neutral so they can and do have a big impact on how we live our lives.<\/p>\n

He goes on to talk about the culture we are embedded in, in fact, he argues the consumer culture is “arguably more powerful than Christianity”[3].\u00a0 So how do we fight this, he brings Augustine into play. He argues “created things…always fail to satisfy our desires…” [4]. Here is the crux when he quotes Augustine’s prayer to open\u00a0Confessions\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>“You have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you” [5]. We find our fulfillment in Christ, not the things we own, not the pursuit of the things we want. So, what does this mean for churches?<\/p>\n

This is where another reviewer disagrees with Cavanaugh. When Cavanaugh argues that instead of sending jobs overseas, particularly in agricultural production. The argument is to bring it back to make it part of the community in small sustainable farms. Craig Gunderson argues, “Not unexpectedly, the explicit and implicit policy recommendations from this book are generally abysmal. And they are especially abysmal for poor persons in both the United States and across the world.”[6] He argues this would make life much harder on those who are poor in the United States because the production here would cause price increases, and at the same time hurt the farmers in other countries as well. [7] The problem with this argument is those farmers are not being paid a livable wage so while I can maybe understand the argument, they are being taken advantage of anyway.<\/p>\n

So, in our churches how do we fight this mentality? It needs to never be about us, we always need to point to Christ, maybe we do not need all of the bells and whistles of a great service. Maybe we should be putting all of our resources into our communities, lifting people out of poverty, giving more than we think is possible.\u00a0And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left.<\/span>\u00a0Then the King will say to those on his right, \u2018Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.<\/span>\u00a0For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,<\/span>\u00a0I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.\u2019<\/span>\u00a0Then the righteous will answer him, saying, \u2018Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?<\/span>\u00a0And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?<\/span>\u00a0And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?\u2019<\/span>\u00a0And the King will answer them, \u2018Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers,you did it to me.\u2019 Matthew 25:33-40.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[1]\u00a0Spiro, John-Paul. “Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire.(Book Review).” Augustinian Studies 41, no. 2 (2010): 494-497.<\/p>\n

[2]\u00a0Cavanaugh, William T. Being Consumed : Economics and Christian Desire. Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Pub., 2008. 35.<\/p>\n

[3] Ibid. 47.<\/p>\n

[4] Ibid. 49<\/p>\n

[5] Ibid. 49<\/p>\n

[6] Gundersen, Craig. “Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire.” Economic Record 86, no. 275 (2010): 648-49.<\/p>\n

[7] Ibid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I picked up\u00a0Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire\u00a0by William T. Cavanaugh two thoughts entered my mind. The first, thank God it is a short book, after the first few books this book seemed to be a breath of fresh air. Two, was this another book crushing the capitalists?\u00a0 On both counts I was pleasantly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":102,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[385],"class_list":["post-16484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-being-consumed","cohort-lgp8"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/102"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16484"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16484\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16508,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16484\/revisions\/16508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}