We are both Christians and economists. One of us is a member of a PC(USA) congregation. We recently turned our attention to the economics of the Washington lobbying efforts of the mainline Protestant churches. We offer four observations from our analysis we believe can be useful in Presbyterians’ consideration of the mission study.
1. Christians are commanded to seek and implement justice.
The story of God’s people is one of Creation, Fall, and Redemption. Following the Fall, serious injustice from brokenness occurs requiring a corresponding and consistent effort for justice. The Law and Prophets demand that we seek and administer justice for the voiceless orphans, penniless widows, and displaced aliens. When Jesus launched his ministry in the synagogue in Nazareth, the scroll he read proclaimed “Good news for the poor.”
Despite the clarity of this mandate, there is a lack of consensus among mainline Protestants over how to have a Christian voice on justice. Much of this discord has centered on the Washington lobbying offices.
2. The evolution and configuration of the mainline Washington offices makes sense given their maturation during the 1950s and 1960s.
It may seem surprising, but the current model of mainline lobbying did not emerge during the expansion of the federal government during the New Deal, but, rather after World War II. There is a good explanation. In this period, growth and centralization were common throughout America. Power shifted away from county seats and state capitals to the federal government. The Department of Defense, I.B.M., and General Motors (remember them?) were held up as path-breakers in capturing economies of centralized planning and control.
The mainline churches were not cloistered from contemporary thought, instead, they mirrored the new emphasis on centralized structure. We recall the baby-boom years as the golden age of mainline growth; what may not be recalled is that it was also a period of centralization. As late as 1937, neither the mainline Methodists, Presbyterians, United Church of Christ, nor Lutherans existed in their current forms. They were formed since that time by mergers.
Another economic reality of the period was that we had not yet experienced the technological and regulatory revolutions that dramatically lowered the cost of transportation and communication. Long distance travel was either by slow train or expensive jet. Long distance phone calls were costly. The low-cost fax machine was nowhere in sight.
These economic trends matched the character of the mainline lobbying efforts. A centralized office fit the ongoing patterns of church governance and leadership. The economic realities of the day (the growth of the federal government and the costs of communication and transportation) made it logical that a centralized office should be located in Washington, D.C., Indeed, each of the mainline denominations has some type of Washington office. In fact, four of them are located in the same building.
3. Discussions about reforming the structure and/or mission of the mainline Washington offices must address incentives that made the disharmony of recent years unsurprising. Disharmony has arisen for a number of reasons.
• Mainline denominations make policy prescriptions through a variety of
venues with different levels of connection to their general membership. The closest connection exists with deliberative bodies such as the General Assembly. But these are not standing legislatures. They meet for a few days every year or more. In between, statements about public policy are made by permanent specialized social-witness agencies. For example, during the 2008 financial crisis, The Methodist General Board of Church and Society issued a statement containing a narrow and specific assignment of blame (“Wall Street barons”) and at least nine specific policy recommendations. This advantage of the specialized agencies, that they operate permanently, must be measured against a potential disadvantage. Being smaller and more specialized in outlook, they are one step more removed from the general membership of the denominations.
• The denominations also affiliate with ecumenical and specialized organizations, such as the National Council of Churches and the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Freedom, which have their own Washington lobbying presence.
• The agencies’ professional staffs have the responsibility for communicating the denominations’ official positions. However, they have their own voice through speeches, sermons, workshops, testimony, networking, newsletters, assignments with affiliated organizations, and Internet blogs. They have freedom to add details and nuance to the public face of the denomination.
The result is that the denominations make policy prescriptions with widely different roots than the general membership. What level of affinity is there between a typical Methodist layperson and the political agenda of the labor union coalition “Citizens Trade Campaign,” of which the UMC General Board of Church and Society is a member? What about Presbyterians and the Washington Office signature on a letter opposing D.C. school vouchers?
It should come as no surprise to readers of The Presbyterian Outlook that the denominations’ leadership largely represents the view that the government is the primary vehicle for helping the poor and the needy. An explicit exposition comes from the PC(USA) publication “Christian and Citizen:”
“ … while the church, voluntary organizations, business, and government must work cooperatively to address the needs of poor persons and communities, the government must assume the primary role for providing direct assistance for the poor” (Minutes, p. 553). The General Assembly has noted that the private sector is incapable of caring for the needy on its own. The 208th General Assembly (1996) asserted that churches and charities, including many Presbyterian congregations and related organizations, have responded generously to growing hunger but do not have the capacity to replace public programs. (Minutes, p. 784).
Statements from other churches are basically the same. The view that government is more capable at helping the poor than the private and voluntary sectors is important because it shapes the debate about faithful witness.
