when religion and economics mix

Just read this in today's Times Union, about a local church that's assisting "family-class" cars in buying gas on one specific Saturday at one specific place...

http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=488238&category=SARATOGA&BCCode=HOME&newsdate=6/3/2006

Of course, this church is showing Jesus' love in a practical way, especially in light of high gas rates.

It's an act of kindness, not out of environmental concern. If that were their case, they would be boycotting amendments that allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, for example; encouraging congregants to buy hybrid cars, commute to work, or ride bicycles instead of cars; and reminding parishioners to buy EnergySmart appliances or signing up for wind power or solar energy (my husband and I use Green Mountain Energy Company as our energy supplier, which means we pay more but our energy is from wind and hydro fuel sources).

If you're serious about your commitment to care for creation and be a better steward of energy sources, for example, become a member of the Evangelical Environmental Network, and you'll get their quarterly magazine, Creation Care, edited and published by Jim Ball (I met him a few years ago when I went to the national Religion Communicators Conference in Indianapolis; he has teamed up with unlikely alliances -- a Jewish liberal, for example, to lobby and inform the public and the church about the need to be better environmentalists).

But back to the Saratoga church wanting to help people pay for gas. That's another issue entirely (sorry for the tangent), and I admire their desire to want to help people in a practical way. Kudos to their vision.

Now, who's going to help the truly poor -- the widows and the orphans -- as James 1:27 invokes us to do?