All In Common

Implementing an all in common system would be best done by the church. For some reason the Lord hasn’t prompted the Brethren to teach us about economic unity. We are currently consecrating our time and talents.

Read my blog about Alma’s Church. A few months ago I wrote down some of my ideas. It’s at http://greenscootersimplelife.blogspot.com/

I believe one of the foundations of any all in common system is that each individual in the order views his abilities, capacities, genius, etc. as gifts from God. Since his ability to make lots of money is a gift from God the surpluses of that gift should be shared like any other non-monetary gift. Without this foundation, people tend use their money to increase their personal wealth.

Another foundation principle is to believe that believing in Christ means that Christ really wants everyone equal. He really wants the poor exalted and the rich debased. He really wants the poor and the needy taken care of – perhaps better than the regular folk. Since I believe in Christ, I want to give my surplus to the priests to help the poor. This belief system, perhaps, is an order above the order that we current live in in the church.

The problem is that it is very hard to judge whether or not a person is walking in the pride of his heart. Alma tried to do it and ended up having to excommunicate anyone who wouldn’t stop wearing fine apparel (along with making a mock of his brother, etc.). How would that be implemented in the church today? It seems impossible.

I haven’t thought about family funds for a while. Perhaps we say in our heart and to our children, “everything I have is yours”, so they, as they get older, believe that everything they have is ours. We just don’t believe that we would better off if we amassed our resources together. We believe we would be the one losing out. We don’t trust that others would be following the ‘rules’ and we would get the short end of the stick.