Presbyterians, Karl Marx, Cosmovision and Letters

This last summer I began a series of articles entitled "Presbyterians Dancing With Karl Marx!” The focus of the articles was several national and international groups and movements that various organizations in the PCUSA are affiliated with. My concern was Christian endorsement of ideologies that are unacceptable if Jesus Christ is Lord.

Because I erred in attributing a quote to the wrong person, I sent a letter to the person I was informed actually made the statement. I did this because I wanted to be certain that he had made the statement, but also because I wished to ask him about another paper and statement he wrote. Stephen Bartlett, Coordinator for Constituency Education, Agricultural Missions, wrote me back a gracious and interesting letter. (I wish, before hand, to commend him for his work with community gardens and children.)

Because I plan to write some more on this subject I am placing my letter to Mr. Bartlett and his response in this posting. His letter is long and I will later have a great deal I want to write so the posting of both of our letters will be the first part of this round of postings.

But first I want to stress that my next round of articles on this particular subject will deal with religious and political movements of the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century, as well as their renewed images in our contemporary world. I will be using the first part of Presbyterians Dancing With Karl Marx! Part 2 as my starting point. My concern is how the Church can be faithful to her Lord in the midst of a fragmenting world in flux. I intend to uphold the Lordship of Christ and His redeeming life and death.

Here are the letters:

Dear Mr. Bartlett,

I have written an article entitled "Presbyterians Dancing with Karl Marx." I posted it in three parts and placed it on my blog, "Naming His Grace." As you can see from this mornings posting I attributed a quote I believe you made to Ms. Sherry Flyr.

I thought I should be much more careful and ask if this is your quote? Are you the author of this statement concerning the USSF's classes on the Agricultural Missions' web site "Katrina, the War, Gender and the struggle against Homophobic Patriarchical Violent Capitalism, Immigration Rights, Worker Justice and Indigenous Peoples and their Prophetic Struggles and Cosmovision."

I also decided that I should ask why you referred to capitalism as homophobic Patriarchical and violent? Beyond that I also note that in your report from the 2006 World Social Forum, [reflections from the AMI (Agricultural Missions, Inc) Agrarian Delegation to the World Social Forum, Jan 19-31, 2006], you state, "How socialism is defined and envisioned today goes beyond rigid Marxist Leninist or even Maoist concepts, and seeks for its roots in indigenous cosmovision and collective governance practices, in a radically decentralized vision for a world in which, as the Zapatistas demand, all worlds fit." Could you please explain what that actually means? For instance, does going beyond rigid Marxist Leninist still include Marxism? What exactly is cosmovision? What are collective governance practices?

Thank you for taking the time to read this e-mail and respond.
Sincerely,
Viola Larson


“Dear Ms Viola Larson,
Warm greetings in Christ from Louisville, Kentucky! I am going to respond to your questions, but I would request that if you publish my reply to your email on your blog, that you do so in its entirety, and not in bits and pieces. Concepts like cosmovision and collective governance practices are not familiar to everyone. A shared understanding of what is meant by them is important to any serious dialog about emerging political and economic philosophies. Thank you in advance for that consideration.

Yes, the article you cited in your blog was from an article I wrote for our Netline publication, a publication of Agricultural Missions, Inc (AMI) with whom I have been working for nearly eight years. You may have been confused by a listing of workshop leaders that said Yours truly (referring to me, not Sherry), Sherry Flyr, Luckner Millien... If you click over to the Netline Publication from the homepage (not from the USSF 'more' link), you can see the same article, with my name prominently listed as the author.

The plenary sessions I was referring to at the US Social Forum were presented as they were entitled in the Forum itself. The choice of plenary themes would have been the decision of a large and diverse council responsible for organizing the forum plenaries and representing various organizations and social movements. In the article you quoted, I did not infer or make any judgment on their content but merely reported their overarching themes. But if you would like to have a more in-depth correspondence on the concepts and themes in question, that is possible. To explain these themes adequately would require a great many pages. I am still prayerfully learning about them myself, in my calling as a disciple of Christ, as a farmer, urban agriculturalist, teacher of gardening to children and advocate for peace and social justice. I am a member of Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church in Louisville, Kentucky, where I coordinate a community garden, now in its 11th year and 6th year of summer gardening camps for children of diverse backgrounds.

I will try to define cosmovision for you. Cosmovision refers to an overarching worldview, or a cosmology or vision of the cosmos. It is most often referring to those beliefs about reality held by a great many Indigenous Peoples around the world, and in particular in the Americas (including North, South, Central America and the Caribbean). It expresses a worldview deeply rooted in the natural world.

