economic gluttony

A appears that a hungry sense for personal significance drives Mall Shopping and QVC and the general economic gluttony of the world. I seem to live in a world obsessed with MORE. More of everything is the desire of the human heart . . . here in Macedonia . . . and elsewhere as well. It is impossible to have a conversation without the direction of the talk moving to money within the first 5 minutes of the conversation . . . well OK, 6 minutes. This phenomena generally bothers us westerners greatly because of our chronic guilt for having more possibilities than the average person.

This experience is repeated so consistently it becomes the expected norm. Another reason Brenda and I notice this so much in Macedonia (actually the entire former Yugoslavia) is that it is different than our experience in Russia . . . which incidentally is far poorer than the former Yugoslavia. The Russians would say regularly, "Under Communism, we had pockets full of money but the stores were empty . . . so you could buy nothing; under capitalism the stores are now full, but our pockets are empty, so the net result is that we can buy nothing. Essentially nothing has changed." But in the former Yugoslavia there is much more the sense of entitlement in these conversations about money. This comes from a falling standard of living in our opinion. Don't get me wrong, people are really struggling for DAILY bread. These are not the imaginary ramblings of the formerly rich who must now slide into middle-class living. No. These are the obsessions and worries of people who most often have no security today nor tomorrow.

But I am becoming more convinced that daily bread is only the visible concern. The real desires of the heart, as seen in conversations with our national friends, is for unrestrained economic gluttony. They were infected with this by our Western culture, although the seeds and roots were already present. Economic gluttony looks like this:

"The richest 1 percent in the world enjoy the same amount of resources consumed by the entire bottom 50 percent. Few in the world of affluence ever experience chronic starvation; many in the world of poverty know little else. Only a small minority of parents in the US ever experience the trauma of having a child die before the age of 5; nearly 10 percent of parents in the poorest countries do. In the world of affluence, parents worry increasingly about childhood obesity; in the world of poverty, nearly 163 million children are malnourished. An American child born in 2004 has a life expectancy well into her 70s, will learn to read and write, and is likely to complete an advanced degree. A child born in Angola has a life expectancy of 46 and little chance of finishing high school; less than half of all Angolans gain enough education to read a newspaper." - http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1118/p09s01-coop.html

It is breathtaking to realize that the richest 1% consume the same resources as the ENTIRE bottom 50%! It is terrifying to see that most of us want to be in that 1 percent! I wonder how Christ views this rampant consumerism? The relentless pursuit of stuff . . . and more stuff? We rent storage to keep our stuff. We have garages. Those garages are so full of stuff that our cars are parked outside the garages. Why doesn't my relationship with Christ provide a sense of contentment that makes all the stuff irrelevant? Why do I resist the idea of living with less, older and smaller in order to have more to share? I do . . .and I mean I really do . . . want something on my gravestone other than . . . "Here lies a consumer." When is enough enough?