Spiritual Perspectives
Predatory Lending and Poverty

By The Baha'i Community
Special to The Independent

This is in response to the informative articles in the Feb. 3, 2006 edition of this paper on predatory lending. A front-page article made its point with the stories of personal suffering of many of the "clients" and the difficulty of our elected leaders to come to terms with this situation. The Opinion Page article, in the same issue, by the McKinley Community Health Alliance, pointed out the negative effect of poverty on individual and community health.

What has been missing, in the media at least, has been spiritual guidance from our diverse religious communities. We know that all of the religions and spiritual traditions have something to say on the injustice of this situation and hope our comments here will encourage more public input from them.

Here are a few selected quotes from the Baha'i Writings that we hope will encourage readers and elected officials to look to their own faith and conscience when approaching this current social inequity and the deeper underlying issue of poverty:

"The arrangements of the circumstances of the people must be such that poverty shall disappear, that everyone, as far as possible, according to his rank and position, shall share in comfort and well-being."

"Certainly, some being enormously rich and others lamentably poor, an organization is necessary to control and improve this state of affairs. It is important to limit riches, as it is also of importance to limit poverty. Either extreme is not good... When we see poverty allowed to reach a condition of starvation, it is a sure sign that somewhere we shall find tyranny."

"There must be special laws made, dealing with these extremes of riches and want. The government of the countries should conform to the divine law, which gives equal justice to all."

"What could be better before God than thinking of the poor? For the poor are beloved by our heavenly Father. When Christ came upon the earth, those who believed in Him and followed Him were the poor and lowly, showing that the poor were near to God. When a rich man believes and follows the Manifestation of God, it is a proof that his wealth is not an obstacle and does not prevent him from attaining the pathway of salvation. After he has been tested and tried, it will be seen whether his possessions are a hindrance in his religious life. But the poor are especially beloved of God. Their lives are full of difficulties, their trials continual; their hopes are in God alone. Therefore, you must assist the poor as much as possible, even by sacrifice of yourself. No deed of man is greater before God than helping the poor.... each one of you must have great consideration for the poor and render them assistance. Organize in an effort to help them and prevent increase of poverty. The greatest means for prevention is that whereby the laws of the community will be so framed and enacted that it will not be possible for a few to be millionaires and many destitute. One of Baha'u'llah's teachings is the adjustment of means of livelihood in human society. Under this adjustment there can be no extremes in human conditions as regards wealth and sustenance."

"Baha'u'llah, likewise, commanded the rich to give freely to the poor. In the Kitab-i-Aqdas it is further written by Him that those who have a certain amount of income must give one-fifth of it to God, the Creator of heaven and earth."

The Baha'i Community can be contacted at (505) 863-4377, 1-800-22unite, or at www.nativeamericanbi.org

This column is the result of a desire by community members, representing different faith communities, wishing to share their ideas about bringing a spiritual perspective into our daily lives and community issues.

For information about contributing a guest column, contact Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola at the Independent: (505) 863-8611, ext. 218 or lizreligion01@yahoo.com.