There is only one mistake to make when talking about economics. That is to talk about economics first and the Christian faith second. If we put them this way around, nothing we say is either Christian or useful. When we do not put the gospel first, we are only repeating what all others say, and are not able to make any distinctive contribution to the discussion. What we say is this. Christian baptism makes us self-controlled persons, no longer entirely propelled by our passions. The ability to say ‘no’ to our own immediate desires is the irreplaceable gift given to Christians. It is the first step to freedom. God, the true judge, is able to release us from our sin and give us mastery of our passions. Through baptism we are freed to love and to act. When we achieve this elementary self-mastery, we can begin to act well towards one another. Only through Christian baptism, and within this Christian community and its discipleship, are we able to acquire this self-control. This baptism has a positive economic outworking, both long-term and immediate. This is what we failed to say at the ‘My Word is My Bond’ G20 meeting in St Paul’s Cathedral this week.
I have written two sets of Lent talks, for different audiences, on this subject and you can see them both at Scribd. The first and longer set ‘Long way to Easter’ contain the moral theology and economics, along with discussions of covenant, marriage, cultural confidence and demography. The shorter ‘Walbrook talks’ set out the theology and ecclesiology. But we need to spell out some of the theology, in particular baptism and the distinctive calling of the Church, before we talk about the world and economics.
