The Exorcism of Money
Part 4, Giving is the Exorcism
As described in the last post, Jacques Ellul argues in Money and Power that money must be desacralized. Ellul calls this the "profanation" of money, stripping it of its sacred character. If money is a dark spiritual power, its demonic potency has to be exorcised.
But how is this exorcism to be conducted?
Ellul shares his startling and simple answer: Give it away. Giving is an act of exorcism. For in giving the spiritual power of money loses its dark hold upon our souls.
Here is Ellul:
Now this profanation [of money] is first of all the result of a spiritual battle, but this must be translated into a behavior. There is one act par excellence which profanes money by going directly against the law of money, an act for which money is not made. This act is giving...
In the biblical view, this is precisely how giving, which is a consecration to God, is seen. It is, as a matter of fact, the penetration of grace into the world of competition and selling. We have very clear indications that money, in the Christian life, is made in order to be given away...
Giving to God is the act of profanation par excellence. An object which belonged to a hostile power is torn from him in order to be turned over to the true God...
[Giving] "desacralizes" money...
We cannot measure the power of giving in human relations. Not only does it destroy the power of money, but even more, it introduces the one who receives the gift into the world of grace (remember the debtors in the parable of the unjust steward), and it begins a new chain of cause and effect which breaks the vicious circle of selling and corruption.
There's some rich and beautiful insights here. By desacralizing money, giving is an act of spiritual resistance, an act of exorcism. Why? Because giving is an act for which "money was not made." Giving dispells the dark enchantment. More, giving extracts us from human relations defined by buying and selling to create a new chain of cause and effect rooted in grace. Giving creates an economy of gift.
Going back to Part 1 and Paul's principle of equality and his discourse on giving in 2 Corinthians, this is why I used Ellul in our Bible class. Giving money to the church on Sunday morning can seem rote and perfunctory, dropping a few bucks in the collection plate. But Ellul helps us see that the Sunday morning offering is a profound act of spiritual resistance, as a battle with Satan himself. Dropping money in the collection plate, giving money away, is an act of exorcism. For in giving money away its demonic hold upon our psyche is broken. Do with money that for which it was not made. Give it away. Drive out the devil. As Ellul shares:
We should meditate on this fact and think of it each Sunday at the time of the offering. The offering is not a utilitarian act, and Protestants should stop thinking of it that way...The offering, the moment of giving, should be for us the moment when we desacralize the world and show our consecration to the Lord.
Ellul: "We cannot measure the power of giving in human relations. Not only does it destroy the power of money, but even more, it introduces the one who receives the gift into the world of grace..., and it begins a new chain of cause and effect which breaks the vicious circle of selling and corruption."
For me this speaks to something far more difficult yet more grace-filled than the offering plate.
I've struggled most of my adult life with the gap between my middle-class security and the neediness of the outcasts I see on the streets and read about in the news every day. Handing money to a panhandler or donating to a nonprofit is as ritualistic as putting money in the plate. I don't really have to feel it personally.
Some years ago while editing an international Quaker blog, I began a corresponding friendship with a Filipino man who had submitted an article about starting a cooperative farm for his village. The farm project is on hold now, most recently due to this year's life-threatening extremes of heat and drought in the Philippines. But my friend and I have gradually adopted each other as brothers.
Early on he asked for help to support his extended family, all impoverished and now-landless farmers on two of the middle islands. He estimated weekly needs, made a budget, and we agreed to a weekly amount. But of course everything changes, and the unexpected costs more than one plans for. Each time he has to deal with inflation or with extra needs for family illnesses, farm expenses, disaster recovery, and so on, I have to find grace within to give more.
My point is that this has changed me. Initially my diminishing “financial cushion” worried me. Over seven years, though, it has become a natural reaction to look first for the funds to send overseas, and then to adjust my own spending to compensate. Yes, giving does desacralize money.
And my friend has changed, too. He still goes off on his rants against the global and local financial exploitation and neglect his people suffer. But then he turns around and gives away a sizable portion of what I send him, not only to family but to neighbors and to strangers in other villages. He, too, is stepping “into the world of grace.”
Blessèd Be, Mike Shell
Sell what you have, give the money to the poor. But first, run it through the paid clergical-seminary-denominational publishing house-local church-chotki-anointing oil-gilded bible system so they can each get their pound of flesh. then follow me.