Theology turns out to have something significant to say to our young student and to society more widely. It can help us discover that there are ways to get at the injustice of an indebted society that predate Marx and his many descendants.

The Bramble Cay melomys (Melomys rubicola), is also known as the Bramble Cay mosaic-tailed rat. On Earth, there are over 2,200 rodent species comprising about 40 per cent of all mammal species. What’s one rat?

Debt creates an interdependent relationship between the creditor and the debtor, until the alienation of the latter from the former. Like an addiction, it can lead to alienation from one’s own body.

It is not only when debt is contracted that the ethical dimension is involved, it is throughout the repayment process. The debtor and the lender are not equal. It is not, as we say in economics, a zero sum game. The creditor expects his money to be profitable and to earn interest.

“I tried to raise the point of who was Edward Colston, and why are these people saying the statue needs to come down? I was just floored, basically told to shut up, and that these people protesting were just ignorant and stupid. So, I just sat there crying silently and just feeling ostracised and disappointed because the other students were also not educated. So that’s where some of this began.”

Debt is where dreams go to die. We put aside ‘unnecessary’ things like our hopes of becoming an artist or musician. There are monthly repayments to be made, and so we need to work, and work, until (if we are fortunate) we can retire and enjoy a few years of glorious unproductivity before death.

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Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice · Confines, Wards And Dungeons “Denmark’s a prison”, says Hamlet in Shakespeare’s play. “Then is the world one”, Rosencrantz responds. To which Hamlet replies: “A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons.” The analogy between a given society – or even the world – and… Read more »