I don't have to

I don’t have to, but I have to

I was thinking about this in terms of helping someone out. He said, you don’t have to. I said, I don’t have to, but I have to. No, I didn’t owe him anything, but I have a moral obligation to help when I can.

This got me thinking about large corporations and their responsibility. In an economic model or a capitalistic way of thinking corporations don’t have a responsibility to their employees, their well being or the well being of their family. In a capitalistic way of seeing the world the corporation has no obligation beyond making sure the paycheck is on time and calculated in a fair and just manner. The corporation has no obligation to the better good of all. The company has no obligation to the beloved community. The only obligation is to the bottom line of profit over loss. This is an economic centered way of life, and it literally kills people by poising the spirit, life, and environment in the name of profit over loss.

This posed a question for me. What is our moral imperative? Where do we go for our obligation guideposts if you will? Where do we go to find our moral center? From that moral center who are we obligated to? Is economics a moral center?

God pulls us back to act as curators of the beloved community in our time and place in history. Our Christian guide to the ways of God is found in Jesus Christ and Jesus not only preaches and teaches about that moral center, but He also lives from that place all the way to the cross. From a moral center as found in Jesus Christ we may understand I don’t have to, but I have to. Economics tells me I don’t have to. The God of Love implores me through empathy and compassion, I have to.

We must help when and where we are able for our own wellbeing. For in the wellbeing of others we find our own wellness.

If we operate from an economic model of morals, then we don’t have to do anything but exploit anything and everything for our own gain. Such as paying employees a less than living wage and using the profits of a worldwide, multi trillion-dollar corporation to finance billion-dollar trips to outer space. In an economic, capitalistic centered model of living this makes total sense. While there are people literally starving in the streets we finance a trip to space.

In a Christ centered understanding of a moral imperative, this is wrong. We, the American corporation, are obligated to the Beloved community, the kingdom, love, care, compassion, health, and wellbeing of each other. This is our moral center from which we all must strive to operate from.

Ubuntu is a valuable way of understanding this moral imperative we have to one another. Ubuntu is not an economic model. Ubuntu is a spiritual model that we see in Jesus and how he walked and talked while on this earth. ‘I Am Because We Are’. ‘Love as you have been love’.

If we are to be a people of the Way in our time and place in the here and now, we are obligated to our neighbors as our selves. We are morally obligated to the creation of equal opportunities for each person to thrive. Creating a model of living from that moral center, love your neighbors as yourselves as God so loved you, will help to create a more perfect union among the people who call this rock of matter and gas, home.

Adapted from a prayer by Robert Rains that first appeared in The Wittenberg Door (04 December 1971)

O God, make me discontented with things the way they are in the world and in my own life.

Make me notice the stains when people get spilled on.

Make me care about the slum child downtown,

the misfit at work,

the forgotten people in our hospitals and nursing homes,

the men, women and youth behind bars.

Jar my complacence, expose my excuses,

get me involved in the life of my city and world.

Give me integrity once more,

O God, as we seek to be changed and transformed,

with a new understanding and awareness of our common humanity

The problems of this world will only be solved when we truly see our neighbor as we see ourselves.

When we begin to listen to the truth in someone else’s story, we begin the journey towards loving as we have been loved.