To me the issue is not about specifically paying usury or even enabling those who sin by taking it from me. I don't expect otherwise from the world - though I do admit I struggle with loving these people who right and left beat me down and steal the money right out of my pocket - money I literally earned by my own sweat. And unlike them I labour assiduously to be honest and fair in my dealings - to my own hurt if need be. I would rather have a clear conscience then shrug my shoulders and be like them.
My real issue is with those Christians who have jumped the fence and stand on the Babylonian side - exploiting not just society at large but fellow Christians. I expect the lost to engage in dog-eat-dog ethics - Darwin's survival of the fittest. This is as old as Cain and Lamech. But I do have a problem with the Christians who have entrenched themselves in the system and are right at home in these various industries and sectors of society - making money hand over fist on the basis of what is essentially legal extortion and Babylonian alchemy. I have a problem with Christians who have baptised this law of the jungle, this atheistic ethic that is completely opposed to New Testament religion.
And worse, we even have usury among Christians in the form of denominational loans and financial services companies. We have outright Christian usurers involved in banking, Wall Street investment, insurance, and other forms of finance. Others are involved in the exploitative and wicked financial schemes that dominate utilities, health care, and other significant sectors and institutions of society. And more and more every day I pass offices housing financial services which attach Christian monikers to their names or mastheads. I would argue these are illegitimate endeavours and means of income. Many of them will admit their industries are corrupt, some even deeply so, but they always somehow manage to believe that they're not part of that. That's someone else. It's out of their hands. Or even in some cases they believe that they can 'make a difference' by staying 'in' or connected with the specific corporation, institution, or vocational field. In other instances, they try and offer Christian 'alternatives' and 'solutions' which are instead near scams that dodge the basic issues at stake. I'm thinking specifically of the various 'Christian' medical 'sharing' platforms - an enraging discussion for another time and place.
Others justify this system by twisting Scripture, in particular passages like the Parable of the Talents, reducing its Kingdom lessons to mere mundane maxims and worldly wisdom - interpretations which fly in the face of what Christ revealed about the parables and why He spoke in such terms, and completely negating New Testament teachings about riches and mammonism. While I will not dive into the passage here, I will simply state without qualification or apology that it does not teach nor endorse interest.
We must reject and denounce the absurdity of so-called Christian investment funds and portfolios. Swimming in a sea of immorality and usury they are subject to the same speculation and numbers games, the influences and forces which render the value of money a malleable medium controlled by the Bestial masters who worship it, rely on it, generate it, and feed on it.
Investments expect returns and publicly traded companies must meet expectations or risk losing investment. They will squeeze the money out for quarterly reports through speculation, buybacks, and other financial tricks such as mergers, leveraged buyouts, loading up debt, and subsequent 'efficiency' cuts - reductions that are not substantive but give the perception of fiscal responsibility to the detriment of individuals, families, and communities. All along the way, finance and re-finance is used to provide capital for everything from purchases and inventory maintenance, to servicing other loans, and meeting payroll. The idea that this kind of wealth generation is somehow honest, quiet, working with your hands kind of work is ridiculous. Such endeavours certainly build ships, factories, bridges, and generate power, mine the earth, and much else. They also tear apart other nations, plot the downfall of rivals, manipulate politics, destroy communities and families, and have been known to start wars. It's ugly and it's also offensive that so many Christians not only partake of all this but we have myriad 'Bible' teachers and 'ministries' that seem to exist in order to sanctify and promote this evil Babel-mammon system - so eloquently described in Revelation 18, which I believe to describe Christendom as symbolized by the Bride-turned-Whore riding the Beast, an entity that has historically persecuted the True Remnant Church.
Again, I expect the world to behave in a Darwinian fashion but it's a sure sign of apostasy when the Church is engaged in the same. Such degenerate ethics and mammonism pervert and destroy the very identity of the Church. I thought of this as I drove by the many 'churches' in conjunction with Memorial Day - all decked out, celebrating the idolatry of Americanism, sanctifying its evil wars (or rather its thefts and murders) and treating its stormtroopers as if they're martyrs. These things are all related. America's wars are not about freedom or ideals but interests and profit. One thinks of Smedley Butler's (1881-1940) powerful admission of guilt:
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer; a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents. (Common Sense, November 1935)
In the context of Christendom, the peasants rose up against such exploitation of the common man and perversion of the Christian message. They were wrong to take up the sword but so was the system which oppressed them. Babylon is wrong and wicked but it is our exile-home - regardless of what nation we live in. We're not here to change it but testify and bear witness against it by our profession and our lives. We're certainly not here to enter into alliance with Babylon and share in its power and profits. This is a gross misapplication of praying for its peace.
For the Church, Babylon can be a problem but it's always there and isn't going away. Christian Babylon is the real problem as it undermines and destroys the Church from within. At this point it's too massive and entrenched to be purged. It spans the spectrum of everything from Roman Catholicism to Evangelicalism - and frankly even most of the Confessional world. The faithful must come out of her but sadly this impulse has in recent years been sidetracked by those motivated by libertarianism and other Right-wing ideologies. That's not the basis for separation. The issue here is not the state or rights, but the Church that has embraced the values of Rome and sworn its allegiance to Babylon.
