Don't expect Warren Buffett to do it all

A sermon preached at Faith Episcopal Church on July 2, 2006>

In the past weeks Bill Gates and Warren Buffett have put a face on today’s lessons. The readings from Deuteronomy and 2 Corinthians make no bones about God’s expectation that we share what we have with those who do not. I want to read to you an interesting response to Warren Buffett’s bombshell announcement from a newspaper in India…

“Why do we create wealth? At the very bottom of the pyramid, it is for survival — today and tomorrow. Climb up a little and it’s a house — the right size, in the right area. The next rung is all about high-end memberships — golfing at the right club, smoking the right cigar, vacationing the right cruise. You still need to climb many more rungs, the millionaire-billionaire catalogues — before you reach the peak, the very top of all lists, aspirations, imaginations. That’s where Buffett and Gates sit.

Buffett could well have passed on his wealth to his children, Susan, Howard and Peter. But the conviction of capitalism, of equal opportunity and no more, came in the way: “The idea that you get a lifetime supply of food stamps based on coming out of the right womb strikes at my idea of fairness.”

In his giving, Buffett is completing the circle of capitalism — applying his mind to resources handed to him by society, systematically creating wealth and finally returning that wealth back to society for more Buffetts to harness. He invested with people and companies that could grow money better than he could. He’s now giving with the same idea — to people who can deliver better than he can. Showing, essentially, that creating and giving wealth are two sides of the same gold coin.”

I think that this is a generous assessment of capitalism and one that is not often lived out. But I do appreciate this reporter lifting up such an ideal. The 20^th century created enormous wealth and I’m thrilled to see the Gates/Buffett phenomenon. I would love to have been in on the thought and heart processes that brought first Bill Gates and then Warren Buffett to this point.

But In both of the readings today, the generosity that is recommended is not just personal. We should all recognize how blessed we are and be moved to share that with those who struggle. The chair of any pledge campaign will tell you that that’s a hard enough sell. But this is not just about personal generosity – it is meant to be woven through the social fabric.

The goal of giving to those in need is not to create a perpetual welfare state but to give everyone the resources and opportunities to move out of need and into self sufficiency. The closing thought of the passage from 2 Corinthians is “The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little.” What a mirror this is for us right now.

I was engaged in a heated conversation with someone the other day about another topic and somehow France came into the conversation. My sparring partner made a fairly sweeping condemnation of the French because as he put, “they expect the government to pay for things” – meaning healthcare and retirement and other social securities. At some point when we have both cooled off enough, I hope to have the occasion to revisit this because I’d like to explain something. First a caveat – I recognize that the social safety net system in France is in need of readjustment if not a fairly large overhaul. But that is not the point. The French people don’t expect this sort of protection unreasonably – they have chosen a form of government specifically to provide such things. France is a socialist country and the people continue to choose that. They have said we will pay the taxes to provide universal health care and employment protections and adequate retirement. That’s their choice and that philosophy of government – the management of the public life looks an awful lot like what today’s lessons are talking about. A culture filled with too many people at one extreme who have way too much and too many people on the other extreme who have nothing is out of balance and not healthy. Can we even imagine a culture that is not like that? If we can imagine it, how might we get there? Can it be achieved voluntarily? That’s the question. It’s a question that appears to have been answered in the birth and rebirth of this nation.

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity” And then there’s this…

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

How is it possible that a nation founded on such ideals, is filled with those who have so much and yet care so little about those who have too little. It is our country and we have only our voices to lift up to say that if indeed we are this nation conceived in such hope then we expect better from ourselves. It should not be left to the fabulously wealthy who have had epiphanies of generosity to make things right.

Jim Wallis is the editor of Sojourners magazine and an important voice on the subject of faith and politics. His book God’s Politics, spent some time on thy NYT bestsellers list last year. In it he states unequivocally that “Budgets are moral documents. They clearly reveal the priorities of a family, a church, an organization, city or a nation. A budget shows what we most care about and how that compares to other things we care about.” An examination of all of our budgets, personal, here at Faith and those of our town, state and nation need to be assessed with that in mind.

Let’s have a 4^th of July birthday celebration that has some substance and not just colorful flashes. Begin with prayer and then conversation and then action. Let us challenge those who make decisions in our name to consider the values lifted up in today’s readings and seek to create that place conceived in liberty where there may be that fair balance from the abundance we share.