Dr Saheb Sahu
William Sloane Coffin Jr. (June 1, 1924 – April 12, 2006) was an American Christian clergyman and long-time peace activist. In his younger days he was an athlete, a talented pianist, a CIA officer, and later chaplain of Yale University, where the influence of H. Richard Niebuhr‘s social philosophy led him to become a leader in the Civil Rights Movement and peace movements of the 1960s and 1970s. He was the President of SANE/Freeze (now Peace Action), the nation’s largest peace and social justice group, and prominently opposed United States military interventions in conflicts, from the Vietnam War to the Iraq War. He was also an ardent supporter of gay rights.
Some of his sermons (preaching) were published in 2004 under the title-“CREDO”. Credo is a Latin word defined as “a statement of beliefs” or “aims which guide someone’s actions”. Here are some excerpts from the book on the topic of “Social Justice and Economic Rights”:
“We have democracy or we have great wealth concentrated in the hands of the few. We cannot have both.
- US Supreme Court Justice- Louise Brandeis
“Public good does not automatically follow from private virtue. A person’s moral character, sterling though it may be, is insufficient to serve the cause of justice, which to challenge the status quo, try to make what is legal more moral, to speak truth to power, and to take personal or concerted action against evil, whether in personal or systemic form.”
“Not to take side is effectively to weigh in on the side of the stronger.”
“Compassion and justice are companions, not choices”.
‘ For evil is not so much the work of a few degenerate people or groups of people as it is the result of the indifference and negligence of the many.”
“Never in the recent history have we had so blatant a plutocracy: a government of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy.”
“When the rich take from the poor, it’s called an economic plan. When the poor take from the rich, it is called class welfare.”
“We may be repelled by materialism, but we are caught up in it. We are troubled by widespread poverty, but overly esteem wealth.”
“Human nature is sinful, and therefore the virtue of the few will never compensate for the inertia of the many. Rich people and rich nations will not voluntarily open their eyes to see the biblical truth that poor have ownership rights on their surplus…. Given human goodness, voluntary contributions are possible, but given human sinfulness, legislation is indispensable. Charity, yes always; but never as a substitute for justice. What we forgetting in this country is that people have rights, basic rights: the right to food, the right to decent housing, the right to medical care, the right to education”.
“There are two ways to get rich: one is to have lot of money; the other to have few needs. Let us remember that Jesus- who influenced history more than any other single person, institution, or nation- when he died, his single possession a robe.”
“The primary problems of the planet arise not from the poor, for whom education is the answer; they arise from the well-educated, for whom self-interest is the problem”.
“Let us indeed not delude ourselves: you cannot have a revolt without revolting conditions. Communism has never come to a nation that took care of its poor, its aged, its sick, and its handicapped.”
“Charity is a matter of personal attributes; justice, a matter of public policy. Charity seeks to alleviate the effects of injustice; justice seeks to eliminate the causes of it”
“Handouts to needy individuals are genuine, necessary response to injustice, but they do not necessarily face the reason for the injustice”.
“The prophet did not say, “Let charity roll down like mighty waters”- because giving without receiving is a downward motion. The prophet said, “Let justice rolldown like mighty waters, and righteousness like an over-flowing stream.”… The exodus story tells us that liberation is primarily the work of the oppressed themselves.”
“In the best prophetic tradition Jesus stood for the relief and protection of the poor and the persecuted; for such use of the riches of creation that the world might be freed from famine, poverty, and disaster.And in the best prophetic tradition, he saw that the real troublemakers were not the ignorant and the cruel, but the intelligent and the corrupt. In contrast to so many of today’s pulpiteers (preachers), Jesus knew that “Love your enemies” didn’t mean “Do not make trouble”.
“Heaven- and Hell- begin here and now, both for individuals and for nations, in what theologians call “realized eschatology”(Eschatology-the part of theology concerned with death, judgment, and the final destination of the soul and of mankind).
“In his time on earth Jesus “stood tall” but not by making others cringe. He had power but used it solely to empower others. He healed, but with no strings attached. He competed with none, loved all, even when we were least lovable, even to the point of dying for us on the cross”.
Source:
William Coffin, Credo. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004
