What Would Jesus Do?

I've been thinking about this more since the current financial crisis and the subsequent references by some to the bailout of Wall Street being "socialism."

And I've been thinking about it in relation to Obama being called a "socialist" because he talked about redistributing the wealth.

And I've been thinking about the many Christians who associate socialism with something bad.

And the popularity a few years ago with WWJD pins.

Do people think God is a capitalist? Or that Jesus was a capitalist? Or that the early Church was capitalist?

I can think of few things that one can say for sure that God, Jesus and the early Church were not, and that was capitalists.

We are told of the beliefs of the early Church and how they applied that to their day-to-day lives, presumably, with the idea that they were living a WWJD way, that they "held all things common."

Acts 4: 32: And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common.

We also are told the theology that led to that belief, which was the whole idea of loving your neighbour as yourself. It is a belief which Anabaptist groups such as the Hutterites who live communally and take care of their own still hold.

The very definition of capitalism - an unmodified capitalism - is that selfishness is good and that if you don't succeed as the world defines success, you are "lazy." Much as Martha, for example in the NT, she of the Lazarus fame, viewed her sister Mary, who preferred to listen at Jesus' feet rather than to cook.

Capitalism does not love one's neighbour. It is in fact human selfishness, a worldly human selfishness.

Yet in all the world, there is no greater misunderstanding about socialism, "liberalism" and Marxism than in the United States. None of them equate communism and none of them speak against communism any more than the intrinsic selfishness of a capitalist system speaks against many kind and caring individuals in the US.

Given that the US is such a conservative nation, a nation so obsessed in a sense with matters of faith that politicians have to play to the Christians in order to win elections - it kind of boggles my mind that the US isn't a socialist country, a Good Samaritan country, a country that acts in a WWJD manner by not living for earthly treasure, but by sharing good fortune in a communal or socialist way as defined in Acts.

It really puzzles me why people are so against spreading the wealth, Jesus-style.