Social responsibility real

I was appalled by Steve Massey’s Nov. 19 column on the Occupy Wall Street protesters. My experience of Christianity finds both social responsibility and personal responsibility to be real. They even seem to need each other.

As a possibility, it may be that I am not personally responsible until I recognize the social irresponsibility of Wall Street and hold up a sign. We are not just individuals making individual decisions, though we are that. We are also involved in each others’ lives fundamentally, and a fuller Christianity puts us precisely there.

This Christianity calls us to a responsibility that will recognize that though no one is forced to sign loan papers, neither is anyone forced to misrepresent the loans to others, and neither was any industry forced to create a social practice that rewards this misinformation.

I hope that all of us, as Christians, can come to this deeper understanding. And I am not convinced that the God we Christians worship would be disappointed with it. This God, who turns out to be one infinite community in one continuous and perfect relationship of infinite love, is not without his own social aspect and his own social responsibility.

Patrick Lippert

Post Falls