Will They Never Learn?
For some months, we have been holding our breath and waiting. Waiting not so much for 'green shoots' in the economy, but for serious signs that our society and its leaders are prepared to take costly steps to reform ubiquitous abuses of the system.
Such abuses are nothing new. An exhibition just opening at the British Museum called 'Medals of Dishonour' features an eighteenth-century medal depicting Prime Minister Robert Walpole sitting on a sack of money, satirising his forced resignation in the wake of accusations of corruption. William Wilberforce, in the same century, had two great goals in life - the abolition of the slave trade, and the 'reformation of manners'.
It is true that most of the excesses of which we hear, now almost on a daily basis, are not actually illegal. But they are immoral, abuses of a system that could work well if everyone cared about the common good rather than their own self-interest. George Soros has commented, 'The cult of success has replaced a belief in principles. Society has lost its anchor.'
What we all want to know is whether rules are going to be tightened, and expectations moderated before the economy picks up and everything goes on as before. Barack Obama's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, is quoted as saying 'Don't let a good crisis go to waste'.
Early signs are not good. Just when Sir Fred Goodwin finally agreed to pay back part of his vast pension, RBS this week announced a pay deal of up to £9.6m for its new chief executive, Stephen Hester.
Mention of Wilberforce earlier calls to mind the film Amazing Grace, which portrayed the disgraceful shenanigans of Members of Parliament of his day. Apart from the clothes, it eerily parallels the behaviour of our current MPs. Whether it's the expenses scandal or the fiasco of the election of the new Speaker, we have become all too familiar with people in positions of authority or responsibility behaving according to self-advancement and expediency rather than conviction and principle.
It is in such a society that Christians are called to 'shine like stars in the universe' (Philippians 2:15). But isn't the Church in many ways, though on a smaller scale, guilty of similar behaviour? Not only in church politics, but also even in the struggles for influence and favour in an average church congregation, aren't we inclined (to parody Paul in 1 Corinthians 3:3) to 'act like mere MPs'?
Will we never learn?
Helen Parry
Links
Read more on the 'Medals of Dishonour' exhibition here
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