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Which socialists are apostles of God?
These two verses from Acts sound very socialist to me. The first is Acts 2:44-45: "All that believed were together, and had all things in common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need." The second is from Acts 4:34-37 "There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means “son of encouragement”). He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles’ feet."
Did Jesus believe in collective or common ownership of the means of production??
These two verses from Acts sound very socialist to me. The first is Acts 2:44-45: "All that believed were together, and had all things in common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need." The second is from Acts 4:34-37 "There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means “son of encouragement”). He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles’ feet."
Results absolutely matter. And the results from half-assed programs that don't accomplish their goals and self-centered private charity are in. They fail at their aims. We need a better system.
Not really. Most private charities have a better dollar-comes-in-dollar-actually-gets-to-the-needy than the gov programs... there was a study on this a while back.
Also, the gov programs seem to fail in their goals most of the time, so why should I believe in them?
Again, these are political arguments... the OP has no legs to stand on.
They took care of each other. This is known as communalism, and is commonly practiced by small tribes and other small bands of people from early history. Note that nowhere does it say they tried to take care of everyone everywhere. Nor does it say all congregations practiced thus. Note that this is not put forward as a commandment. Note that it was done willingly and voluntarily, not by coercion. This is not socialism. Socialism didn't exist then.
Not really. Most private charities have a better dollar-comes-in-dollar-actually-gets-to-the-needy than the gov programs... there was a study on this a while back. Also, the gov programs seem to fail in their goals most of the time, so why should I believe in them?
Again, these are political arguments... the OP has no legs to stand on.
Absolutely not. Yet my discussion with Sangha indicates that He was. Furthermore, I've heard such statements from ideological liberals before. Of course, not all liberals believe this, yet I've never heard He was a socialist from conservatives.
Jesus was telling a rich man to be charitable, independent of any form of government or market system.
Well I mean ****, he could have made a killing opening up a fish restaurant, he'd have barely any overhead costs.
How very un - patriotic of him to just hand out fish for free, doesn't he know he's creating liberal free loaders!
No, it's just a higher form of charity that we, in a society run by greed, is not used to. Jesus, would have known this not as "charity", but "tzedakah". Tzedakah - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
and again, it's independent of any form of government. He didn't say "give all your positions to the poor, unless you are a socialist, then just wait for the tax man with a 90% tax rate."
You are supposed to be charitable, regardless of what form of government you believe in. even If you believe in a 99% tax rate, government universities/stores/water parks/rent/etc for everyone, you still have the obligation to give to charity.
Taxes isn't giving to the poor, it's giving to the government. If the government, the "middle man", is honest, he will use it to give charity and do good works as well, but that is still a lower form of charity
...and there is still the problem of "honesty" and "wisdom" issue, which the government lacks.
For the same reason I would never advocate the spread of Christianity "by the sword" (ie convert or die). It takes away choice; it makes the rightousness of charity something the government does in your stead, automatically, whether you will or not, and to whom you will or not. It makes the rightousness of charity compulsory and automatic, and the individual never gets to demonstrate what he would do if left to his own choice. Or else he is left with his conscience left wanting, feeling that the government's socialism with that portion of his pay that they've taken is no proper spiritual equivalent; perhaps he will feel compelled to do further charity even though the taxation of socialism may have left him with little to begin with.
As with communism, the problem I have with socialism is the coercive part. That, and the creation of special dependency classes, the loss of independent spirit in segments of the populace, and the tendency of social programs to grow until they bankrupt the nation.... as ours are doing.
How is that actually working out for us, Paschendale? We have generational dependency, loss of family cohesion due to welfare policies that discourage marriage and permanent partnering, and the creation of a permanent underclass that always clamors for more bennies but never seems to rise above their dependency or poverty, as a whole. If we, as a society, had programs that demonstrated large-scale positive results in getting people out of poverty and dependency and into the self-supporting class, I might feel rather differently about it. If the nation weren't on the verge of bankruptcy and if more than half the deficit wasn't a result of social programs, it might seem more viable. If socialism actually helped produce a larger independent middle-class instead of a larger dependent class.... well you get the picture.
Intentions are all very well and good, but results matter too.
