This 1962 CCMJ reflection came to light recently. It would be valuable to understand your own present view of how we tackle the accelerating global financial crisis.Or your comment on where you feel we should lay greater emphasis  in our own daily witness

Findings  1962As a result of our investigations, we have come to the following conclusions:

1. We believe that the existing system of debt-finance, whereby practically all money comes into circulation as interest-bearing debt, is prejudicial to human well-being, a drag on the development and distribution of wealth, finds no justification in the nature of things, and perpetuates a wrong conception of the function of money in human society.

2. We believe that the virtual monopoly of credit enjoyed by the banking system is contrary to reason and justice. When a bank makes a loan, it monetizes the credit of a creditworthy customer, admittedly a necessary service. But when it has done this, it hands him back his monetarized credit as a debt to the bank plus. 6, 8 or 9%. There seems to be an anomaly here, masked by the use and wont, that calls for examination. The true basis of credit is found in the assets of the Nation – People, labour skills, natural resources and the enormous power for production now in human hands. The creation and functions of money ought to bear a strict relation to those physical facts, and to nothing else.

3. We believe that the existing system constitutes a barrier to peace and discernment. It involves the trade war with resulting inter-national friction. It requires the priming of the financial pump through the colossal expenditure on armaments in the cold war situation. By this means that vast sums are put into circulation without a corresponding production of consumer goods. It seems difficult to deny the assertion made by Professor Galbraith and others that without the expansion of the economy in this way, there would be economic collapse in the USA and in this country. Since we are confident that it is not beyond the wit of man to devise a system from which these features would be absent, we would urge that it is an imperative Christian duty to press for the introduction of such a system.     

A 1962 reflection at The Christian Council for Monetary Justice. [CCMJ].Peter