# Does any major branch of Christianity still consider usury a sin? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 20, 2004, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291 "2004-10-20T22:07:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Hamish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a5b964/32.png) [@Hamish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hamish)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/21 "2004-10-22T22:26:19Z")
Thanks **BrainGlutton** , **yBeayf** , and **chukhung** for the information on religion and usury. So now I know that the founders of the Protestant churches expressed reservations about usury without actually condemning it (according to **chukhung** ’s website), and the Orthodox church is opposed to it in principle but realizes it can’t eradicate the practice. The two questions I have now, then:[ul][li]Did Catholic dogma change – or have they simply come to the conclusion, like the Orthodox church, that it’s inevitable?[/li][li]For **yBeayf** , are devout members of the Orthodox church discouraged from becoming bankers?[/ul][/li] And **Fear Itself** , I have to admit it was the divergeant attitudes on homosexuality and usury that inspired this thread. There was a time when they were condemned equally, and often in the same breath. One attitude apparently changed, and the other didn’t. I wondered why. I decided not to bring it up because I wanted the thread more focused. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/22 "2004-10-22T22:47:39Z")
> [@](#): > > For yBeayf, are devout members of the Orthodox church discouraged from becoming bankers? It certainly wouldn’t be encouraged, but if the person were doing relatively harmless forms of usury, like managing people’s savings accounts, or helping people get home mortgages at a fair price, there wouldn’t be much problem. Something like running a pawn shop or an EZ-Loan While-U-Wait would be heavily discouraged, I would think. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2004, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/23 "2004-10-22T22:51:54Z")
[QUOTE=Hamish] [list][li]Did Catholic dogma change – or have they simply come to the conclusion, like the Orthodox church, that it’s inevitable?[/li][/QUOTE] Can’t put my hands on it right now, but I think I read in Bertrand Russell’s _History of Western Philosophy_ that the Catholic Church opposed usury until it got into a position to be a moneylender in its own right (the Templars may have had something to do with that), and after that doctrine changed and non-payment of debts became a very serious sin. ---
**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2004, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/24 "2004-10-23T05:48:46Z")
Just a thought: > [@](#): > > Now another point. There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest – what we call investment – is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong… But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life. – C.S. Lewis ---
**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2004, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/25 "2004-10-23T05:54:37Z")
Whoops, the full quote from _Mere Christianity_ runs as follows: > [@](#): > > There is one bit of advice given to us by the ancient Greeks, and by the Jews in the Old Testament, and by the great Christian teachers of the Middle Ages, which the modern economic system has completely disobeyed. All these people told us not to lend money at interest: and lending money at interest – what we call investment – is the basis of our whole system. Now it may not absolutely follow that we are wrong. _Some people say that when Moses and Aristotle and the Christians agreed in forbidding interest (or “usury” as they called it), they could not forsee the joint stock company, and were only thinking of the private moneylender, and that, therefore, we need not bother about what they said. That is a question I cannot decide on. I am not an economist and I simply do not know whether the investment system is responsible for the state we are in or not. This is where we want the Christian economist._ But I should not have been honest if I had not told you that three great civilizations had agreed (or so it seems at first sight) in condemning the very thing on which we have based our whole life. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2004, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291/26 "2004-10-23T15:42:15Z")
> [@Hamish](#): > > Thanks **BrainGlutton** , **yBeayf** , and **chukhung** for the information on religion and usury. > > So now I know that the founders of the Protestant churches expressed reservations about usury without actually condemning it (according to **chukhung** ’s website), and the Orthodox church is opposed to it in principle but realizes it can’t eradicate the practice. > > The two questions I have now, then:[ul][li]Did Catholic dogma change – or have they simply come to the conclusion, like the Orthodox church, that it’s inevitable?[/li][/ul] I have done a search of the [online-searchable Cathechism of the Catholic Church](http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc.htm) English Version, and “usury” does not even appear, and “usurious” appears twice – both times as a qualifier for what in the civil sphere we would call “abusive clauses” in contracting: i.e. transactions that are ruinous for the party at a disadvantage. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-any-major-branch-of-christianity-still-consider-usury-a-sin/270291.md?page=1)