Wisconsin Bureaucrats – ‘Ministers’ or Thieves

Wisconsin Bureaucrats – Ministers or Thieves?

 Hearing about the demands and maneuvering by the members of the public workers’ union in Wisconsin has reminded me of my very recent article discussing the importance of what it means to be a ‘minister’ in civil government. We used to call them ‘public servants’, a term rich in Biblical undertones. Now we usually refer to them as ‘public employees’, ‘government workers’ or similar terms that will eliminate the Christianized edge to the conversation. After all, a ‘public servant’ sounds like someone whose main purpose is to serve, bringing to mind all those Bible texts that promote things like foot washing, going the extra mile, and being the ‘servant of all’. All of these would be subsumed of course under the title of ‘minister’, which is the Biblical term for all public employees – ahem – public servants. It was the term the Apostle Paul used in Romans 13.

 So here we are watching this spectacle of civil ministers trying to figure out how to hold their state hostage to ludicrous demands for more of that root of all evil. The concept of the public servant has long evaporated. Now it is all about cash. Show them the money or they stop washing feet.

 Meanwhile, what they are not pointing out is the sheer corruption of the entire relationship. Here is how it works. These civil ‘ministers’ have organized themselves into a union designed to collectively bargain with the state for various cash and benefits. These employees ‘ministers’ then pay some of that loot back to the unions in the form of union dues. The union then uses the dues money to help elect the very representatives with whom the employees are bargaining.  The upper level elected ‘ministers’ then have cause to demand higher wages since they must stay ahead of those they supervise and to whose demands they have given in. Then they raise your taxes to cover the cost. What else could they do? I can see the shoulders shrugging.

 This is very cozy for all of them. Covetous (tenth commandment) sure. Stealing (eighth commandment) absolutely. Money laundering – yeah probably. And this is exactly where the abandonment of Biblical language, thought and ideals in the public square leads. The ministers have become the mobsters. The church cannot speak to this partly because we have long quit the vision of being a city on a hill and more importantly because our own members are likely out there with signs. The church needed to preach about this marriage of corruption when it began. Now the union is made and its thieving child has matured.

 There was good reason why the first civil servants under Moses were required to be,”able men who fear God, men of truth, those who hate dishonest gain…” (Exodus 18:21). There was recognition from the beginning that financial greed could be the undoing of any civil government. Dishonest gain had to be conscientiously fenced from the public square.

 Our foolish abandonment of principle has brought us to this moment. Now we not only have vast budget deficits to wrestle with nation wide, we also have moral rot built into the heart of the systems. We are finding out why that old path, those old doctrines about civil employees being ministers is irreplaceable.  

 For Christian Culture

 Don Schanzenbach   2-24-11

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