Religion wealth and poverty the need for world development.

GCSE Religious Studies (Philosophy & Ethics)

Neel Joshi Religious Education Coursework

Religion Wealth and Poverty

The need for world development

In the world today there are two types of countries. There are the more developed countries (MDC’s) such as the USA and the UK. Then we have the less developed countries (LDC’s) such as Bangladesh and Mali. There are also countries in the middle that are either struggling to get out of poverty or have suffered damages and losses. These two extremes outline the need for world development.

Countries are becoming less developed for many reasons.

Countries are being hit with natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. An example of a country suffering from this type of threat would be Bangladesh as it is in an area that is prone to heavy floods every year.
Countries can also be split up and broken down by wars. As we look at the current situation in Pakistan and India. These two already poor countries are on the verge of war and on the verge of completely destroying their own economy and people.
Many less developed countries suffer from debt. This is where they have borrowed money from the more developed countries to build or farm crops and have not yet paid their amount off. The interest on the money is ridiculously high and this ensures the country will virtually never get out of the red.
To get money into the less developed countries they need to sell products grown in their land to the more developed countries around the world. For example the UK buys most of its tea from India. India has taken up land to feed the British rather than the starving people in its own country.
There are also problems of health, too many children, lack of education etc., which prevent the country from developing.

To overcome these problems the world needs to be interdependent and help and sometimes rely on each other rather than using each other for slavery, business and money. Once the world is working together it will be a much better place to live.

Christian Teachings on Wealth and Poverty

Christians have many teachings on wealth and poverty and I am not able to show them all in one piece of coursework, so I will analyse the key beliefs and use these.

Wealth

Christians believe that Money should be used only for good. This means that you spend ...

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Christian Teachings on Wealth and Poverty

Christians have many teachings on wealth and poverty and I am not able to show them all in one piece of coursework, so I will analyse the key beliefs and use these.

Wealth

Christians believe that Money should be used only for good. This means that you spend your fairly earned money on good things rather than evil things, in other words do not buy drugs or bombs or any other things that may do harm to yourself or another being.

They also believe that worshiping evil can lead to evil. This means that if you were to do an evil deed or thing you will end up being evil yourself. So the best thing is to stay pure and not to give in to evil.

Poverty

Christians believe that they must help the poor whenever they can and that the poor should have an equal start in life as they have had. This means that if you were a Christian you must try to help out the poor at least once in your lifetime, this could be by either donating money or donating clothes.

Christians also believe that you should not be selfish. This could also be related with one of the 10 commandments, which read, “Love thy neighbour” this basically means to respect each and every person on gods earth.

There are also Bible quotes that back up the points raised in this section of the coursework. Please refer to John 3:17 to 3:18 and James 2:14 to 2:17 in any the Bible.

Muslim Teachings on Wealth and Poverty

Muslims believe that god for benefit of humanity gives wealth. Sharing wealth is not optional. This means that the Muslims think that they have wealth because god wants them to have good humanity.

Wealth and Poverty

Zakah means that you must give some money to others, because it purifies the money and no harm can then come from it. This means that to be sure that all of their money is free from evil they must give some to charity or another good cause.

Muslims pay annually 2.5% of their income to be sure that the rest of their money is not evil. They also pay Zakah at the festival of Id ul ‘Fit’l. They must also give interest free loans.

Muslims go to the Mosque and they must also pay Zakah, helping the poor Muslim families and poor countries. This shows that they are caring for the poorer people that are not as well of as they are. They also carry out this process to rid the money of evil as well.

The work of a religious agency working for world development

For this particular section of my coursework I have chosen to use Christian Aid as my subject.

Christian Aid is a non-profit organization (charity) that is working for world development. Despite the name Christian Aid they do help other non-Christian countries to develop and make the world a better place. They are currently carrying out missions in India and Africa.

A man called Bob Finley, who has completed 53 years of ministry as an evangelist, pastor, missionary, Bible teacher, and Christian statesman, started Christian Aid in 1947. During those years he has travelled over 4 million miles and has preached “face to face” over 20 million people. Additional people have heard his messages through radio, television, films and videos. His published articles have touched thousands of lives and played a major role in changing the methodology, and direction of Christian missions throughout the world.

Christian Aid up to today have been a great help to over 20 billion people all over the globe. They preach to millions of people through many means be it radio or face to face. They describe their own work as “Christian Missions”. They hand out aid to the less fortunate and help them gain control of their lives again. They have chosen to develop the world in a different way to other missionaries, they do not go to poor countries and build houses and give them water but they go and help the country be teaching the population how to read and write and how to learn using various means. They build schools and learning centres they give them the chance to learn so that they are able to become somebody in life. As they do these good deeds they also spread preaches and prayers that Bob Finley once spread.

“There should be no rich as long as there is poverty in the world.”

I agree and disagree with this quote for different reasons.

I think that if a person has earns their money and wealth in a fair and honest way then they have the right to spend it as and when they wish. Although I think that if you do have little money spare you should donate a small amount to charity. As long as the better off understand that there are millions of people who are not as wealthy as they are and donate some money to them I think it is fair to say that there can be rich and poor in the world. Many religions would disagree with this quote as they have both rich and poor believing in the same god. It would be biased for a poor person to agree with the quote and a rich person to disagree.

On the other hand I do agree with the quote because the world would be a much better place if the world shared its wealth with all countries and people alike. There would be no LDC’s and MDC’s all countries would be interdependent with each other. The starving would no longer be hungry and the homeless will no longer have no place to stay. There would be no superior western hemisphere compared to the east. But yet again this would be and impossible and unrealistic conclusion to draw as the chances of this fairy tale coming true is slim to none.

As a conclusion I can say that I agree with the quote knowing that it will possibly never happen or until I become rich. There are so many argumentative cases that this questions holds that if it were to come true I don’t think that world would live in harmony as either way someone somewhere is losing out. It seems that it is “every man for himself” and that is the way it will be.

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