A reflection on the second-richest person on earth



This is Warren Buffett, nicknamed the "Oracle of Omaha" for his investing prowess. He is currently worth about $44 billion US dollars. He could stay in a 5-star hotel and drink Dom Perignon every day for the rest of his life. He is 75, so that probably won't be more than 2 decades, but still, he is rich.

However, he is giving practically all of it away. He recently committed to giving $37 billion worth of stock in his company, Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A BRK.B), to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Most of the other $7 billion, he will give away at his death. He lives in the same house in Omaha he bought in 1958 for $31,500. His annual salary is $100,000 - not even loose change by the standards of corporate America. The license plate on his old Lincoln Town Car was "Thrifty". He has almost always been an unpretentious man. He did buy a couple of corporate jets for his company, perhaps against his better judgment (he later called the plane "the indefensible"), and he does drink 5 cans of cherry coke a day. But, we can allow an old, rich man some minor vices.

Jesus commended an old woman for giving 2 copper coins at temple, which was all she had. How much more he demanded of the rich, asking a rich young man to sell all he had and give to the poor. When you have wealth, it's very hard to give it up. But, indeed, we are called to do so. There are Christians who point to Jesus' comment that "the poor you will always have with you" as an excuse not to do everything they can to alleviate poverty. To put it bluntly, these Christians are blind, perhaps wilfully blind. We may always have the poor with us. This means that we must never stop advocating and acting for meaningful solutions to poverty, and we must give of our wealth to the poor in our own communities and in more needy ones. Whether you are a conservative Evangelical or a progressive Christian, the social implications of the gospel - the injunction to aid the poor and the oppressed in every way possible - cannot be ignored. From the Mishna (Jewish oral law), Rabbi Tarfon says, "It is not up to you to completethe work (of perfecting the world), but neither are you free to refrain from doing it."