THERE IS A LOT TO BE SAID FOR LESS.

The Golden Calf of consumerism demands worship. But, tapping into the wisdom of our faith, noted author Dolores Curran calls us to resist the pull of possessions and the allure of the mall.

Adjacent cars parked outside a supermarket boasted an intriguing pair of bumper stickers. The one on the left proclaimed, "I shop. Therefore, I am." The one on the right responded, "Been there. Done that." These messages sum up the promise and disillusionment of subscribing to a cultural creed that equates happiness and meaning with possessions and pleasures.

Consumerism has been called the religion of capitalism. Even our federal government supports the notion by labeling families "consumer units." From earliest childhood, we are bombarded with messages to buy items we don't need and don't have time to enjoy, messages that promise pleasure, fulfillment, and social acceptance. Children are taught that they should want Furbies, Beanie Babies, Giga Pets, or Tickle Me Elmo dolls for Christmas because they are designated popular toys for a given season, and parents feel obligated to buy them so the child's self-esteem and social standing won't suffer.

Inside the supermarket, alongside the usual bank of shopping carts, we find miniature carts for children bearing poles with the sign "Customer in Training." No surprise that by the time we reach adolescence we are inculturated into believing that the good life is measured more by what we have than by who we are. As we age, we refer to our new cars, computers, and other acquisitions as toys; we buy into the conventional wisdom that we are what we drive, compute, and wear. Then we wait impatiently for the elusive happiness promised.

We are well-programmed to believe in consumerism as the panacea to happiness, the antidote to emptiness, and the entitlement of hard work. It takes a strong person to resist this creed, a counter-cultural person. Those who choose voluntary simplicity as an alternative way of life report that they are regarded as odd, underachieving, and even unpatriotic by friends and family who constantly yearn and work for more goods and pleasures to give meaning to their lives.

In my research on families, I have found that healthy families possess a strong religious core, but it doesn't always mean a strong church affiliation. Rather, it indicates that the family finds its meaning in something other than consumerism: in faith in God, in love for one another, in service to others, in righting injustice, in a cause or movement, or in sharing goods and hospitality.

When a family has no deeper reason for being, pleasure becomes the meaning and purpose of life. When the pleasure in an object or experience wanes, a new object for happiness must be identified. Together, the family saves and works to obtain it, which provides a sense of bonding, but once the new item is acquired and the novelty wears off, the family needs to identify another, and the cycle repeats itself. Jesuit Father John Kavanaugh calls this the "catechetics of capitalism."

It's never enough

We often try to solve our problems by buying. A mother in one of my parenting groups made this startling statement: "We aren't getting along very well in our family so we're thinking of getting a camper van." When questioned, she admitted she had bought into the advertising promise that camping creates happy families, although deep down she knew they would simply take their family problems along with them.

The problem of consumerism as a creed means we must keep upping the ante. Enough is never enough, and soon we are possessed by our possessions. Shopping is the number one cultural activity in America. Accumulation of unnecessary goods has become a habit--even an addiction--as we wring our hands over lack of storage space. What we once considered luxuries we come to regard as necessities, and eventually we become dependent upon the things we acquire.

Consumerism as a way of life demands competition, workaholism, and individualism. When we're bent on acquiring a bigger home, more cars, season tickets, and the latest computers, we work longer hours and spend less time with those we claim to love. For job security and promotion, we compete with fellow workers rather than cooperate with them. It's each person for him- or herself. Dog-eat-dog.

"I can love my neighbor. No sweat," one man said. "But don't tell me to love or help the man in the workplace who's eyeing my job."

How do we reconcile our consumer creed with Christianity? With great difficulty. Jesus does not equivocate when he warns us about the tyranny of possessions: "Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one's life does not consist of possessions."

Jesus goes on to tell the story of the rich man who kept building bigger barns (today's wail: "I need more storage space"), and he ends the passage with: "But God said to him, `You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?'" And Jesus concluded, "Thus will it be for the one who stores up treasure for himself but is not rich in what matters to God" (Luke 12:15-21).

Counter the culture

Consumerism as such is neither negative nor sinful. It's how we regard it and what it replaces that brings it into conflict with our professed beliefs. In his encyclical Centesimus annus, Pope John Paul II says, "It is not wrong to want to live better; what is wrong is a style of life which is presumed to be better when it is directed toward `having' rather than `being,' and which wants to have more, not in order to be more but in order to spend life in enjoyment as an end in itself."

