Nag, Nag, Nag

"Finally I made my choice. I would give my place in the boat to someone in the water, and I would see what it was like to swim for a while instead of sailing. If it turns out that Hardin is wrong after all - if there really is room enough in the boats - then if I'm still around when the others have gotten in I'll be glad to get back in too. I don't want to die. I would be glad to live in God's world. But if Hardin is right... Well, a lot of dark faces disappeared while I sat in the lifeboat. Maybe God will call this white face to join them."
Zack's voice was soft as he ended, hardly to be heard. He did not look at the other man now. And in the quiet moment that washed over the two of them there the Pastor paused, too, thinking that there were not many in his congregation like this man. Nor did he easily think of anything to say, though he had no question at all about the direction which his remarks should take. But he knew he had to say something, and so, after the pause, he said, "Zack, I wouldn't for the world want to say or do anything that would dampen your zeal for the Lord, nor, for that matter, to question the seriousness of the problem you're tackling. It does seem to me, though, that we need to combine zeal with God-given wisdom and knowledge. Could we agree on that for a start?"
Zack said yes, he could, and that in fact was why he was attracted to Hardin, although his choice differed from Hardin's in the end.
"Well then, frankly," the Pastor continued, "doesn't it seem to you that you could do the poor of the world more good by seeing to it that you stay in shape to live out your normal life and to work in the normal way, giving a part of your income over many years to the relief agencies, rather than giving so much now that soon you won't be able to work at all and maybe even die prematurely?"
Zack looked at him and said, "I don't know. Do you think I could?"
"I've got no doubt of it at all." As he said it he thought to himself that maybe this simple observation was all that Zack needed. But as soon as he had that thought he had a second one, more doubtful.
"I've thought about it a lot," Zack began. "I thought of it myself, of course, before I really cut down. And people at the office have suggested it, and Mr. Pencewaite, and now you. But I still don't know. You see, if I died somebody would move into my job, and he'd leave a vacancy and someone would move into that, and so on. Maybe at the bottom of the line somewhere someone would get a job which would make the difference in his surviving. And if I die I'll be leaving a part of the world's food and resources-the part I'd consume if I lived - for someone else. On the other hand, maybe the poor would be better off if I stayed around. I really don't know.
"One thing, though. I think it would be suspicious if the people who decided who should live and who should not were deciding about their own case, too - especially if they generally decided that it would be better for the world if they themselves were to live. A Christian, anyway, has to remember how deceitful and wicked the human heart is. Sometimes I want a good meal so much that it just seems incredible to me that I could work out that computation in any unbiased way. If I had to depend on that I might just as well give up and order myself a big steak. It would be better if there were someone else, maybe in the church, someone we could trust, and who would make the judgment about us."
The Pastor moved a little. He was about to speak but Zack went on, not noticing him.
"I know you've just said that you think it would be better for the world if I lived. I hope you won't mind if I say that doesn't help me very much." And here Zack looked at the Pastor and then looked quickly away. "It's because you... well, you say it too quickly. You say it right off, as soon as the subject comes up. And that makes me think you don't say it because you know something about me and those other people and have thought a lot about what each of us contributes to the world. I think you say it mostly because we're friends and I'm a member of the congregation here and you love me."
Zack paused momentarily, and then went on.
"Or look at it this way. Is there anyone at all in our church to whom you would say that he should give up his place in the lifeboat so some black African could live? Maybe there is, but I don't think so. I don't imagine your saying that to anyone we know. I think you'd talk to everyone else in our church just as you talk to me. And, you see, it would seem to me if anyone claimed that it was better for the world as a whole for everyone here to have good food and plenty of clothes and a nice house and so on, while a lot of people starve in other parts of the world. It would seem odd to suppose that all the people here did the world so much more good than so many people elsewhere."
Zack shifted now in his chair and waited. But the Pastor did not speak, because in at least one thing Zack was right. He too could not imagine himself saying to any member of his congregation that he or she should starve so that some African might live.
Finally Zack went on.
"Anyway, that's what I come to when I follow that line of thought. But also, I'm not sure that whole line of thought, a sort of utilitarian adding up of the benefits and costs, is the right way to go about it. Most of the time, I guess, I think I ought to just go by what is right and fair and just, and leave the benefits and losses up to God. When I think that way I ask myself whether I have more right to a good dinner or a second suit of clothes than does any one of thousands and thousands of people who don't have those things. And I don't think of any reason to suppose I do have more right to things like that. I suppose I'm better educated than most of those people, maybe I'm even smarter than many of them, and maybe I've got the edge on them in some other way, too. But it doesn't seem like those things give me any special right to the things that are scarce. And that seems to me a lot firmer than any computation of what would do the world the most good."
"Do those other people have more of a right than you have?" the Pastor asked.
"No, I can't see that they do. But if we have equal rights and there isn't enough for both of us, it doesn't seem odd to me to think that a Christian might lean a little bit to the short side for himself. When it's a matter of a massive famine that will mean, of course, going below the line."
The two men did not part easily that night, for they respected each other. Before their visit was ended each one loved the other more than he had before. But when Zack finally left to go home the Pastor knew that he himself had failed.