Last week, we saw newly appointed Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng unveil a ‘mini-budget’.
For many of us of the Christian faith (and indeed, many others of faith and none) it was deeply concerning – not only because of its financial impact on families, but also in terms of the moral path it sets our country on.
Given the depths of the cost-of-living crisis, and the prospects of worse to come, it has been shocking to see tax handouts made to the rich. These seem designed to increase the UK’s wealth and income inequality, rather than help the wider society that the Government should be in service to.
Jesus told a very practical story, showing how our attitudes to wealth both exemplify and influence our spiritual and moral integrity. Found in the gospel of Luke 16:19-31, it’s the story of The Rich Man and Lazarus, and of how the eventual fates of these two people are bound up with their experiences of wealth and poverty during their lifetimes.
TRICKLE-DOWN ECONOMICS
In his lifetime, the rich man revels in displaying his wealth, while Lazarus goes hungry and is covered in sores. Lazarus longs for even the crumbs from the rich man’s table – which could easily be understood as a metaphor for so-called ‘trickle-down economics’ if ever there was one. ‘Trickle-down economics’ is similarly a fairly forlorn hope.
This is a timely story, as it reinforces a question that Jesus Himself asked often: what are the wealthy doing with their riches and how are they helping the most vulnerable in society (Mark 10, Matthew 25)?
How do we respond to these biblical challenges today? Does the economic system within which we live nowadays reflect our Christian values? From this most recent budget, it would seem that many of our leaders favour the rich over the poor.
The Government is taking a huge gamble that their latest budget policies will lead to economic growth – and the fact that they appear to have refused independent scrutiny of the numbers is concerning.
The story of The Rich Man and Lazarus clearly shows that God cares deeply about how those of us with wealth use it, and how we treat the poorest. And like the rich man, we’ve no excuse for not knowing better.