Headlines this week:
Brown sparks £1.9 trillion bailout
PM spent £37 billion buying shares in RBS, HBOS, LloydsTSB
Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, Austria, Italy, Holland follow suit with combined £1.5 trillion
America spends £2 trillion
How much is a trillion?
Short scale countries = 1 million million = 1012 = 12 zeroes
Long scale countries = 1 million million million = 1018 = 18 zeroes
Most of 20C Britain was long scale and US short scale
1974 UK government adopted short scale, but British usage still applies otherwise, but most of mass media adopt short scale which is just as well given the sums involved
For most people the actual sums are irrelevant. They mean nothing we can understand or measure.
Somehow we just know we are all poorer as a result – will pay more tax
Appropriate that gospel reading concerns tax – who should pay?
Question refers to poll tax imposed AD6 when Israel became Roman province
Provoked rebellion of Judas the Galilean (Acts 5:37)
Herod’s party favoured paying – collaborators
Pharisees and Zealots + people resented it = unholy alliance
Jesus had arrived in fulfillment of prophecy
Challenged religious and secular leaders in Temple
Different factions ganged up to play politics with him + dispose of threat
Yes, pay = trouble with crowds
No, don’t pay = trouble with Romans
Catch 22
Tax paid in silver coinage
Effigy of emperor
Described as divine and to be worshipped
Blasphemy
Jesus: “Why are you testing me?” – same words as he used to Satan during Temptation in Wilderness
Yes or No
Jeremy Paxman
John Humphries
Was the ‘Render Unto Caesar...” answer just a device, or is there a teaching or command in this response for us today?
We have no choice but to pay our taxes, any more than the Jews had with the Romans
But we have more say in how our taxes are used
How to vote
We can also decide
What to buy (Traidcraft, where sourced)
Which shops to use
Where to save (ethical investment – Co-op, Nationwide)
Whilst PM pledged £37 billion in one day
GDP of Ethiopia in 2007 was £43 billion
Whilst Bush promised £2 trillion in support
Total worldwide spending on HIV/AIDS in 2007 was £5.7 billion
Spending in US for each person infected by HIV/AIDS was 35 times that of each patient in Latin America and 1,000 times that in Africa
So when we look at these numbers we have to ask
What has a more devastating impact? HIV/AIDS pandemic or the risk of financial services meltdown? The rise in tuberculosis? Or malaria?
None are desirable, but is it worth spending 190 times as much in Europe alone as the whole world spends on HIV/AIDS? Is this ethically sound thinking, and does it chime with the gospel message of social justice and equity?
Perhaps these questions themselves are too big to answer, but surely we should ask?
An then, there is the question: “How did all this come about?”
Not just the domino effect of a few defaulting mortgages in the US and a lot of risky lending?
Greed? Hope against hope? Head in the sand? Short term quick bucks, and let’s hope I get out before the whole deck of cards comes crashing down?
I am not qualified to answer, but the message of the gospel this morning is clearer:
Give to the legal authorities what belongs to them, and to God what belongs to God
It’s the second part that is the more important
What belongs to God in our lives?
What priority do we give to it, compared to the time we spend on getting the best interest rates, chasing down the best bargains, looking for the best value car insurance, evaluating our next major purchase.
Here’s a passage from Matthew 6. It’s worth re reading it regularly:
Treasures in Heaven
19 "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
22 "The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
24 "No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.
Do Not Worry
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. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life [e]?
28 "And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labour or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendour was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
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