Hair fashionably mussed, a soul patch beneath his lower lip, the Singer steps onto the small stage and eyes the small audience seated before him.  A man in a dark T-shirt impatiently eyes the Singer.  Pen fidgeting in his mouth, he inquires tersely, "Okay, what do you have for us today?"

The Singer takes a deep breath before answering.  "Well, I'd like to start out with 'Not to Us' by Chris Tomlin."

"Okay," the man responds without emotion.  "Good luck."

Apprehensive, jittery, nonplused, the Singer takes a step forward.  And with all that he has, and all that he is, he opens his mouth.  And sings.

"Not to us, but to Your name be the glory," he proclaims.  "Not to us, but to Your name..." he repeats, each time with greater conviction.  The certainty of his beliefs seem to steady his voice, and he digs into the phrase deeper.  Taking a deep breath, he readies himself for the first verse.

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As I sit here reflecting on this past Christmas, the Holiday season, the days leading up to Christmas, family, friends, and our society, I also reflect on the past year, the mistakes, the accomplishments, the good, the bad, and the ugly. I am reminded that the culture industry of Christmas is a machine that gets going long before December 25th. I am also reminded that Christmas, at least here in the States, has taken on a commercial form that is trumped by little to nothing. I am even further reminded that the culture industry of Christmas has globalized itself and turned a Holiday that is supposed to be about a spiritual connection to Christ, family, religious traditions, humanity, and people in general more into cultural mores focused around buying, spending money we don’t have, getting that “good deal,” consuming products we don’t need, and waking up at ungodly hours to get a toaster oven for $4.99. Are we all consumed with just buying as a society? Where did the spirituality go? Yes, I’m sure that the praise and worship music blared through the speakers at Wal Mart gets us in the “mood” for Christmas and the blatant manger scenes at our local churches give us reflection on the “reason for the season.” I’m also sure that the once-a-year- giving spirit causes us to feel good about ourselves when we acknowledge the homeless person on the corner and give her/ him a couple of dollars because “Jesus would have done so.”

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One of my responsibilities as a blogger is to start dialogue and conversation on controversial topics.  In order to effectively set up these conversations, it is important that I remain truthful, open, and honest.  In that spirit, I have a two confessions to make.  Here’s the first:  I am a choir boy.  

 

When I was in elementary school, my music teacher, Mrs. Neidringhaus (who, coincidentally, just became my Facebook friend last week), suggested I join a local professional boys choir, The All American Boys Chorus.  Lured by the promise of international travel and missed school days, I auditioned.  I was never really a singer before that moment, but that started a new journey for me as a chorister. 

 

 

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I did something for the very first time the other day.

I saw a new book coming out in hardcover and thought, Boy, if I had a Kindle, I would totally download that one.

What is happening to me?

I work at a publishing house! I love the printed page! I love ink on paper! I love books!

And yet, for that particular book (and if you’re curious, it was Michael J. Fox’s Always Looking Up), I was interested enough in the content to want to read it, but not so interested that I wanted a hardcover that was retailing at $25.99.

And, really, it wasn’t so much the price that was stopping me. It was the thing—the hardcover book. Some days, the thought of accumulating even one more thing wears me out.

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I topped off my CRV at the Exxon up the street, poured a cup of black coffee, and was handed change for my $20. I know I should have been happy, but as the coins clinked in my hand I had to wonder. Cheap gas lowers the cost to transport goods, saves people money getting to work and generally makes us happy. But we can’t forget that there are two sides to every coin. In many ways, cheap gas is bad for America. Cheap gas destabilizes key countries, discourages investment in alternative fuel development, and encourages Americans to live lives that are out of touch with environmental realities.  

In declining economic climates, populism often wins. Two of our world’s key nations are directly destabilized by dramatically lower gas prices. As you know, oil is exported to the US, where it is refined and made into gasoline. So the cost of oil is the source of the cost of gasoline. The fact that oil moved from $147 a barrel in July to the upper $30s in February is due to a complex combination of factors, but primarily it means oil consumption slowed faster than oil exporting countries could cut production. In Iran, 50% of the state budget is derived from oil exports. Unemployment in Iran, which had hovered around 15%, is now expected to go to 30%. Inflation is around 25%. The dramatic drop in oil has created an economic crisis that in turn has created a very tenuous political climate. Fundamentalist Muslims have been held at bay in Iran by national economic opportunity. If we think we have problems in the Middle East now, imagine what would happen if Iran collapsed.

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If you follow ConversantLife somewhat regularly, you’ll notice a trend lately toward anti-consumerism (including some of my own posts). It seems the right thing to be—a lover of God and humanity more than a lover of things, a Christ follower who chooses abstracts like love and peace over crass commercial objects. I’ve been feeling the vibe myself. The Christmas season tends to inflame these sentiments even more. Christians, you know, can be very anti-establishment when it suits us.

All the talk of philanthropy and anti-consumerism has gotten me thinking. I’m sure lots of other people have thought about these things longer than I have. I’ll bet I could find a hundred books debating the virtues and vices of capitalism. I am not a student of economics, so pardon any embarrassing gaps in my understanding, but here’s a simple layman’s exploration.

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                Does consumerism have a cost?  We could talk about the environment. We could look at the UN’s recent study that showed, between 1954 and 2004, 80% of the world’s population became poorer, and 20% became wealthier. We could look at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and how marketing always pushes consumers to the two lowest levels of need (safety and belonging), and then wonder about how that constant push messes with our minds, our faith, and our relationships. In Evangelical circles, “spiritual warfare” is often defined as God blessing us with stuff (“God blessed me with a new car!”) and the Devil busily taking stuff away (“I’m being attacked! I’m going to lose my house!”). We pursue oil in Iraq to fuel our SUV’s, as part of a moral crusade (“battling Evil”).

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        Did you know that the United States has the most people imprisoned per capita in the world? I mean the whole world, including Russia, China, Albania, wherever. According to the US Department of Justice annual report, on this very day about 2.3 million Americans are in prison. Add in people on probation, and the number is over 3% of our total population. The current rate is four times higher than in 1980. What? How can that be? Even more striking, 1 out of 10 young Black males are in prison. In fact, if you are a young Black male, you have a much better chance of going to prison than going to college. 10.4% of all black males between 25 and 29 years old are in prison, 1.3% of white males the same age. 75% of women imprisoned are single mothers. What’s going on?

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I’m awkwardly bent at the waist, shuffling like a penitent monk as I search for my winter clothes in our low-slung attic. I always forget to stay low, till the inevitable “thunk” of my head reminds me to repent. Why do I even have winter clothes? What does that mean, to have clothes that are seasonal? In most cold places I’ve traveled, people just put on more of what they have, relying on layers instead of Gortex. It is a strange world I live in. 

So I’m writing on consumerism. Not just consumerism, but the bigger picture, the impact our nation’s insatiable appetite for more has on other parts of our increasingly small globe. As I mentioned, I do this hesitantly. It’s just too close to home, so painfully obvious in my attic, as I swap out Dry-Fit for Gortex. But, as blogs seem to be as much about self-confession as about anything else, I’m going to press on. How does American consumerism impact others? Does my personal wealth, evidenced in my clothing options, affect Nigeria?

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