As the focus of our attention these days seems to be on economics, we have a gospel at deals directly with that. Th master who has a debtor whoowes a huge sum of money, but cannot possibly repay it.
The gospel does not say "Moved with compassion the master he said to him "I would love to forgive you but it would create a moral hazard" . The gospel says he forgave him.
That servant, forgiven the huge sums he owed then refused to forgive the people who owed him much smaller amounts. Sound like anything in the real world?
In the gospel the master then punishes severely the one who owed the huge amount, but refused to pass on the forgiveness. How many huge banks were bailed out only to turn around and foreclose on much smaller debtors.
Some would say to me. "Father, that's business. And the church should stay out of that."
I would say that has been the problem. The church has been too quiet about business practices. If I hear one more person say that it is the responsibility of the CEO to make as much money for the stockholders as possible, I am going to scream.
Profits are not bad. But the way they are made not only has to be legal but moral. The excuse used by some on Wall Street that they didn't break the law is just that, an excuse. Every Christian who is a business person has a primary responsibility to be moral, then comes their responsibility to make money for shareholders. Not breaking federal or state law is not enough. What about God's law?
