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Author Topic: Have you ever heard a sermon against usury?  (Read 1788 times)

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Offline St Ignatius

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Re: Have you ever heard a sermon against usury?
« Reply #15 on: October 17, 2017, 12:22:19 PM »
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    • Quote from: Geremia on October 17, 2017, 11:24:32 AM
    Belloc was weak in his condemnation of usury. He thought, like Calvin, that taking usury on productive loans is moral.
    Here's a premise by Belloc to support the "argument" of a "productive loan,"

    The modern world is organized on the principle that money of its nature breeds money. A sum of money lent has, according to our present scheme, a natural right to interest. That principle is false in economics as in morals. It ruined Rome, and it is bringing us to our end.
       Supposing a man comes to you and says: "There is a field next to mine which is a very good building site; if I put up a good little house on it I shall be able to let that house at a net profit[size=-1]-----[/size]all rates, taxes and repairs paid-of [/color] 
    £100 a year. But I have no capital with which to build this house. The field will cost £50 and the house £950. Will you lend me £1,000, so that I can buy the field, put up the house, and enjoy this nice little income?" You would presumably answer, "Where do I come in? You get your £100 a year all right; but you only get it by my aid, and therefore I ought to share in the profits. Let us go fifty-fifty. You take £50 every year as your share for your knowledge of the opportunity and for your trouble, and hand me over the other £50. That will be five percent on my money, and I shall be content."[/i]

      This answer, granted that property is a moral right, is a perfectly moral proposition. The borrower accepting that proposition certainly has no grievance. For a long time [theoretically, forever] you could go on drawing five percent on the money you lent, with a conscience at ease.


    Please show me where does the "moral objection" lay...
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    Offline PG

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    Re: Have you ever heard a sermon against usury?
    « Reply #16 on: October 17, 2017, 12:48:26 PM »
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    • ignatius - what if you lived in a 3rd world country, and you asked your neighbor to help you erect your stick and hay roof on your one story mud hut, should the neighbor have 1/2 a right to the utility of your mud hut because that stick roof exists only because of the neighbors aid?  That is the same math applied to a different situation.  

    And, the moral objection is covetousness.  You are coveting that which doesn't belong to you on perhaps multiple levels.
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    Offline St Ignatius

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    Re: Have you ever heard a sermon against usury?
    « Reply #17 on: October 17, 2017, 12:58:36 PM »
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    • Quote from: PG on October 17, 2017, 12:48:26 PM
    ignatius - what if you lived in a 3rd world country, and you asked your neighbor to help you erect your stick and hay roof on your one story mud hut, should the neighbor have 1/2 a right to the utility of your mud hut because that stick roof exists only because of the neighbors aid?  That is the same math applied to a different situation.  

    And, the moral objection is covetousness.  You are coveting that which doesn't belong to you on perhaps multiple levels.

    You're not distinguishing the difference between "productive" verses "nonproductive" loans...

    Here's a link to Belloc's essay on "Usury."

    http://www.catholicapologetics.info/morality/money/bellusry.htm
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