How are there so many christian capitalists?

Question has been discussed before...a couple of times. search is your friend

That said, I think the answer comes out to something like "matters of country and matters of religion are separate; give to the emperor what is his and give to God what is His" or something else that tries to deflect the fact that modern day capitalism is the antithesis of Christianity.

eh

 

Because people are f***ing hypocrites.

 

Folks selectively take parts of the Bible and use it to support anything. Believe it or not you will find folks who consider themselves Christians and libertarians. It is hard to be perfect, but to basically say that you believe in the "virtue of selfishness" ala Ayn Rand and the market rules in all human endeavors and morality is wierd, though comforting to those who are wealthy and feel that they are smarter and healthier than most.

 

Jesus had no problem with wealth. Saying he did is taking individual quotes out of context.

 

I don't think Jesus ever advocated having the government force people to donate their money to others. He wanted people to do that on their own.

Many people who are "capitalists" donate to charity. One does not preclude the other.

 

i have all sorts of problems with capitalism and every other sort of -ism meshing with Jesus. I have a really hard time with the Church selling capitalism and nationalism...selling out to political interests.

having said that....where do you get that Jesus said the government should redistribute people's wealth?? i don't have a problem necessarily with government doing that. but i'm not going to use the words of Jesus to make that case...the best you could do is point to Acts 2, to talk about the early Church having everything in common...the wealthy selling stuff off as necessary to take care of those less fortunate....but that was the Church...not the government.

Jesus did tell a parable about a selfish guy who passed a beggar outside his mansion every day, never stopping to help him....and then when the man died, he found himself in hell.

 

Using Christianity to justify capitalism is a bit...ludicrious.

You can argue that Jesus would not actively endorse socialism.

But there is no argument that He would absolutely deplore capitalism. It's a system inherently based on moral flaws and selfishness. It works well, I'm not saying that it doesn't, it is the best system we have. But, from the point of view of someone like Jesus, it's an abomination. course, this is all my opinion, and I can't exactly go around trumpeting my opinion as that of the Almighty (although I'm fairly certain a good amount of people do that anyways), but I have a feeling that anyone who studies Scripture would tend to agree with me.

 

Where did I use Christianity to justify capitalism? All I said was that the two aren't incompatible.

 

Well, if you're talking about Christianity as a doctrine of Christ instead of the whole organized religion bit, I would argue that the two are incompatible.

I took that as using Christ's doctrines to justify Capitalism...but it could be up to interpretation I guess.

 

I don't think Jesus would have said religion and government are separate. Still, there's more than one way to skin a cat. Can you give to the poor without socialism? Of course you can. So, I don't see how there's a mandate to be socialist. There is a mandate to handle your politics and economy prudently. If the wisest way you can manage to do that -- while still doing what you should be doing for the poor -- is capitalism, I don't see why you shouldn't or wouldn't do that, as Christians.

 

Does that mean all the carpenters, stonecutters, and merchants did their work for free? Farmers were all subsistence farmers, who didn't sell any of their crops or calves? Didn't own any of the land they lived on? What am I misunderstanding about capitalism or scripture (neither of which I've studied very thoroughly)?

 

Through capitalism, the more you bring in the more you EXPAND the institution to reach out to "more" people. Church trickle down!

Capitalism with a Conscience.

 

Not saying that Christians shouldn't pursue anything. God knows, most sins are thing we shouldn't do, but we do anyways. It's being aware of the fact that many who espouse unregulated capitalism on one hand profess on the other hand that they have the most faith in the Lord. They are being hypocritical. It's a central conflict that runs especially deep within some social conservative circles. You can be capitalist and christian, it's just a clash of values that goes beyond religion and government and goes to the question of your own soul; you believe in two doctrines that in essence contradict one another. One professes that you cannot place anything higher then the Lord and the other is fundamentally based on the fact that people value commodities above all else! Sure, the two can coexist, just like criminals and police can "coexist" together in a community. They aren't close to being compatible, supporting philosophies.

Adam Smith lays it down better then I ever could.

If you embrace both and believe that in your greed you are serving others, then the religion you adapted is directly contradictory to how you live your life. Christianity's fundamental value is altruism and that's without thought for yourself. Capitalism is entirely based on thought for oneself.

 

I want to amend and say I believe that people who use capitalism as a system to gain great reward and then give out of whatever motivation are,regardless of their intentions, GREAT people. For example, Billie Gates and countless other philanthropists.

I'm mostly aiming this rant at those who actually fundamentally believe in the inherent righteousness of capitalism while espousing Christianity as their system of belief, it just doesn't work (and I'm under the impression that there are a significant number of these people in North America). If one is Christian, one must always be aware that capitalism is a dirty cloth holding society together, to be disposed of at once when a better alternative is made and never to be considered morally justifiable.

 

Exactly. This whole Jesus was a socialist thing is absurd. Capitalism is better for people than communism, why else has free market capitalism spread around the world as a model for most economies?

Oh, and it's also a fact that Christian conservatives give more to charity than liberals do.

 

I don't want to have to be the one to break it to you, but socialism and communism are not the same thing.

 

Capitalism is better than socialism too.

 

you're making that claim, but where are the facts ?