Since in my work with Agricultural Missions (founded in 1930) it is my job to learn about and to accompany and support the efforts of people of the land, including indigenous people, we are respectful of religious or cosmovision beliefs different from our own Christian beliefs. Call it a humble and loving attitude of ecumenicity and interfaith dialog and mutual respect. It is our experience that indigenous cosmovision and sustainable and reverent practices of land usage are of great value to humanity, particularly in these times of environmental crisis. It is also the case that many indigenous peoples, even those who may not be Christian, nevertheless show high respect to the teachings and life of Jesus. In Jesus they often see a great Healer of divine inspiration.

To respond to your question about the discussion of the new concept of 'socialism' developing in Latin America, Europe, Africa and Asia, which I mentioned in another article you cited, you may again infer that I am describing some aspects of the debate going on among those most impacted by the negative effects of neoliberal globalization, in various countries and regions. You may be aware that Christians too have been debating to what degree unregulated capitalism, based as it is on the unbridled profit motive or self-interest, reflects the Sermon on the Mount or not. Again, I am describing the debate as it is developing and not taking one position or another.

Karl Marx, like Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, John Maynard Keynes, Galbraith, etc... was a philosopher and an economist, a highly influential one in his day, and the concepts and analyses he contributed have become part and parcel of modern Western thought, whether you are from the Chicago School or are Neo-Keynesian. It is worth noting too that just as Marxism may take different forms, so does capitalism. So it is hard to define exactly what may be meant by the moniker 'Marxism.' Some forms of socialism have fallen down for a variety of reasons and some of them were characterized as rigid, doctrinaire, bureaucratic, overly-centralized, party-bound, etc... Going beyond those forms of so-called socialist societies was what I was referring to, in the general debate at that social forum. For example, today there are welfare state countries in Europe who see their origins in Marxist thought, because of their generous safety nets providing health care and education for all, for free or very inexpensively. One commonly held idea of what 'socialism' means is where the economy is organized around the benefits that can accrue to a society and its members. That is, socialism is often thought to be any economy where social good takes priority over the capitalistic values of wealth accumulation and concentration. As I mentioned before, the life and words of Jesus are often difficult to reconcile with an economy that may enrich some and impoverish others, or lay waste to the environment on a global scale. Hence the urgent search for alternative models for organizing society. Here in Louisville, for example, as part of the work of the Community Farm Alliance, a farmer-led organization seeking the betterment for local farmers and local consumers of food, we are creating what is being called a 'solidarity economy' whereby people buy their foods from local farmers directly, even if this may be less convenient or require more cooking. In this way, family farmers of our region can survive economically and society as a whole benefits. In fact, we are now finding ways for local farmers to get food directly into the hands of the lowest income people in impoverished neighborhoods, so that those least able to get fresh and healthy produce may do so, and creating a link of solidarity between urban dwellers and regional farmers. One could call this a form of capitalism or a form of socialism, according to one's use of those terms. We call it a solidarity economy, within a capitalist economy.

'Collective governance practices' refers to decision-making procedures and norms of a community, social sector, social movement, organization, company, country or international body or forum that do not rely exclusively upon what we call representative democratic procedures and Roberts Rules/Parliamentary Procedure, but rather on horizontal inclusive consultation, consensus building, and social accountability norms. It is thought, for example, that agrarian or hunter gatherer societies typically practiced and still do practice collective governance, as do towns in Vermont where townhall meetings are held to hash out decisions for the community, and everyone has a voice. The Zapatista indigenous communities to whom I referred utilize collective governance practices, which is why their decision-making process is slow and tedious. However, such thorough consultations and town meetings have the advantage that once a decision is taken, everyone stands behind that decision and it can be implemented at once by nearly everyone involved. The degree to which a society is democratic (reflecting the opinion of the majority, or involving wide participation in decision making processes) is not only a concept within capitalist societies (voting, performing civic duties, paying taxes), but also within so-called socialist societies or, ideally, non-hierarchical societies, where community councils and other consultative bodies allow members of society to participate in decision-making. In general such democratic procedures are often referred to as Participatory Democracy. That, in essence, was what I meant by my use of the term: Collective Governance Practices. Think of a town hall meeting in New Hampshire! And extrapolate.

I hope this helps clarify the concepts you referred to.

peace in Christ,

Stephen Bartlett
Coordinator for Constituency Education
Agricultural Missions, Inc. (AMI)
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