Jesus and Health Care

Have I ever told you what it's like to have a baby in Australia? (*in the case that you are reading this in Australia, skip forward a couple of paragraphs.)

For starters, it's free. The government covers all the cost of pregnancy as long as you choose a public hospital for all your pre-natal appointments and delivery. We opted for what they call "shared care" which is where the expectant mother goes to her own doctor for all but two appointments and pays anywhere from $10 to $20 per visit. But the delivery was free and uncomplicated.

But wait, there's more.

The government in Australia has decided that due to a declining birth rate (especially among Caucasians) to do two things: 1) pay each couple $4000 per child born in Australia without regard to financial need, and 2) boost immigration by skilled workers from overseas (who also tend to have more children per capita).

But wait, there's more.

Not only did we have a practically free pregnancy and delivery and have $4000 deposited in the bank upon record of Ella's birth, we also continued to receive from the government nearly $350 every two weeks until we left Australia--a gesture from the government to promote financial stability among "new families."

We Americans tend to wonder how they manage to afford all this generosity. Australia is a country of only 20 million people whose standard of living compares with the most affluent countries in the world. One major difference, however, is that the wealthiest Australians are required to subsidize the poorest at levels that even some political liberals in the U.S. would consider scandalous. So we have Rupert Murdoch, James Packer, and others to thank for the financial blessing that flows freely from the state to us mere mortals.

What's truly amazing is that in spite of all this, the birth rate in Australia, like in much of Europe, is still declining. This phenomenon has been the subject of many books and articles meant to make us aware and even afraid. Europe will be a Muslim continent in our lifetime, or so they say. Even nominal Christians will be a minority of the population in Australia and Canada. And dutifully, many in the Church have taken the bait and given into fear.

And that tells us something else significant. There is an apalling lack of understanding of the mission of God in Christendom. That's the best case scenario. Worst case is that so-called Christians understand the mission, but they simply don't care. They just don't want to have noisy neighbors, pay high taxes, or (understandably) live under sharia law.

Let's return to free health care for a minute. Most conservative Protestants in Amreica find the idea unthinkable. "Hillary-care," "socialized medicine," "Marxism at its worst"--these are some of the epithets directed at the ideas of those who feel that the government must act in the face of astronomical health care costs and a growing population of uninsured citizens. J.P. Moreland, a well-respected evangelical ethics professor at Biola University in Southern California, has just blogged that Jesus would not have supported free health care--

"Jesus was angered at moral teaching that emphasized outward conformity to rules without moral action flowing from a heart of compassion and virtue, even if such conformity produced good results. Now the state cannot show compassion in the arena of economic justice, because a necessary condition for compassion is that it is freely given and not coerced. The state forces people to conform to rules. It takes their money and gives it to others."

I have no problem with any of the premises stated here, they are all elementary and verifiably accurate. But what about the inferred conclusion? Jesus was angry at the religious leaders of his day for teaching that outward conformity was good enough while ignoring inward transformation. At no time, however, did he ever praise or criticize Rome for their system of laws--just or unjust. Moreland has drawn a conclusion--that Jesus would not support state-sponsored health care (and presumably, He is against it)--based on His contextualized criticism of the Pharisees. But if, according to Moreland, the State should not be held to the standard of active compassion given to the Church, then why should we expect it to freely limit its own coercive powers based on Jesus' criticism of a group of ancient Jewish priests?

The State throughout history has often reserved the right to discriminate between or against certain groups of people based on a perceived common good. The question has always surrounded how to define the common good. Some have understood coerced compassion to meet the criteria of common good. Others have understood an unregulated market in the same light. Usually, it depends on the culture and historical circumstances of the given society.

Universal health care is an idea that emerged out of a shattered post-war, post-Christian Europe before spreading throughout Christendom. In fact, societies with relatively little Christian history or influence have not successfully implemented such nationwide charity. China, for example, tried universal health care as it seemed to fit with their pro-poor and big-government agenda. Nearly 60 years later, the poor in China today remain some of the most desperate and disconnected in all the world. There is no insurance for well over 90 percent of the country's 1.3 billion people. Those that can manage to afford hospitalization and prescription drugs are often faced with unhygenic facilities and shocking levels of corruption. While the State is beginning to pay attention to the crisis (due in large part to growing public outcries among the poor), China is a long way from having a "compassionate" society. And perhaps, free health care may once again be perceived as a common good. But with its titanic population and growing materialism among the rich, that's less than unlikely.

Now without asking the presumptious and often irreverent question as to what Jesus would or wouldn't say to the Chinese government, let me just ask you a simple question. Where would you rather give birth? China or Australia? I'm sure if Dr. Moreland were forced to decide, his answer would be the same as yours.

Yesterday, Dr. Mohler, the president of Southern Seminary where I attend, added his voice to the growing concern over declining birth rates in Christendom. His conclusion (which I agree with), is that the birth rate decline reflects a world-view demise. In other words, the less Christian a society becomes, the more likely it is that the affluent will pursue their own self-interest as opposed to procreating. (I have blogged previously about the moral issues surrounding having large families).

All of this begs the question as to what the Church and Christians as individuals are supposed to do about the problem. In Europe, Canada, and Australia, the government (not the Church) has taken the initiative to subsidize child bearing and child rearing. Parents have certainly beneifited, but birth rates continue to decline. A news story yesterday reported a Russian village declaring a "procreation" holiday for all married couples in order to bolster Russia's population (currently in free-fall). Americans--while easily scared by the prospect of being outnumbered by recent (read: non-WASPy) immigrants--have done next to nothing to address the social realities which have produced the trend. Free health care for kids and realistic maternity and paternity leave for parents are often laughed off by American conservatives as creating a welfare state. Clearly, the European experience suggests that a government-only approach is not sufficient to increase birth rates. But then again, what exactly has the Church done except preach to the choir?

It is high time for a wholesale reformulation of the mission of God in America. Scholars like Moreland and Mohler have been good at diagnosing problems (coercion does not create compassion or justice, birth rates are declining due to selfishness, etc.), but have offered few solutions. And we wonder why indifference is the common response in the pew and in the polling booth.

True Christian compassion can and must thrive with or without a mandate from the State. When communities are full of new immigrants who know nothing of Jesus and His love, our first response should be to go to them. When we read of birth rates falling, we can pray that our own families will be living testimony of the love that God has for His children. And we must do everything in our power to ensure that our communities are places where children are welcomed and cared for. And yes, that may include political advocacy and financial sacrifice (even government coercion). We live in a fallen world, and sometimes the beautiful ends must justify the painful means. Christians owe it to the communities where they live and take up space to adopt such a posture of love toward their neighbors. More than bemoaning secularization and societal ills, we must address them head on with simple acts of kindness and God-given discernment.

Ideology must and will give way to love.