RIGHTS AND HUMANITY

‘Ubuntu’; from crisis to a just and sustainable world economy

Premise – the Kingdom of God and the Noahic Covenant are expressed in contemporary form as The Earth Charter

“THE SYNONYM FOR USURY [EXPLOITATION] IS RUIN” – Samuel Johnson

A STUDY SET IN ‘THE FIERCE URGENCY OF NOW’ [MLK]

January 2009

The Golden Rule of treating of others as we would that they treat us reminds us that to use others for our own benefit at their expense is, bluntly, exploitation.

In money-related terms this is what usury is. It is based on the curse of money making money without a beneficial societal productive source for such benefit.

It is a quintessential aspect of universal law as we are coming to understand it in integration and systems thinking, that there is an inalienable right for all life forms to be held in, and treated with respect for their contribution to the life of the planet..

With the Golden Rule as premise, Together we seek inclusive justice in an economic order that ‘works for everyone and protects the earth’

1. COMMON DANGER – EXPONENTIAL GROWTH

* diagram from New Scientist October 2008,
illustrating some 15 trends in Human intervention
as they mount exponentially towards impending disaster.

Many dangers growing unrecognized over many decades are now gathering at an exponential rate to a crescendo of damage to planet and people.

In humble submission to the nature of the ceaseless creativity of earth we must seek sanity in the way we manage land and its uses in our economic systems.

It is deeply short-sighted not to examine the curse of money making money afresh when the present picture is of benefit of the few against the dis-benefit of the many on an obscene scale.

2. COMMON CAUSE

TO GET DOWN TO THE ROOTS BELOW THE ESSENTIAL PALLIATIVES
* diagram illustrating how we must recognise
social and environmental emergencies, but also
reach below them to the relentless structural drivers

We must use the resources of our new researches into the dangers we now face to tackle the insidious dangers of

– complicity in a consumerist society,
– rampant destructive elements of exponential growth;
– exceedingly narrow ownership of the gifts of life in land and physical assets
– exploiting others so as to advance our own vested interests.

3. COMMON SOLUTION

* diagram of a reciprocal financial flow chart
based on the book ‘The Modern Universal Paradigm’,
and to be found on www.binaryeconomics.net

In the insistent reality of today’s economic disorder this description of how fiscal and monetary systems can interact in pursuit of inclusive justice, that works for everyone and protects the earth, will be described.

4. COMMON INTENTION

The discussion today around the information conveyed will help us to identify ways to find such justice through the deliberations of any group of ‘jobbing theologians’ wishing to explore the insidous evil of exploitation, and in particular usury, now so deeply imbedded in human society.

Rev Peter Challen – 2009