Theologian H. Richard Niebuhr postulates that Christians look at the involvement of Christ in the culture of worldly activity in five basic ways.
(1) They see Christ against the culture of the world. Here one must choose the sin of this world or a heavenly world that is totally separate.
(2) A second approach is that Christ is of and in the world. God is the force that directs culture toward its greatest (human) achievements.
(3) Christ is above the culture. People may live lives directed toward a good, but to achieve the highest human aspirations they must make a supernatural leap to the higher power.
(4) Christ and culture are forces with dual power over people. As subjects we render unto both God and Caesar, seeking to keep religious and civil authority separate yet together.
(5) Christ is seen as the transforming agent to remold the culture. People undergo a conversion while they are in the culture (Niebuhr 1951).
Christian views on gambling can be guided by these approaches. Absolutist views – always negative views – toward gambling are found among groups adhering to the first view. For instance, Jehovah’s Witnesses seek not to let the materialism of this world become dominant forces in their lives, and accordingly, they disdain all gambling. The Jehovah’s Witnesses do not lobby governments or campaign for or against any gambling questions. Members do not vote. Although they show respect for authority, they see governments as worldly, secular institutions, which should not be encouraged, albeit the edicts of government will be obeyed. Their spokespersons make it clear that their members do not participate in or support gambling. The Watchtower, the official journal of the faith, regularly reports on gambling, calling it an activity of “greed” and “covetness” stimulating “selfishness and lack of concern for others”. Gambling “degrades” people and “entraps them in false worship” (1 October 1974, 9).
The Salvation Army also rejects gambling in its entirety; however, it subscribes more to the second approach of Christ and culture, that Christ is of the world, that he came and walked among the sinners and gave them the light by which to transform their lives and lift up the culture. With this approach the church does not actively campaign against proposals for gambling, but rather like Gamblers Anonymous groups concentrates its efforts on reforming the individual suffering from the influences of gambling.
The third and fourth approaches that churches take toward the role of Christ in culture seem to accept the status quo with regard to public policy. Many of the churches do not oppose gambling outright but look at it in its full context. Churches such as the Methodists (United), Southern Baptist, and Latter-day Saints condemn all gambling by members in all circumstances while they adhere to the fifth notion that Christ is the transforming agent sent to earth to remold the culture by converting individuals within the culture.
The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, for instance, proclaims:
Gambling is a menace to society, deadly to the best interests of moral, social, economic, and spiritual life, and destructive of good government. As an act of faith and love, Christians should abstain from gambling and should strive to minister to those victimized by the practice. Community standards and personal lifestyles should be such as would make unnecessary and undesirable the resort to commercial gambling, including public lotteries, as a recreation, as an escape, or as a means of producing public revenue or funds for support of charities or government. (General Conference of the United Methodist Church 1984, 98–99)
The Southern Baptist Convention is the largest non-Catholic denomination in the United States. Their director of family and moral concerns, Harry Hollis, told the Commission on the Review of the National Policy on Gambling much the same story:
In all its resolutions, the Southern Baptist Convention has rejected gambling. Obviously, some forms of gambling are more serious than others, but all forms have been consistently rejected in Southern Baptist statements and resolutions. The use of gambling profits for worthy activities has not led Southern Baptists to endorse gambling…. The availability of gambling tempts both the reformed gambler and the potential gambler to destruction. For the entire community, gambling is disruptive and harmful. Thus, concerned citizens should work for laws to control and eliminate gambling. (Bell 1976, 172–173)
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) has been equally vehement in maintaining that gambling is always wrong. In 1982 Spencer Kimball, the twelfth president of the church wrote:
From the beginning we have been advised against gambling of every sort. The deterioration and damage come to the person, whether he wins or loses, to get something for nothing, something without effort, something without paying the full price. Profiting from others’ weaknesses displeases God. Clean money is that compensation received for a full day’s honest work. It is that reasonable pay for faithful service. It is that fair profit from the sale of goods, commodities, or service. It is that income received from transactions where all parties profit. (Kimball 1982, 355–356. See also Ludlow 1992, 533)
An interesting side issue arose recently over temple privileges. A member of the Church of Latter-day Saints (Mormon) must be in good standing in order to enter a temple. In the past if a Mormon worked in a gambling establishment or in a gambling-related job, especially if the job was on the “frontline” of providing gambling service such as being a dealer, he or she might be denied good-standing status. When the church decided to build a temple in Las Vegas (about 10 percent of the local population are Mormons), many members who held jobs in casinos wished to have temple privileges. Casinos provide the largest number of jobs in the Las Vegas community, so many members of the Mormon faith do work in casinos. The church stand against casino employment was reviewed, and it was decided that casino workers who did not personally gamble and did not overtly encourage others to gamble could have good standing if they met other church and community obligations.
Churches that accept gambling in some circumstances generally view Christ’s role in culture in the third or fourth way as advanced by H. Richard Niebuhr. L. M. Starkey writes in Money, Mania, and Morals that “All Catholic moralists are agreed that gambling and betting may lead to grave abuse and sin, especially when they are prompted by mere gain. The gambler usually frequents bad company, wastes much valuable time, becomes adverse to work, is strongly tempted to be dishonest when luck is against him, and often brings financial ruin upon himself and those dependent upon him” (Starkey 1964, 90–91). Nonetheless the Catholic Church reconciles gambling with the fact that Christ must have been of the world as God had given people personal freedom that led them into certain activity. The New Catholic Encyclopedia relates, “A person is entitled to dispose of his own property as he wills… so
long as in doing so he does not render himself incapable of fulfilling duties incumbent upon him by reason of justice or charity. Gambling, therefore, though a luxury, is not considered sinful except when the indulgence in it is inconsistent with duty” (The New Catholic Encyclopedia 1967, 276).
The Catholic Church believes that it is sinful for a person to gamble if the money gambled does not belong to him or if the money is necessary for the support of others. The Church also condemns gambling behavior when it becomes compulsive and disruptive to family and social relationships. Moreover, the freedom to gamble implies a knowing freedom to enter into a fair and honest contract for play. Cheating at gambling is considered wrong, as are all dishonest games.
The Church also looks at the end result of the activity. If through gambling good consequences may follow, the gambling activity may even be considered good and may be promoted by the Church. Hence, a limited-stakes bingo game conducted honestly by Church members within a church building in order to raise funds for a school or hospital is not bad.
On questions of legalization of gambling, Catholic Church leaders ask if the particular form of gambling puts poor people at disadvantages, if it causes people to become pathological gamblers, and if the gambling will be adequately monitored to ensure that it is honest and fair. Church leaders have opposed some public referenda while they have supported others.
The Church of England and its U.S. offspring, the American Episcopal Church, both essentially reformed Catholic organizations, accept the same approach toward gambling as is taken by the Catholic Church. The National Convention of the church has no stated position on gambling. Individual church organizations have used gambling events to raise funds; others have prohibited the use of gambling within church facilities. Basically the issue of gambling is a low-priority ethical issue. Individuals are left to develop their own attitudes on the subject.
|
|