Over the course of my life I have been deemed a Methodist, a Buddhist, a Capitalist, a Socialist, a revisionist, a columnist, an antagonist, a racist, an economist, an ecologist, a sexist, an egotist, a pragmatist, and a moralist. (I have thankfully avoided fascist, misogynist, elitist, and communist.) My economic views on equitable solutions to wealth disparity have won me the label of capitalist, while my religious views and theological interpretation make me a socialist. Both labels have been weaponized and used in the most negative sense possible. We just love our labels, especially when we can misapply them through ignorance or misappropriation. Capitalism was not intended to be about greed and power, but a social structure that would guarantee a healthy economy founded on the common good. The fact that self-interested, greedy, corrupt, and selfish people used it for the accumulation of wealth and the abuse of power doesn’t mean that capitalism is bad, just that it can be bastardized. Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” was a neutral force that if used properly could employ, house, feed, and provide healthcare for, everyone. And I am so sorry how we have undermined and exploited. So sorry, but if you follow the teachings of Jesus in the gospels and Paul in his epistles, you are going to be a bona fide socialist in the purest sense of the word (and the Word). Most -ists are neither positive or negative, but depend on what kind of -ist we try to be.

I don’t like labels. Labels are reduction-ist. Labels are separation-ist, Labels are class-ist. Labels are used to do harm, to insult, to dismiss, wielded like a f-ist. However, labels can be tools for affirmation and praise. I like being a philanthropist, a Methodist, a linguist, and a pacifist. In fact, I am going to ascribe a new label to myself. Not a socialist, not a capitalist – I am a social capitalist!

The key to our future is not the current polarization and hostility being perfected in the United States and bringing pain, horror, and destruction to innocent people in Ukraine/Russia, Israel/Palestine, Myanmar, Maghreb, and Sudan. Think how easily we toss around the label “terrorist”, immediately casting a horrifying aspersion and turning people into faceless monsters. Hate rhetoric is damaging and destructive. It accomplishes nothing positive. It is petty and immature (yes, I know, I am labeling, but behaviors, not people. Feel free to think of examples and see if you can find anything redemptive in what they say, or the way they act). 

Social capital is about relationships. It is about mutual benefit and the common good. It demands we shift our energies from the negative to the positive. It requires us to expand our circle of care and responsibility. It redeems accountability from punishment to sincere interest in integrity and improvement. Social capital can be built upon the widespread sharing of the fruit of the Holy Spirit. If our core values are loving all people, creating an environment of joy, making and cultivating lasting peace, unflappable patience, unmerited kindness, abundant generosity, a resurrected faithfulness in civility and the common good intended by God, gentleness of speech and action, and basic, mature self-control, our world will indeed be transformed. There will be no debate over who deserves what, of who is good and who is bad, of how to deal with greed, selfishness, and violence. What will emerge is a dedication to mercy, justice, and peace. We will select governmental representatives based on their character and values, rather than the volume of their accusatory and aggressive rhetoric.

It does seem that the forces of darkness have gotten a strong toehold in our culture. We seem to have abandoned any kind of vision for the common good. Our politics have gone toxic, our corporate media sold out to sponsors and their icons have confused real news with their own opinions, and a whole lot of social media is a clogged sewer of the worst kind of excrement. We should want better than this.

For me, a card-carrying social capitalist, it is all about relationships. We need to set aside our differences to search out our commonalities. We need to connect the rhythms of our heartbeats, pumping the same lifegiving blood to all God’s children. We need to seek to understand unconditional love and unmerited grace. We need to be better, not just for ourselves, but for one another.