Poverty/Income Inequality

Holland explores the concept of gentrification from an academic standpoint. What is gentrification? How can we talk about something that resists being defined?​ Holland examines the factors of supply, demand, and policy that feed gentrification along with its effects on the people who leave, the people who live there, and the neighborhood itself.

According to reliable information, 20% of American children and 13% of all Americans live in poverty. Globally, nearly one-half of the world’s population or approximately 3 billion people live on less than $ 2.50 a day. Given the tragic and widespread reality of poverty, how should Christians respond and how shall we live? This issue […]

Shiela E. McGinn, Lai Lang, Elizabeth Ngan, Ahida Calderon-Pilarski, eds. By Bread Alone: The Bible through the Eyes of the Hungry. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2014, 257 pages, $29.00

Excerpted from the official statement of the Conference of International Black Lutherans’ second meeting, “A Message from Bulawayo,” this piece discusses the complex social, economic, and political forces that create the crisis of poverty worldwide. Though the message was published in 1997, its contents are still frighteningly relevant today. ​

Brattston acknowledges that Christians have an obligation to care for the poor because of Scripture. However, he points to the first two hundred years of Christian community, before debates of doctrine created a splintered church, as a further sign that all Christians share these forebears and therefore should listen to their counsel to care for the poor. In the spirit of the early church fathers, Brattston urges Christians to pray for justice and contact their political representatives to enact policies that will support sustainable and sufficient standards of living.

As Christians, we are called to serve the poor. However, how do we do so justly and effectively? Green notes that by identifying the poor as “other”–as something outside of “us”–we do a disservice to the community and often do not help those in need. Christians should stand in solidarity with those in poverty as members of the body of Christ.​

Scripture calls us to aid the poor. Why should that be limited to only the private sphere? Lanoue explores the secular and religious arguments regarding tax reform and how it can help those who truly need it.

​We very often associate capitalism with the modern Occupy Wall Street movement, or Marx writing in the 19th century. However, Hansen argues Luther himself witnessed the emergence of capitalism in Europe. What did he have to say from a theological perspective about markets and debt?

Love thy neighbor. We all know that verse, but what does it mean in terms of the global economy? For instance, how do we love our neighbors in the Global South if we do not know, or ignore, how our economic choices impact them every day? Furthermore, in an age of environmental harm, how do we redefine who our neighbor is? Moe-Lobeda explores these questions while envisioning the possibility of a moral economy.

A persistent and unfortunate reality in our world today is that, in relative terms, the rich get richer even as the poor get poorer. Is this just the inevitable and tragic nature of life or are there certain economic, market and other forces that combine to produce such a result, namely, marginalization? In the wake […]