The denominations’ policies obviously address issues of the least fortunate. However, consider the actual Biblical language: “defend the fatherless;” “seek justice;” “release the oppressed.” We believe that it is worth considering this gap between the Biblical mandates and the specificity of some of the Washington lobbying.
Denominational leaders make recommendations at levels of detail that require the wisdom of theology, science, and economic theory and analysis. Many of these issues are such that Christians can legitimately disagree, not merely over matters of faith, but also over how the world operates. Yet, we do not see many domains of disagreement or alternative viewpoints, nor caution over the connection between policy prescription and empirical realities. For example, we cannot understand how a robust debate on health insurance reform in the United States can take off the table, as a purported matter of Biblical witness, the expansion of health insurance coverage by transferring the insurance tax from employers to individuals. This may not prove to be the best answer, but it is a credible and faithful policy proposal.
We will make a stronger statement. Some knowledgeable Christians believe that the mainline denominations advocate positions that actually harm the very poor and marginalized people we are mandated to favor. Examples include minimum wage legislation, rent control, opposition to school choice, and tighter command-and-control environmental policies.
Finally, by entering the arena of specific and detailed debates on economic policy, denominations run the risk of participating in what economists call “rent-seeking” (which can be thought of as “favor-seeking.”) Either the government takes resources from some and gives to others or it gives some individuals a privileged economic position. From a Christian perspective, some transfer activities are Biblically faithful. For example, social security payments to the blind, orphans, and mentally handicapped benefit highly vulnerable populations.
The reason we raise this issue is to caution Christians about its associated dangers. When any institution has the power to transfer resources from the wealthy to the poor, it also has the power to transfer resources from the poor to the wealthy. This should not surprise Christians. Government rent-seeking that benefited the wealthy was the target of the prophets in the Bible. Zacchaeus was using his privileged position as a tax collector to benefit some, most likely the wealthy, at the expense of others, most likely the poor. And, Protestant reformers opposed rent-seeking behavior in the medieval church. All bets that only the poor and marginalized will benefit from rent-seeking should be off: lobbying scandals over legalized gambling, “bridge-to-nowhere” earmarks, and esoteric tax breaks for a few are choice examples.
Wouldn’t our story end here if the positions taken by church leaders were roughly coincident with the positions of ordinary mainline Protestants? Yes, but it is well known that mainline leadership positions on economic policy do not line up with those of the members in the pews. If the back issues of the Outlook are not enough to make this case, the reader is invited to contact us for more supporting data.
Theologically, one must be careful to avoid the idea that individuals in church governing bodies “represent” anyone other than the Holy Spirit. However, if we believe that the same Holy Spirit is guiding both members and leaders, this divergence should concern us.
If the policies favored by the denomination’s leadership diverge from those of the members in the pews, shouldn’t the representational aspects of the denominations lead to a change in policies? Not necessarily. Economists have shown that groups that have lower organizational or communications costs and concentrated benefits have advantages over groups with high costs of communication and coordination and diffused benefits. Denominational leaders are already organized; advocating issues of social justice is a part of their job. They likely have lower costs of communication and coordination with one another than do regular members. Furthermore, we conjecture that many of the professionals in Washington are in their jobs because social justice is a personal priority for them.
The result is a de facto asymmetry in favor of the positions favored by the leadership, even if the de jure rules of the denomination are neutral. Nothing in this analysis implies that denominational leaders deliberately impede their members from expressing their views. Furthermore, the asymmetry itself does not imply whether the leadership or lay policies are superior economically, or theologically.
So, the divergence of the policies favored by the leadership from those favored by the members can be stable (what economists call an equilibrium). No one in the system, regardless of how unhappy they are with the outcome, sees any advantageous change from unilateral action.
The plausible nature of this equilibrium is easy to describe. Individuals and congregations became angry and lowered their support (in time, talents, and money) for social justice ministries (either because “my taxes are already paying for that” or because of outright hostility towards the “Washington” position). They supported less controversial activities over which they had more control. As the church receded in its witness to social issues, the argument that “only the government” can address these issues became more compelling to denominational leaders.
Just because this situation is durable doesn’t mean that it is good. Moreover, there could be other stable outcomes, perhaps even preferred by a majority of a denomination’s membership.
Why aren’t we at one of those equilibria instead?
One reason is the previously referenced process of centralization. An unanticipated side effect of centralization can be the concentration of collective voice in one location. Economic research demonstrates that when communication flows primarily in one direction, there can be biases as to which equilibrium is established. Therefore, the prominence of the “government-first” policies of denominational leaders is not surprising.
