National Council of Churches and Church World Service: Social Creed for 21st Century

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From: General Assembly of the National Council of Churches USA and Church World Service

Social Creed for 21st Century

We Churches of the United States have a message of hope for a fearful time.

Just as the churches responded to the harshness of early 20^th Century industrialization with a prophetic “Social Creed” in 1908, so in our era of globalization we offer a vision of a society that shares more and consumes less, seeks compassion over suspicion and equality over domination, and finds security in joined hands rather than massed arms.

Inspired by Isaiah’s vision of a “peaceable kingdom,” we honor the dignity of every person and the intrinsic value of every creature, and pray and work for the day when none “labor in vain or bear children for calamity” (Isaiah 65:23). We do so as disciples of the One who came “that all may have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10), and stand in solidarity with Christians and with all who strive for justice around the globe.

In faith, responding to our Creator, we celebrate the full humanity of each woman, man, and child, all created in the divine image as individuals of infinite worth, by working for:

• Full civil, political and economic rights for women and men of all races.

• Abolition of forced labor, human trafficking, and the exploitation of children.

• Employment for all, at a family-sustaining living wage, with equal pay for comparable work.

• The rights of workers to organize, and to share in workplace decisions and productivity growth.

• Protection from dangerous working conditions, with time and benefits to enable full family life.

• A system of criminal rehabilitation, based on restorative justice and an end to the death penalty.

In the love incarnate in Jesus, despite the world’s sufferings and evils, we honor the deep connections within our human family and seek to awaken a new spirit of community, by working for:

• Abatement of hunger and poverty, and enactment of policies benefiting the most vulnerable.

• High quality public education for all and universal, affordable and accessible healthcare.

• An effective program of social security during sickness, disability and old age.

• Tax and budget policies that reduce disparities between rich and poor, strengthen democracy, and provide greater opportunity for everyone within the common good.

• Just immigration policies that protect family unity, safeguard workers’ rights, require employer accountability, and foster international cooperation.

• Sustainable communities marked by affordable housing, access to good jobs, and public safety.

• Public service as a high vocation, with real limits on the power of private interests in politics.

In hope sustained by the Holy Spirit, we pledge to be peacemakers in the world and stewards of God’s good creation, by working for:

• Adoption of simpler lifestyles for those who have enough; grace over greed in economic life.

• Access for all to clean air and water and healthy food, through wise care of land and technology.

• Sustainable use of earth’s resources, promoting alternative energy sources and public transportation with binding covenants to reduce global warming and protect populations most affected.

• Equitable global trade and aid that protects local economies, cultures and livelihoods.

• Peacemaking through multilateral diplomacy rather than unilateral force, the abolition of torture, and a strengthening of the United Nations and the rule of international law.

• Nuclear disarmament and redirection of military spending to more peaceful and productive uses.

• Cooperation and dialogue for peace and environmental justice among the world’s religions.

We—individual Christians and churches—commit ourselves to a culture of peace and freedom that embraces non-violence, nurtures character, treasures the environment, and builds community, rooted in a spirituality of inner growth with outward action. We make this commitment together—as members of Christ’s body, led by the one Spirit—trusting in the God who makes all things new.

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National Council of Churches Justice and Advocacy Commission

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Thoughts on ethical and political reform

The Merton Institute for Contemplative Living offers a free weekly thoughts newletter of Thomas Merton, a famous 20th Century American monk. The Sep. 3rd issue strikes to the heart of what All Things Reform is about-- ethics and politics. Here Merton in his later years speaks of it, not as an agenda of a program with a definite beginning and ending, but as a way of life.

The Merton Reflection for the Week of September 3, 2007
"[Reading Chuang Tzu, I wonder seriously if the wisest answer (on the human level, apart from the answer of faith) is not beyond both ethics and politics. It is a hidden answer; it defies analysis and cannot be embodied in a program. Ethics and politics, of course: but only in passing, only as a "night's lodging." There is a time for action, a time for "commitment," but never for total involvement in the intricacies of a movement. There is a time of innocence and kairos, when action makes a great deal of sense. But who can recognize such moments? Not he who is debauched by a series of programs. And when all action has become absurd, shall one continue to act simply because once, a long time ago, it made a great deal of sense? As if one were always getting somewhere? There is a time to listen, in the active life as everything else, and the better part of action is waiting, not knowing what is next, and not having a glib answer."
Thomas Merton. Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander. New York: Doubleday, 1966: 173.

Thought to Remember
"A postulant who has come to the end of his rope and wants to leave, but who has been dissuaded (not by me), stands in the novitiate library leafing through a book called Relax and Live. Sooner or later it comes to that."
Conjectures of A Guilty Bystander: 173