On Wednesday 25 Jun 2003 8:49 am, you wrote: > During the days of Merry England I > understand there were about one-hundred and fifty holidays per year. > Are we really making progress?] ------------------------------------------
I think that is precisley my point -- everything I read about those old days suggests crowds and mobs of people standing around in the streets, scratching a living -- surviving -- wherever they could. It seems to me that it is no different today, at least in our country. I�m not sure how you define �employed� and �unemployed� -- I know that for statistical purposes it relates to �numbers of people� engaged in the �formal� sector, which to my mind is a bit of humbug because (again, in our country) a large proportion of society supplements shared wage-packets -- or survives entirely -- by some sort of subsistence agriculture, home-industry, or local trading in the ' Informal sector�. This is no different than the days before the Industrial Revolution. The imbalances created (or merely aggravated?) by the Industrial era seem to be a �bump� along the road, which will have an end, and all things will be as they were. I am not saying it is right, but it is the result of human failing (sin, resulting from the fall), a shortcoming which, as you rightly say, is not going to be corrected by providing opportunites for �regenerative works� for the population to engage in. I think that correlating work in income-producing engagement with �good works for salvation�, is a gross distortion of a particular religious position, a position which is contrary to the Protestant position of salvation by pure grace. The two have nothing to do with each other, except that the redeemed should by nature share the results of their labour with those who are less able. �Not of works�, as Paul has it, refers to works of religion by which one erroneously thinks he or she will win Brownie points with God --�By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.� Douglas surely knew this. No Protestant should have any misconception about the fact that forgiveness of sins is purely by unmeritted favour of God. But, as the quotation goes on to explain, good works of every kind should result from being saved, something that should come naturally to anyone who is saved. This has little to do with paying for your forgiveness, but it does have everything to do with using your ability to cater for your own needs, the needs of those entrusted to your care, the needs of the weaker members of society round about you -- in other words, being a decent human being. So it is not: �If all the world was unemployed, all the world would be saved�, neither is it: �If all the world was at work, all the world would be saved.� However, if there is some store of value -- brought about by the innovations of the entrepeneural class combined with the labours of labourers -- that can be shared out among the entire populace, then let it be so -- let governments issue it. What stops them? Jessop. -------------------- ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84IaC.bcVIgP.YXJjaGl2 Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] TOPICA - Start your own email discussion group. FREE! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/create/index2.html ==^================================================================