The more difficult question is whether a durable outcome such as we have described can be changed. In other settings, radical reforming events do occur. New technologies such as CDs displace old technologies (vinyl) that have been the standard for years. Non-equilibrium behavior by a few reveals new ways of doing things and new costs and benefits to the larger society. And sometimes “new ways of doing things” are not really new, but old ideas reclaimed for new generations.
4. The key to revitalizing the social witness ministry of the mainline denominations is not simply restructuring of the Washington offices (although that is important). Rather, reform and renewal must be driven by the transformation of Christians in the pews, including (especially?) those who have been critical of the leadership.
We propose attempting a new equilibrium for Christian social-justice ministries. It requires a commitment to radical non-equilibrium behavior of the sort that mirrors Jesus’ upending of the status quo. Our surprise for the reader is that while this essay may seem to have been about the PC(USA) Washington office, it is really about those members in the pews who have disagreed with the leadership. They are behaving rationally given their dissatisfaction with the status quo, but we argue that Jesus’ message is that it is time for them to try something different.
First, reclaim the joy of giving. Our gifts provide congregations with new sources of capital for locally determined ministries of compassion. The Barna Group estimates that in 2007, per capita giving by a typical adult Protestant to charitable causes averaged $1,705, which is about five percent of after-tax income. This is consistent with other estimates. While we are called not to give from a place of compulsion we will use the benchmark of the ten-percent tithe in the following numerical example.
Consider a typical congregation of 250 members, and assume that the average donation to the congregation could be increased roughly in accord with the notion of a tithe. Using the $1,705 from the preceding paragraph that congregation would have an additional yearly flow of funds of about $420,000!
Secondly, we need greater distinction between church needs and church wants. The church is not mandated to purchase new carpeting, instead, they are mandated to seek justice. Congregations need to rediscover that imperative for justice and direct funds in a manner consistent with that call.
Suppose that the congregation imposed a simple metric on the additional $420,000. If we use a rule that approximately three percent of Americans are in some sort of desperate economic need, that would represent about eight members of a typical congregation of 250. Suppose that a congregation decided to devote the entire $420,000 to those eight members and to eight individuals outside of the congregation (in response to Jesus teaching that our neighbors are not limited to those in our kinship or geographical groups). Then the hypothesized $420,000 could be used to provide $26,250 for each of these sixteen individuals. Even if each one of those individuals were responsible for children, $26,250 could quite literally do wonders.
The two steps above, if undertaken by enough congregations, could undercut the “only the government can do it” argument, even without any structural change in the Washington offices. But, perhaps we should rethink our relationship with “Rome.” More recent business models have smashed the dominance of companies like I.B.M. and General Motors. The hallmark of those up-and-comers? Adaptability. “Always reforming” Presbyterians should consider new structures in missions that facilitate the ability of individual and naturally forming groups of Christians to witness for social justice. The “old AT&T” telephone monopoly is long gone, replaced by low cost, decentralized communication channels. Thus, these facilitating missions could be located outside of (expensive) Washington, releasing funds to other church missions.
Our proposals may sound impractical, but Jesus’ message of the advent of the Kingdom is profoundly hostile to satisfaction with merely adapting to what others are doing. The Kingdom is no longer defined as a place where people are simply kind to those people who offer kindness in return, nor loving and serving towards those who will reciprocate inside the community. The “salt of the earth” are people who can move society’s outcome precisely because they are not just doing what seems obvious.
The key to our scenario that envisions more sacrificial giving for social justice concerns is the transformation of individual Christians — a spiritual process called sanctification. The importance of individual transformation cannot be overstated. The current equilibrium represents a modern approach to Christianity that makes the government appear as the most compelling institution to seek justice. It is only when one destroys the individually rationalistic approach to Christianity that the Church can be restored as an independent, vigorous dispenser of social justice.
The new, decentralized communication structure we have proposed is important in this process. Both inside a congregation and across congregations, “agents of grace” can use the reduced costs of communication to organize, transform, and lift up others.
Also, there will be other benefits. The role of the pastor would include more attention to the material needs of their congregation, providing increased fullness in their roles as shepherds.
The salt of the earth may, by committing to act as though the behavior of the rest of the world doesn’t matter, find out that they have both salted and changed the world.
R. Mark Isaac is professor and John and Hallie Quinn Eminent Scholar in economics at Florida State University, Tallahassee, Fla. He is a PC(USA) elder and member of First Church, Havana, Fla. Douglas A. Norton is an assistant in Experimental Economics at Florida State University. He is a member of the Wesley Foundation Campus Fellowship at Florida State University, a congregation of the United Methodist Church.
