The Way In, and the Way Out of Socialism

I have a friend who is a missionary priest in South America, he said something to me about 5 years ago, that really stuck with me. It was in a country that was about to elect a radical socialist, broderline communist President of their country. The country was making great strides to advance freedom in the area, but it was looking like at the time that they were going to move to greater government control. This priest knew it was coming, so I asked him how he felt so sure. He said because he watched how the rich lived, it was incredibly insightful, because it was his belief that where the country was going was basically the decision of the rich. He said, you can not live in a bubble as if the poor do not exist and then expect to keep all your freedoms, eventually the poor will vote you out, because more people are poor than rich.

Its my strong opinion that the greed of the rich in our society has basically set into motion the strong movement towards socialism. When Jesus tells the story of the rich man that stores up his treasure for himself. He starts the parable like this, "Once there was a rich man that had a bountiful harvest." He doesn't say, "Once there was a bad rich man who had a bountiful harvest that was evil." No, in fact, the tone from the story is that the rich man's talent and his bountiful harvest was a gift from God, a blessing. The rich man was simply a steward, it was his choice. He chose to hoard it for himself, imagine if he chose to use this for the good of those around him. Its obvious what would have happened, the blessing would not have stopped, and the poor would feel no desire to rise up and defeat this good man.

As a culture, for a long time, our society lived like the rich man from the Gospel, and the fruit of this is a move toward socialism, which only infects society, because Government's make very cold mothers, try doing a business dealing with the government, and you will understand coldness. The question is do we want every form of society infected with this spirit. Or do we want to be the ones that spread the warmth of goodness, through our own choices, not through mandates.

Here's the good news, there's a way back. But its harder now, we actually had a lot of resources in which to give back then, it would have been easier to show that humans, not only have the ability to give, but have the desire, because its in his own best interest. Now the way back will be hard, but the fruit will even be better, we have to simplify our own lives, and look to give to the poor from our resources, to give from our wants. Even in our own small lives, our gifts will make a difference. Governments make cold mothers and fathers, but people make warm one's. That's our task to move towards more freedom.