When I was nine-years-old, my parents moved to a stately old house on the south side of Danville, which is how I acquired my southern accent. The house had been built in 1913 for a Quaker minister and had a double parlor where Quaker weddings were held. When I was growing up, and people would ask where I lived and I told them, they’d say, “My grandparents were married in that house.” I’ve done weddings in my own home, mostly gay couples who’ve been so traumatized by the Church, they want to be married elsewhere, so I marry them in our living room, and Joan bakes brownies, and we hold the reception in our kitchen. It is quite the good time.
When my parents bought their house, it needed renovation, which was unfortunate because my father knew nothing about home maintenance. He had two tools—a hammer and a large flat-bladed screwdriver, which he used as a chisel, pry bar, and bottle opener. That was the extent of his tool collection, so his maintenance projects were often accompanied by fervent swearing, which is how I acquired my linguistic habits. When I bought my own home, I was determined to learn how to maintain it, so when someone would come to our house to repair something, I would watch and ask questions, so that if it ever needed fixed again, I could do it myself and save money. But then my philosophy of wealth and money changed. I no longer want to save money; I want to use it.
We’ve been thinking about money and its role and power in our lives. I no longer view money as a treasure to be hoarded, but as a tool to be used, a resource to be shared, circulated, and employed. In the past year, we’ve remodeled our bathrooms, roofed our house and screen house, installed new gutters at our house, painted the interior of our home, sanded the floors, and replaced our 26-year-old appliances. I was counting everyone who’s been at our house working this past year, and over 25 people have been able to support their families because money was transferred from us to them.
The general contractor’s wife has early-onset Alzheimer’s and the work he did for us paid for three months in a nursing home. The man who sanded our floors has two kids in college, the women who painted our house fed their children and paid for their back-to-school clothes, the Hispanic men who roofed our home sent money to their families in Central America, the drywaller put money in his retirement fund, and the carpenter made enough money to take a week off to help build a house for a poor family, free of charge.
In the process, human dignity was created, along with deep satisfaction for jobs well done. I’ve made new friends, and now know how to apply drywall mud, a skill I will never put to use, because I want the drywaller to have the things I have—a roof over his head, food in his stomach, and a financial cushion for his retirement.
Money is a tool to be used, not a resource to be hoarded. It is finite, which is what gives money its value. Scarcity creates value. If a gold deposit were discovered that was a thousand times larger than all the gold already mined, gold would decline in value, because scarcity creates value. Money is valuable because it is a finite resource. Water is valuable because it is a finite resource. Food is valuable because it is a finite resource.
In the United States, the total net worth of all households is 160 trillion dollars. Ninety-eight percent of that is owned by the richest half of Americans, the rest is owned by the poorest half, which though significantly larger in number, owns only 2% of our nation’s wealth. The top 1% control almost 1/3 of the nation’s wealth, or 50 trillion dollars. And we can’t touch that. That is off-limits, because we’ve decided all that wealth should congregate in the hands of a relatively few families. Efforts to tax their wealth in order to right that imbalance are met with stiff resistance. If we even raise the subject, we’re accused of socialism. But imagine if those ratios of ownership were also true of food and water. Imagine if the richest half of Americans owned 98% of the water. Imagine if the top 1% owned 1/3 of the nation’s food. Imagine every day we saw people die of thirst and starvation. Imagine we saw infants with swollen bellies, and adults with emaciated, shriveled bodies. Imagine that every day we were told by the leaders of our nation that water and food could not be more equally distributed, that nothing could be done to right this imbalance, because to do so would be socialism.
In no civilized society should so many resources rest in so few hands. In fact, if someone hoarded all the water and took all the food, we would realize that person threatened our well-being and we would act. But let a person manipulate financial and political systems to accumulate unimaginable wealth and we will let it persist, and even celebrate it, elevating them as geniuses, as role models, when in fact they are deeply troubled people, whose appetites are insatiable, whose greed is causing the misery and death of millions of people around the world.
This is not humane. This is not civilized. In a nation whose founding document promises life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, it is not American. It most certainly is not Christian. And it’s time we said so. Jesus said so. In the gospel of Luke he spoke about a rich man whose wealth was so great, he had no place to store it, so he built bigger barns, and reveled in his excess, saying, “I have arrived. I’ve made it. I will recline and enjoy.” But that very night he died. Jesus said, “That very night his life was demanded from him.” The bill came due. When wealth is hoarded and not shared, the bill will come due.
Amassing wealth is not a Christian virtue, nor for that matter is it a democratic value. Sharing is a Christian virtue. Generosity is a Christian virtue. This is why I believe wealth is a tool to be used, not a treasure to be hoarded.