But how is the best way to do good in the world?
There is strong evidence that the early followers of Jesus had a socialist/communist bent. Passages in the Acts of the Apostles clearly suggest that the early disciples lived a communal lifestyle:
"And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need." - Acts 2:44-45.
And then there's Jesus' commission for his disciples to leave their worldly possessions behind when they go out and preach from the canonical gospels: "take nothing for the journey except a staff" .
So, if I want to be a true Christian, should I be supporting communist/socialist policies?
I've been asking myself that question lately as I wrestle with the historical reality that capitalism seems to have done more to improve the life of the world's poor than communism or socialism has. The demise of the Soviet Union and the communist regime in China, the decline of the Kibbutz movement in Israel, and (more recently) the economic decline of Chavez' Venezuela serve as proof of weaknesses with communist and socialist systems.
In the United States, our experiment with socialism hasn't fared very well either. Numerous reports have come out lately about how the middle class is being wiped out and wealth is being accumulated in the hands of an elite "Robber Barron" class like we had in the 1800's. This is due to the fact that inflation-adjusted incomes for most of us have been stagnant or declining since World War II, after growing for most our our country's history. But during this post-war period, welfare programs like social security and medicare have grown exponentially, proving that socialist policies haven't helped much here either.
Communism and socialism don't seen to be adequate solutions to improving the plight of the world's poor. When governments try to drive the economy and distribute the wealth generated from that economic activity, we humans seem to loose our drive to succeed -- causing everyone to be worse off.
Is free market capitalism a better choice, then?
I do buy into the argument that free-market capitalism has done more to increase the overall wealth of nations than any other governmental system devised so far. Just compare the results of Western European nations to their Eastern European counterparts post World War II.
The real question is whether we should allow successful people to be charitable on their own, or whether governments need to step in to forcibly redistribute their wealth to those that need it.
As Arthur Brooks noted in his book "Who Really Cares", people who give to charity voluntarily (and those who receive that charity) are much happier overall than those who rely on forced income redistribution by the government to solve social issues. Brooks also examined who give more to charity; pro-business republicans or socially conscious democrats. Surprisingly, he showed that republications actually give more to charity, both with their money and their free time, than do socialist democrats that ardently support government wealth redistribution programs. Are democrats just taking the easy way out knowing that they wouldn't be charitable on their own?
So as a Christian who sincerely wants to help those less fortunate, I've come to the conclusion that socialist governmental policies do more harm than good -- parting ways with those earliest followers of Jesus. I believe our focus should be on how we can get free-market capitalists to behave more "Christian" on their own, instead of demonizing them and stealing the products of their hard work.
