Forgiving the Banker

How I resolved my anger at Wall Street about the economic crisis

I live in New York, the finance capital of the world. Until a few weeks ago, that is, as the stock market tanks in value.  I surprised my liberal self in the beginning of this turmoil when I disagreed over the government’s plan to bail out certain private companies.  Wait, what? As a Democrat, don’t I want MORE government intervention?

This bailout thing didn’t seem right to me. As Bob Herbert put it in an editorial a few weeks ago: “Does anyone think it’s just a little weird to be stampeded into a $700 billion solution to the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression by the very people who brought us the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression?” Yes! It is weird!

While watching C-SPAN, I agreed with Republican congresspeople addressing their constituents’ bailout concerns: proof that this financial crisis is not a partisan issue. We must join together as Americans, especially on the eve of deciding the next President of the United States, to find the best possible solutions to make this nation better. I agree that something needs to be done as soon as possible.

But I’m still angry. As a Christian, my faith tells me to bail out the poor from poverty, the sick from illness, the suffering from plight, and the oppressed from injustice. When A.I.G. spends nearly $500,000 on a resort spree a mere week after receiving $85 BILLION in bailout money from average, hard working taxpayers, I’m disgusted. Why should the nation’s already financially burdened middle class be paying for rich people’s lavish and unnecessary lifestyles? Are they trying to rub it in our faces?

People, myself included, have the urge to watch Wall Street suffer.  They robbed us for so long, some say, that it’s their turn. Their market is supposed to be free and open, so no taking corporate welfare from us! 

These few weeks have given me a personal taste of the stock market’s effects. The one financial blessing to happen last week was I finally got a job after a six month search, doing exactly what I want to do—working for a faith-based nonprofit organization—and actually getting paid for it!  But, as a new employee, I have to fill out the paperwork for investing in their retirement program.  Because I am frugal, having a retirement account was my favorite part about getting a job. (Yes, I am 24 years old and all I can think about is stuffing money away in mutual funds.)  That is, until the economy went down the drain. Why should I put money in this account if it is just going to be lost to bad judgment by financiers? How is this an incentive to saving for retirement?

It is also angering to know that, as part of this economic system, our retirement and investment status is ruled by the stock market. I can’t sock money away under my mattress. I MUST invest or else it will be worth nothing in thirty years. I know that the Gospel says that investments are rewarded (see the Parable of the Three Tenants), but greed is not something my faith is ruled by.  It is frustrating that there is no other option. We are owned by this system or else we die.

And, whether we like it or not, we are all connected in this flawed system.  Someone I don’t know couldn’t pay back their mortgage because lenders gave people mortgages with high interest rates who couldn’t afford them, and when they couldn’t pay back their loans, the giant investment banks all failed because the mortgage-backed securities these loans were packaged in, in which the banks invested, actually weren’t secure at all.  Now we all have to pick up the tab.

Yet, being of faith means I also have to forgive.  On my way to my new job I was reading “The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran.  Sufi poets and thinkers have always influenced me, and though not a Christian, he speaks truly Christian words.  The day I turned in my retirement plan information, I read this, in a section called “On Buying and Selling”:

To you the earth yields her fruit, and you shall not want if you but know how to fill your hands.

It is in exchanging the gifts of the earth that you shall find abundance and be satisfied.

Yet unless the exchange be in love and kindly justice, it will but lead some to greed and others to hunger…

And before you leave the market place, see that no one has gone his way with empty hands.

For the master spirit of the earth shall not sleep peacefully upon the wind till the needs of the least of you are satisfied.

The market place should be a place where all are participants, not just those with stock options or capital to invest. This is just what M. Douglas Meeks, professor at Vanderbilt Divinity School, argues in his book “God the Economist.”

Fittingly, the next section of the book is “On Crime and Punishment.” He invokes Jesus when Jesus asks those who are sinless to“throw the first stone”:

Oftentimes I have heard you speak of one who commits a wrong as though he were not one of you, but a stranger…

But I say that even as the holy and the righteous cannot rise beyond the highest which is in each one of you,

So the wicked and the weak cannot fall lower than the lowest which is in you also.

And as a single leaf turns not yellow but with the silent knowledge of the whole tree,

So the wrong-doer cannot do wrong without the hidden will of you all…

Yea, the guilty is oftentimes the victim of the injured,

And still more often the condemned is the burden bearer for the guiltless and unblamed.

You cannot separate the just from the unjust and the good from the wicked;

For they stand together before the face of the sun even as the black thread and the white are woven together…

If any of you would bring to judgment the unfaithful wife,

Let him also weigh the heart of her husband in scales, and measure his soul with measurements.

This passage brings to light the core of my mixed feelings about the financial downturn right now. I just got a job, and I have a salary for the first time in my life. Once I knew the number, I immediately thought of how I could make it bigger. I wanted more. I don’t want the stock market to crash, because I want more for ME.  We all do, I guess, but since getting a job I am realizing the lure money can have on someone. It is addictive, and can take ownership of you.  I disliked bankers because, deep down, I wanted to be one.  I wanted to be financially secure, own five houses, afford the best apartment in Manhattan, and splurge on fancy boutiques in the Village.

Through this realization, I understood that I was not separate from the system that made this crisis, nor was I unaccountable to it.  Revenge on Wall Street is not good for the economy; it will not make the financial situation better. Othering bankers was merely me casting judgment on them while making myself morally superior. Though it might seem trivial, forgiving is the first step to solving this crisis. Therefore, I forgive you, sub-prime mortgage trader, because we are not strangers; rather, I am you.