Bayside Church

I usually like what the Shadow Finance Minister Barnaby Joyce has to say.  I find him refreshingly different, honestand ready to speak out on issues that don’t always tow the party line.

I guess his comments last week about Australia’s foreign aid certainly fit that description.  The only difference is that this time I find myself disagreeing with him in a big way. Speaking at the National Press Club in Canberra, Senator Joyce suggested that aid to the third world should instead be spent on reducing food costs in Australia.

Australia currently lags well behind other nations in terms of its foreign aid commitment. Australia gives less than 40 cents for every $100 earned across the economy compared to 60 cents in the UK and almost 80 cents in Denmark and Belgium.

Senator Joyce's comments appear to be at odds with a bipartisan commitment from the Coalition and Labor to boost foreign aid to 0.5% of gross national income (GNI) by 2015. In 2009-10, Australia is expected to provide $3.8 billion worth of official development assistance - an increase from 0.32% of GNI in 2008-09 to 0.34% - which amounts to about one per cent of Federal Government expenditure.

And that is as it should be.  We are a very prosperous, very blessed nation.  It is unjust – and unchristian – that we should simply consume all of our prosperity upon ourselves.  But neither does the Bible teach us to ignore our problems in the pursuit of helping of others.  It’s not either/or – it’s both.  This truth is clearly summarized by the apostle Paul in Philippians 2:4, “Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

I’m sure I’ll continue to agree with Senator Joyce on many issues in the future.  But this time I believe he got it seriously wrong.

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written by John Edwards, February 12, 2010

I agree with much of what you wrote, but I think we need to be careful with the use of the word "unjust". If someone refuses to help others, we could call it "selfishness", and even "unchristian", as you have done. We might even call it "ungracious" or "unmerciful". But by calling it "unjust", might put us at risk of subtley implying that other nations somehow have a RIGHT to Australian's money. That would be like, if you graciously chose to give someone a Christmas present, and they didn't happen to think you spent enough on them - they could call you "selfish" and "unchristian" if they want to - but they don't have the right to call it "unjust" - because that would imply that your gift never truly belonged to you in the first place; it would mean that your giving was never truly a "gift", but was merely an administrative redistribution of public property; and it would imply that you had actually become a thief, because you had witheld for yourself something which someone else actually had rights to. If someone witholds some of his own personal property from a needy person, the Bible might call that "ungracious" or "unmerciful". It's only if a person retains SOMEONE ELSE's own rightful personal property that the Bible would call it "unjust". Any morality of redistributionism which subtley confuses "ungraciousness" for "injustice" becomes the seedbed of various levels of socialism and communism. Let's go all-out for selflessness and generosity. But what IS unjust, is a morality which teaches that someone else has RIGHTS to your personal property. And it's a mentality which perpetuates poverty rather than alleviating it. God bless.

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