How does welfare discourage marriage and family? Unless you're taking the position that people who could live comfortably and work choose not to in order to abuse welfare. A position that has been discussed, at length, and revealed to be a load of bull. The vast majority of welfare recipients are impoverished children, and most of the rest obtain welfare benefits for less than a year before returning to the workforce. Or at least, this was so before the recession. I don't know the numbers post-2008, but the basic tenets of human morality have not drastically altered in the last three years. A tiny minority are welfare queens. And the benefit reaped from those programs far outweighs the cost of a few freeloaders. I contend that these programs don't do enough. They only help a person regain what they had lost. Those in poverty still remain in poverty, because we do not have adequate education. We have far too many teachers using antiquated equipment. And then, even if a poor child obtains a decent education, we have no means to get that person into a job. Comprehensive education and job placement programs will grow the middle class and keep it stable.
The problem is that our programs are underfunded and unfocused. They are not powerful enough to tackle the problems they are tasked with. Our social support systems only go far enough to help a person maintain what they have, which isn't enough for many Americans who are trapped in poverty.
As for our deficit... we do have the lowest tax rate in the industrialized world. Why is it surprising that we don't get much bang for our buck? We gear our whole economic system towards personal gain, with a zero-sum outcome, and then call those who do not succeed in this system failures and immoral. As opposed to the reality where most of one's success is based on where one started out. Our programs do not cure poverty because they are not designed to. They are designed to maintain poverty, but prevent starvation. If we want people to actually escape poverty, they need more than food stamps. They need jobs. The current system of "go out and find a job" is inefficient and clearly not working. We need a system to place people with work, effectively. We need those jobs to pay a wage that will get people out of poverty. And we need to educate people so they can do those jobs. And we need to not make those people take on a lifetime of debt in order to do it.
Results absolutely matter. And the results from half-assed programs that don't accomplish their goals and self-centered private charity are in. They fail at their aims. We need a better system.
I'll let you know after we institute a socialist system. However, there are a few socialistic nations that have a higher standard of living than we do. They aren't as wealthy as the capitalistic US, but they do enjoy a better SOL
They took care of each other. This is known as communalism, and is commonly practiced by small tribes and other small bands of people from early history. Note that nowhere does it say they tried to take care of everyone everywhere. Nor does it say all congregations practiced thus. Note that this is not put forward as a commandment. Note that it was done willingly and voluntarily, not by coercion. This is not socialism. Socialism didn't exist then.
Not really. Most private charities have a better dollar-comes-in-dollar-actually-gets-to-the-needy than the gov programs... there was a study on this a while back. Also, the gov programs seem to fail in their goals most of the time, so why should I believe in them?
Again, these are political arguments... the OP has no legs to stand on.
Dammit, did I grab the wrong ch:vs for the right quote?
****. Luke 18:22.
/whew No, it was right in the original post. I just dropped the '1' further down.
Jesus advocated for much more than simple charity. He proposed that the rich sell EVERYTHING they owned. It was a warning about accumulating material wealth when others were going without the basic necessities
According to Jesus, if you didn't sell off your excess wealth and give it to the poor, you would be damned to Hell. That sounds pretty coercive to me.
Very well said. I would add that charity, including those run by the clergy, are also subject to waste, fraud, corruption and inefficiency.
I'd like to see how those cute little charities do when attempting to deal with a systemic issue. I don't know of any charity large enough to actually do something about poverty, or about illiteracy. All these charities can do is tackle a few individual cases, without addressing the root cause. The problem continues despite the most well-meaning efforts of these charitable organizations. They are not capable of enacting large-scale change. Only a government is actually big enough to do that.
As I said before, they fail because we do not empower them with enough resources to succeed. We cut school budgets and then wonder why children aren't learning as much. We know that people don't have jobs, but we do nothing (or at least, not enough to actually fix the problem) to help them get them. All it takes is prioritizing a problem, and then just doing whatever is needed to solve it. That kind of simple approach always gets mudded down by red tape and partisan politics.
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You say voluntarily, I say necessary to survive. The tribes and clans that didn't watch each others' backs didn't last very long. And again, mutually agreeing to something makes it voluntary, just as the US lawfully adopting socialist policies by normal voting procedures would also make it voluntary. Losing an election does not make the policies enacted after that election coercive. Skipping the vote altogether or subverting might, though.
Tribal communalism may not be called socialism, but it functioned pretty much the same way. All the resources of the group were devoted to the survival and prosperity of the group, which did include the survival and prosperity of its members. People didn't deny to their clan-mates the things they needed out of a sense of greed. They would not last long in the tribe if they did. Still, it was their closeness that allowed this mentality. We do not have communities like they did, and I truly mourn that. But that is an example of socialism functioning properly. It is what a group of humans will naturally fall into if they must rely on one another to survive. We can only be so cutthroat capitalist because our only major fear is each other. We'd turn commie pretty quick if aliens arrived on our doorstep.
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