The organized church [has made] peace with a destructive economy and [has divorced] itself from economic issues because it is economically compelled to do so. . . . No wonder so many sermons are devoted exclusively to "spiritual" subjects. If one is living by the tithes of history's most destructive economy, then the disembodiment of the soul becomes the chief of worldly conveniences.

There are many manifestations of this tacit allegiance between the organized churches and the "economy." . . . [One is] the phrase "full-time Christian service," which the churches of my experience have used exclusively to refer to the ministry, thereby at once making the devoted life a religious specialty or career and removing the possibility of other callings Thus a . . . preacher is a "full-time Christian servant," whereas a . . . farmer, . . . so far as the religious specialists are concerned, must serve "the economy" in his work or in his failure and serve God in his spare time. The professional class is likewise free to serve itself in its work and to serve God by giving the church its ten percent. The churches in this way excerpt sanctity from the human economy and its work just as Cartesian science has excerpted it from the material creation.

Wendell Berry, "God and Country," from What Are People For?