Are the Rich Better Church People?

I almost drove off the highway on the way home from work Monday while listening to this interview with Libertarian author Charles Murray about his new book – Coming Apart: The State of White America 1960-2010.  

He casually said  that The Rich Are Better Church People Than The Poor.  Really?

Don’t get me wrong.  There are very faithful wealthy people who often serve as patrons supporting 21st Century evangelists, apostles, teachers, etc. much like Paul and others were supported in the 1st Century Church.

But Charles Murray seems to ratchet this up a bit.  He says that wealthy Americans are more likely to be good church people than their less educated, poorer fellow citizens.

First this made me angry.  And then I think I got it.

Wealthy, established people benefit the most from institutions:  schools, clubs, churches, etc.  They are better at being institutional because they have benefited from institutions: universities, fraternal organizations, social clubs, and so on.

It used to be true, he said, that civic institutions attracted people from a variety of socio-economic groups.  The Moose Club, The Elks Lodge, the Kiwanis Club enjoyed memberships that included rich, poor, and everyone in the middle.  But today, Murray asserts that the Upper Class and the Lower Class have segregated themselves.  (This sounds a lot like The Big Sort.)

Upper Class Whites generally watch the same TV shows, eat the same foods, and rear their children the same way as other Upper Class Whites.  Lower Class Whites basically watch the same TV shows, eat the same foods, and rear their children the same way as other Lower Class Whites.

Among the activities that Rich People Life is church.  Or synagogue.  Or mosque – again, according to Charles Murray.  He would argue that this means that the wealthy are more committed to religious institutions.  

But this doesn’t mean that The Rich are most committed to Jesus.  Two different things.

Again, there are both rich and poor who are Good Church People and there are both rich and poor who try to follow Jesus.  These groups are not necessarily the same but sometimes they are the same.

(Side note:  when HH and I saw The Book of Mormon in January, I was struck by how much more church talk there was compared to God talk.  The missionaries were most concerned with bringing people into the church, building the church, obeying the church.)  In my theology, the church is a body that brings people to God, builds God’s kingdom, tries to obey God.

Are the Rich better Church People?  Maybe.  Are they better disciples of Jesus?  Maybe.  But the poor in our world and all who hunger for purpose and relief are more likely to call God’s name in the night.  Those who’ve experienced the living God, who’ve known resurrection in this life, who’ve acknowledged God’s grace are the ones more likely to be disciples.   They could be financially rich and serving within institutions.  Or they could be financially poor and connected by less formal relationships.

What have you seen concerning wealth and faith?

Image source.