I was skimming through a lengthy summary of John Howard Yoder's The Politics of Jesus, and it again raised the question of what a corresponding economics of Jesus might look like. Yoder offers an uncompromising view of the Gospel and its politics, and makes a compelling case that we are called to follow this, whether or not it is practical or even feasible.
One attempt to describe such an economic vision is William T. Cavanaugh's Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire. Though it is a worthy effort, it often reads, as the author admits, as a menu of standard progressive economic ideas rather than something uniquely rooted in the Gospel.
Two upcoming conferences (which I hope to attend) promise to grapple with this issue in a more comprehensive way. The first is this summer's gathering of the Ekklesia Project in the Chicago area (which Cavanaugh will be attending) and the second, the gathering of Jesus Radicals in Memphis.
Whether in Luke's account of the early church, or Matthew's of the Sermon on the Mount, among many others, there can be little doubt that the economics embedded in the Gospel is radically different from any now extant, whether of left or right. I hope over the next year or so to begin to tease out and question what such an economics might look like. I can use all the help I can get.
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