We live in a culture dominated by money, it is not just the prize in every contest, the goal of every agenda, it is the weapon and tool used to bring about every outcome, the rationale for every thought.

Just think, everyone always knew that election campaigns were really waged with dollars, but it was always done clandestinely, acknowledged with a wink and a nod, a secret the insiders were perfectly aware of but the rest of us just referred to with exasperation, futility and guesswork. Today, the amount of money accumulated by candidates and the donors and contributions they command is gleefully reported by the press, proudly boasted by the politicians, and declared by the courts as constitutional freedom. Institutionalized bribery has become accepted as how we select our leaders and determine national policy, and we are forging our election laws and even how we perceive governance as a system for raising and channeling cash.

Persuasion can be bought, and coercion can be financed. I suppose its always been that way; but in the past, at least we were ashamed of it, and made every effort to hide it. Today it has become the primary ethos of our civilization. It has finally come out of the closet. We are proud of our corruption, and devise formal philosophies and ideologies to justify and celebrate it.

We are no longer a society of rulers, warriors, priests, merchants, craftsmen and workers. We are now a civilization of money-changers, from the obscene, bloated puppet masters at the top, to their wretched, twitching victims on the bottom. The hoard of money we control (not even the wealth we actually possess) is how we are judged as citizens, yea, even as human beings. It is what determines our position and our worth, and those who do not join single-mindedly in the pursuit of Mammon are lavished with disdain, contempt, and even violence.

I can see now why Jesus had to cast the money-changers from the Temple. They were worse than the Romans.