"Be on your guard against all kinds of greed": the problem of poverty in the perspective of the World Council of Churches
Abstract
The World Council of Churches (WCC) is an ecumenical fellowship of Christian churches which represents almost 25 % of all Christians worldwide. This paper explores the stance of this important ecumenical organization on the issue of poverty.
It is divided into three main parts. The first part outlines the historical development of the social thought of the WCC in the course of the 20th century until today.
The next part discerns main features of the perspective of the WCC on poverty and social (in)justice. This is done by way of four theses.
First, the WCC position is based on the premise of God's preferential option for the poor. Second, the poor are regarded not as mere objects of the church's service and mission, but rather as its active and crucial agents.
Third, the WCC statements on poverty are dominated by a systematic critique of global neoliberal capitalism which, as well as greed as its principle, is seen as the root cause of poverty today. And fourth, in recent WCC documents the issue of poverty is closely interlinked with the issue of wealth accumulation and ecology.
The final part of the article then brings up some critical remarks regarding the WCC position, in particular certain simplification, naivety, the exclusion of some important voices, and the tendency to be too ideological.