“Did Christianity Cause the Crash?” asks the provocative journalist Hanna Rosin in the December 09 issue of The Atlantic. Rosin’s well written article argues that the prosperity theology present in a significant amount of American churches has been a cause of the current economic crisis. In order to link this theology with the economic crisis, Rosin presents evidence to suggest that the areas, both geographic and demographic, where there was a high incidence of defaulted sub-prime mortgages are the same areas where the ‘health-and-wealth’ gospel prospered.
As expected this article has provoked a significant reaction. The Immanent Frame, an excellent blog produced by the Social Science Research Council, coordinated a response that includes the opinions of 13 Christian academics. These responses mostly focus on the criticism that the prosperity gospel should not be equated with contemporary Christianity. Rather, it is a theological heresy, with much of the Christian tradition offering a different interpretation of wealth. Alongside this, the prosperity gospel is less influential than the author supposes. The second major criticism is that Rosin has wrongly interpreted prosperity theology as a cause of the current crisis. Instead, it is a symptom of a much deeper problem (the ‘American’ gospel/the republican party/modernity/Adam Smith/Calvin – take your pick!).
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There are certainly problems with Rosin’s thesis. The evidence Rosin accumulates is inconclusive. Rosin appears to be grasping at straws in attempting to produce a causal link between prosperity theology and the credit crunch. However, this does not mean that the article is without merit. The article reveals some uncomfortable truths regarding the contemporary Western Church’s inability to articulate a gospel that challenges the economic assumptions at the heart of modern life. James K.A. Smith, in his response to the article, suggests that the failings of prosperity theology are not an aberration in contemporary evangelicalism but are rather an example, albeit a particularly clear one, of a wider problem. Smith argues that, “while [Joel] Osteen and his ilk might be denounced by evangelicals, I do wonder if his gospel of prosperity differs by degree, rather than in kind.” Smith recognizes that most evangelical churches appear to be unable to resist the hyper-consumerism present in late-modern capitalist societies. When seen in this light, prosperity theology is just a particularly clear example of contemporary Western Christianity’s complicity in the creation of a culture of debt. This suggests that rather pointing the finger of blame at prosperity theology, we should recognize our sterility in imagining an alternative to the culture of debt. Rosin’s piece posits that theology necessarily impacts upon economics. Therefore, it follows that the sterility is on one level a theological one. In other words, why has our account of the gospel failed to foster alternative practices to those that mark our contemporary culture?
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