On Making Poverty History

I received the following query from a reader of this site, concerning a banner link to the 'Make Poverty History' campaign which has featured prominently on most of this site's pages.

It may seem minor, but Jesus said The poor you will always have with you. If a non-believer hears Christians saying they are going to end poverty, does that not appear as if we do not believe what Jesus said? I think so.

So what did Jesus mean by his passing remark at a dinner party?

He makes his comment in the course of defending a woman who had acted in an extravagant and wasteful manner as an expression of love and gratitude. He is asked whether the money might not have been given rather to the poor. (In John's account, he thinks the objection offered by his dodgy treasurer is frankly insincere.) In any case, his response indicates that he values love even higher than equity: it is the attitude in which we ought to live, whether we are rich or poor. So much is self-evident: While love can largely compensate for even very serious poverty, no amount of wealth can compensate for its absence, either in this life or in our entrance to the next.

Personally, I expect that if a non-believer-in-Christ were to hear of Christians who were not striving to end all poverty, then it would seem that it was those Christians who did not believe what Jesus said.

Consider the parable of the sheep and the goats, for example, in which our final judgement is made to depend on how we treat people in need. “Then they will also answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and didn’t help you?’ Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Most assuredly I tell you, inasmuch as you didn’t do it to one of the least of these, you didn’t do it to me.’ So are you a sheep or a goat? That is to say -- while minimizing any disrespect directed at the goat species -- are you a true or a false Christian? Why not try this simple test: How do you treat the poor? These questions are one and the same in this parable.

The objection above allows an admirable concern for consistency to be set against a concern for others. But why oppose the two? We ought to keep the one without neglecting the other. If our exegesis ever contradicts a major biblical ethic -- like love for others, or compassion for the poor -- then it is probably wrong. Now I doubt that my correspondent is saying that Jesus wants us to ensure that poverty always exists, even if we can prevent it! Or that we should say to the malnourished multitudes of the world: Sorry, but I can't prevent your poverty in case I accidentally prove Jesus wrong! But I think that their argument leads off in that direction, and this is both unpleasant and unnecessary.

If we consider, say, Mark 14:7 -- For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want to, you can do them good; but you will not always have me -- it is easy to see that he is contrasting the ongoing presence of the poor with the imminence of his own death. On the one hand, he is addressing his contemporaries. On the other hand if the 'always' is a mildly hyperbolic phrase, such as people use all the time (see!) in these kind of sentences, then it is quite unlikely that he is either recommending fatalism, or revoking his own explicit, systematic teaching on our attitudes toward the poor.

So much is plausible. Then again, he may indeed reveal a conviction that the elimination of poverty is unachievable in this life and world. But even if he did, that shouldn't stop us aiming for it. There are many things we strive for just because they're good things in themselves; not because they're necessarily attainable -- a life of perfect goodness is one excellent example: realistically, we won't achieve that. Likewise for introducing everybody to the same relationship with God that we ourselves (I hope) enjoy. Odds on, that won't happen either. But none of this is any reason to give up or hold back. (Or worse, to argue that striving for perfection would violate Jesus instructions about forgiveness! Or to fear that everybody being reconciled to God would make a mess of certain eschatologies.)

Sadly, I doubt that poverty can be eliminated from the world by human effort. Human nature being and remaining what it is, many people will simply never develop the personal responsibility required to competently manage their finances, and those with power of all kinds will continue to oppress or neglect the disadvantaged for their own ends. But we should certainly do all we can to counter this and to reverse it insofar as we are able. The difference between the sheep and goats was what they did and didn't do: whether their actions demonstrated that their faith was real or not -- whether they really thought the poor and disadvantaged were their brothers and sisters and equals before God.

So why not try and Make Poverty History? What's the worst that could happen? -- Kalessin