He touches upon the greatest cost of cultural consumerism: It is embraced to fill an emptiness that can only be filled by a loving relationship with God. When this spiritual relationship is attained, we no longer need to search for things to give life meaning or make us happy. We live in a quiet joy of inner peace that no object can supply. Further, this oneness with God extends to those around us. We shine as expressions of God's love to others, a love that reflects upon us and increases our joy.

Mother Teresa noted that although the people she cared for were economically impoverished, she found Americans spiritually impoverished by substituting the "good life" for the Christian life of simplicity, sharing, and caring for one another in love. When we are spiritually impoverished, we try to fill the void with such things as education, work, food, sex, travel, sports, and shopping. Like drugs, these activities numb the emptiness at first, but God is a relentless nag who refuses to allow shallow pleasures to fulfill our hunger for him.

Eventually we become disillusioned with the futility of acquiring more and "I shop. Therefore, I am" degenerates to "Been there. Done that." It's a grace-filled moment, this revelation of the betrayal of consumerism. Kavanaugh writes, "Having faced the dominant gospel of our culture and compared it to the gospel of Christ, we should arrive at a growing recognition that our relation to this culture can be only as people apart.... Persons still yearn to live lives of integrity. They yet yearn for mystery that is not magical but personal. Service still beckons them. They feel the suffocation of a closed materialistic universe, and their pain surfaces in a variety of searches for something and someone beyond."

And who is that someone beyond? The one we call our Father, who loves us so dearly that he wants us to live in joy, not cheap gratification. He sent his son to teach us that we are a people apart. Our very Baptism signifies that we are countercultural because we aspire to higher values than wealth, possessions, power, and prestige.

Where your treasure is

A huge gap exists between the creeds of the cultural consumer and the Christian consumer (see box on this page). The cultural consumer lives by--and is betrayed by--bumper-sticker messages, advertising promises, and a constant search for pleasure. The Christian consumer lives by the word of the Lord, "Do not lay up for yourselves an earthly treasure.... Remember, where your treasure is, there your heart is also."

We are the People of God who profess to care for and share our riches with those who are economically impoverished. Saint Ambrose said, "You are not making a gift to the poor man from your possessions but you are returning what is his." When we understand these words and opt for simple living, loving, giving, and the inner peace that comes only from a deep intimacy with God, we are no longer enslaved by consumerism. We are no longer spiritually impoverished. Then we are free to proclaim, "I believe. Therefore, I am."

RELATED ARTICLE: WHAT THE CHURCH TEACHER

"Meeting fundamental human needs must come before the fulfillment of desires for luxury consumer goods."

--U.S. Catholic bishops, Economic Justice For All

"Superdevelopment, which consists in an excessive availability of every kind of materiel goods for the benefit of certain social groups, easily makes people sieves of `possession' and of immediate gratification.... This is the so-called civilization of `consumption' or `consumerism.' An object already owned but now superseded by something better is discarded, with no thought of its possible lasting value in itself, nor of some other human being who is poorer."

--Pope John Paul II, Sollicitudo rei socialis 

RELATED ARTICLE: CULTURAL VS. CHISTIAN CONSUMERS

Cultural consumers:

* Buy according to want

* Evaluate success on image and possessions

* Identity is closely linked with possessions (I am what I have)

* Treasure the new and novel

* Enjoy shopping as a leisure-time activity

* Find it difficult to discard unused possessions

* Focus on what they don't have and can't afford

* Always have in mind an item that will make them happier

Christian consumers:

* Buy according to need

* Evaluate success on relationship with God and humans

* Identity is based on the true self created by God (I am who I am)

* Treasure the old and familiar

* Shop only when necessary

* Find freedom in discarding unused possessions

* Focus on relationships, nature, faith, family, and sharing

* Seek happiness in inner peace rather than external goods

--DC

Recommended resources:

* Affluenza (PBS documentary on American consumerism, www. pbs.org/kcts/affluenza)

* Following Christ in a Consumer Society by John F. Kavanaugh (Orbis, 1991)

* The Poverty of Affluence by Paul L. Wachtel (NSP, 1983)

* A Life-Giving Vision by John Powell S.J. (Thomas More, 1995)

* When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough by Harold Kushner (Pocket, 1987)

This article also appears as one of three new titles in U.S. CATHOLIC's parish booklet series "Catholic Wisdom." For more information on the series and how to order the booklets see our back-page ad.

By Dolores Curran, a family-life expert and author who lives in Littleton, Colorado.