This is why before the Reformation the groups that opposed Roman Christendom were usually identified in terms of poverty. It was a rejection of not only the mammonism of the Church but the power such mammon represents. As such, they stood in direct contrast to the Magisterial Reformation, its social agenda, and its values. The problem is ten-fold in our day - at least in terms of sheer money power. The Church may not seem to be as powerful in the context of post-Christendom, but it operates on a different level and through errors such as the doctrines of Vocation and Dominionism (or Integralism in the case of Rome), the Church's identity is blurred and for many, the forces atop Wall Street banks and corporations represent the power and interests of today's so-called 'Church' and the pseudo-Kingdom it seeks to build.
Usury is sin and while the Mark of the Beast is something much bigger than some kind of physical mark, ID chip, card, or barcode, there is a financial aspect to the mark that we dare not miss. The Mark need not be understood through a narrow or overly literalistic lens that relegates it to the future. It's as old as the hills and has certainly been present throughout the life of the Church. In contrast to those marked by the Holy Spirit, it is the mark of those who belong to the world system and those who refuse to sign on with its programme (as it were) are going to suffer and pay a price - often struggling to live and survive.
On the financial end of things we think of mechanisms like credit scores, and larger questions of status, and standing. Those who refuse to buy into the system may not literally be barred from purchasing food - though that has been the case in some instances. But it will be as if that's the case - to varying degrees. There's no place for flourishing and sadly many have missed that Christendom (so-called) is in some respects the worst and most perilous scenario of all - for it seduces and ultimately turns most harshly against those who resist it Bible in hand. Church history bears this out as believers suffered terribly under the authoritarian (and at times totalitarian) monstrosity known as the Roman Catholic centuries. This did not end with the Reformation as faithful dissidents in both Protestant and even Catholic contexts continued to suffer (though often to a lesser degree) until the dawn of the 20th century and even beyond. In liberal societies they struggled to remain faithful in the contexts of capitalism and civic 'obligation' (i.e. jury duty, the purchase of war bonds, and conscription) and much more so under the industrial-totalitarian paradigms of fascism and communism.
Usury is odious and it embitters me when I must turn to a loan sharks to make ends meet. And by loan sharks I mean the smiling plump middle-aged lady at the local bank branch as well as the Mr. Cool car salesman that's trying to pretend like he's my friend. I don't blame them personally as they are just caught up in the system and have probably never given a second thought to it. It's simply how things are done. But I do take great exception to the fact that they might profess to be Christians while they engage in this work or worse, they take a kind of Christian pride in it.
The world is evil and the capitalist Western world is a racket. Let's pay the minimum of what we have to and move on. I don't want to support them or give them credence. I don't want to waste my time listening to the blather about the in's and out's of their world. I have other things to do. If you can live cheap and simple then by all means do so. In some respects I've been able to do this and am looked down on for it - by both the world and the Church. In other respects I have failed to be true to my principles and have been forced to seek financing in order to keep a vehicle going - so I can work and keep afloat. My goal is not to build up my credit score. I didn't look for a starter home. I'm not thinking about debt-to-income ratios, equity, or depreciation. It's Caesar's coin and those who don't dance to Caesar's tune are not likely to do well. That's our calling but it hardly matters. We're not here to make money or earn accolades. We here to bear witness and glorify God by taking up the cross.
A few corollary points and additional considerations....
In Romans 13, we're exhorted to owe no man anything and this is the passage (along with a few Proverbs) usually appealed to by a certain type of Christian financial advisor or ethicist in order to discourage debt.
This is kind of ironic as they repeatedly demonstrate by their investment ethics that they have no problem with debt or usury - they just don't think Christians should be in debt. But they can sure make money off of those who are.
If this is so (that all debt is forbidden) then the Church must engage in a radical re-think of life in a capitalist society. Even the Amish can't make it anymore. I see them in the bank seeking mortgages and business loans as their economic dynamics and realities are radically changing. They are rapidly moving from farming to the cash economy. Most of them are now engaged in other forms of work. Like the rest of us, they need cash. And now that they have it, they're spending it and becoming consumers.
If we're going to owe no man anything in the literal sense and live by that ethic ourselves in how we treat others - not encouraging them to owe and sin, then we will not be able to purchase homes. We will rent (which some think unwise and poor stewardship), be relegated to the lower end of the economic spectrum, and we will need to engage in communal living arrangements - or we need to leave the Mammon-dominated West. With regard to the latter, I would happily do so if I could afford to.
I wonder why there is such rigid literalism regarding this passage in Romans but then so many other New Testament commands are treated lightly, metaphorically, or explained away?
If Christian laws and ethics are universal (as so many seem to think) as opposed to covenantal, then the only consistent course for these Dominion-minded anti-debt people is to crusade against Capitalism and seek to overthrow it. Capitalism depends on credit - on people owing. If that's wrong, then they cannot be capitalists. There is no other alternative - unless they are willing to abandon universal claims and the so-called Dominion mandate to sacralize the nations and all aspects of culture.
At that point even parking your money in a bank and collecting interest is a problem as the bank loans out your money on interest - we're not even talking about the definitions of usury here. They are extending credit - setting up people to owe. By collecting that interest you are profiting on other people owing and paying. If that's sinful, then you cannot in good conscience take that interest. If all interest is usury, then that resolves the issue at a much earlier point and in simpler terms. As stated, I don't have interest-bearing accounts - and yes, I'm well aware that money depreciates as a result, inflation being another inevitable and built-in aspect of the capitalist system. But given that I don't really have any money to speak of, I hardly care if it depreciates. I lose no sleep over the depreciation dilemma. But even putting my money in the bank without interest is still a problem - as they're loaning it out anyway and making money on it. As far as I'm concerned, that's on them. And yet I still use their services.