What about......?

One question I keep getting from people, especially people who have read my book, is 'What about...?'

Like  someone from Michigan who said "I want to send my kids to a Catholic school, but it is expensive.  Is that acceptable?"

Or someone from Calgary who said "I love art, and have some expensive pieces.  What about those?"

Someone from Quebec said "I think part of theology of the body means we need to treat our bodies well, and eat highly nutritious, preferably organic foods.  But eating like that is expensive.  Is that ok?"

What about putting our kids in sports?  What about developping hobbies and skills? What about planting a flower garden? What about going on family vacations?  What about enriching experiences like museums and zoos?

I like what Pope Leo XIII said in Rerum Novarum "True, no one is commanded to distribute to others that which is required for his own needs and those of his household; nor even to give away what is reasonably required to keep up becomingly his condition in life, "for no one ought to live other than becomingly" (Paragraph 22- worth reading in context!)

So-  it comes back to conscience again!  In your judgement, would art or camping or sports be necessary for living becomingly?  

Remember that we are stewards, and that our wealth does not really belong to us but to God.  God wants to provide us with good things, but wisdom, prudence, and the sound judtgement of your conscience will be necessary to know exacty what God would have us own!

Just remember the caution of St Basil the Great;

“By a certain wily artifice of the devil, countless pretexts of expenditure are proposed to the rich.” 

There will always be another thing to covet, another thing you could justify as allowing you live 'becomngly'.  This for me is another reason why the luxury budget has proven so fruitful. I may justify some gardening supllies or camping trips with the family, but if it cannot be easily justified, I have also allowed myself a certain amount of money for those luxuries. 

Live Simply during a pandemic

I am continuing to create content about living simply, like a youtube video that I made with a talk I would present to teens, and more excitingly, I published a book!  Well, almost.  Check back here for updates...

But then Covid struck.  I wonder if books on the End of the World might do better right now than books challenging us to Live Simply.

However, it seems that during this time of pandemic living simply might actually be the wise thing to do!  We know that many people in our culture are living beyond their means. They are house poor, or have accumulated large amounts of debt from vehicles and electronics.  The pressure to keep up with the Joneses has them renovatig their homes or buying that RV that they can barely afford... when suddenly the economy turns down and they have even less money than before. Whereas part of living simply would mean not accumulating debt to get more stuff, and not caring how nice the Joneses new RV is.  So while many are struggling right now to make ends meet, I have found that living some distance below the lifestyle I could have afforded has given me the freedom and peace of mind of knowing that we are in a good place financially.

In fact, since the Canadian Government gave everyone $300/child, regardless of whether their finances were strained from the downturn, we were able to give each of our children the option of deciding which charity they wanted to give their money to!

The thing is-  as strained as many of us are in rich countries, it's even worse in the poor countries. I personally did not lose my income from Covid, but even if I had, government subsidies would have kicked in, and hopefully kept me afloat.  This is just another piveege that I have, in that I have a stable, well paying job that I can do (to some degree) from home.

But what about the most vulnerable in our society?  Chances are they can't.  What about people in other countries?  I spent time in Kenya, Tanzania, Mexico-  not only will those people not be able to work during the pandemic, but their government will not be able to provide for them when they have no income.  And if they do get sick, their health system will be quickly overwhelmed.  If there are disruptions to food security, it will likely be much worse there. So many people in the developping world depend on the donations we make to NGO's for their welfare-  and now even rich people are cutting back on their giving, because their own lifestyle is being challenged.

For this reason it is more important than ever now to be generous with the poor.  The need is growing, and the resources to help are shrinking.  What can you do without?