I wanted to highlight friend of the network Brian McLaren’s extremely interesting post on his blog about economic recovery. I think his examination of the current economic situation through the lens of addiction is worth further exploration. There’s a lot of good material in there, but I was especially intrigued by this part:

4. Our addiction to stuff. Jesus said that a person’s life doesn’t consist in the abundance of her possessions. An economy that measures growth by the number of durable goods (resources) extracted from the environment and turned into non-durable goods that are bought, used, and then thrown away into a landfill … that economy “succeeds” by turning goods into trash, and calling it success. That’s not success. We need to imagine moving beyond an extractive, consumptive economy to a sustainable economy, and beyond a sustainable economy to a regenerative economy. I believe that in God’s world, if billions can be made destroying the planet and exploiting people addictively, trillions can be made caring for the planet wisely and caring for people justly.

Some commentary after the jump…
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