Ending Debt Slavery (TomPaine.com)

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Ending Debt Slavery
Bob Edgar
March 26, 2007


Reverend Dr. Bob Edgar is the General Secretary of the National Council of Churches.

Last week marked the 200th anniversary of the end of the transatlantic slave trade. Two centuries later, it is clear that one of history’s most towering evils, the enslavement of human beings, came to an end only when citizens challenged their governments to understand slavery as incompatible with basic laws of God and humanity.

Around the world today, citizen campaigners are leading their governments to understand that deadly poverty and crippling debt, slaveries of our own age, similarly are incompatible with the basic laws of human dignity.

Despite the international community’s new commitments to poverty eradication over the past seven years, particularly the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals , the basic inequities that fuel deadly poverty in our world are as pronounced as ever. Every day, 13 percent of the world’s population goes to bed hungry and nearly 15,000 people die of AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.

The vision of the Jubilee that we find in scripture challenges us to address these realities as part our nation’s commitment to building a more prosperous, stable world for all people.

In the Hebrew Scriptures we find a vision of life in community that is liberating and just, governed by Sabbath cycles: the Sabbath Day, the Sabbath Year and the Jubilee Year. These cycles are a powerful reminder of God’s intent that all creatures enjoy fullness of life and partake in the abundance of God’s world. Sabbath Year observance requires that every seven years debts are canceled and those enslaved because of debts are freed, restoring equal relations among community members and preventing a situation of ongoing exploitation. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2007/03/26/ending_debt_slavery.php

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1. So, is the good Reverend saying that usury is the great enslavement

...tool of today? If that is Rev Edgar's point, then I agree completely with him. This should be the year of world debt cancellation including all debt in the United States which comes to more than $49 trillion. That would set a lot of people free and we could then kick the asses of out the crooked politicians and their masters right out of the country.