Column on student debt for Alton Telegraph on line

I pray the Lord’s Prayer daily. As a Presbyterian, we use the Matthew version of the prayer, so one of the petitions is “forgive us our debts, s we forgive our debtors.” Usually we spiritualize or at least apply this to emotional wounds. Still, the word was deliberately chosen, as it is different than the word Luke chose in the shorter version of the prayer. Debt is a financial term. It is directed toward people who were often facing crushing debt burdens. perhaps the few who were owed large sums heard it and responded.

I ask readers to consider if we should apply the words of the Lord’s Prayer to the issue of debt in our country. In particular, how should we respond to the crushing debt young people carry in order to carry on their educations. This applies to public institutions as well as private ones. When I was a student in the late Dark Ages, the state provided more than one half of the funding for the University of Maryland. That figure, has dropped to less than one fifth. The burden is left on the student.People may look with nostalgia at a time when one could work through college, the enormous basic costs of present could only permit that memory to live if a student took ages to finally finish a degree.

Many of the high debt costs are due to interest rates at the time of the time in college.Even bankruptcy does not forgive the loans. These loans are large and crushing. Soon, the amount of college loans will exceed our unconscionable credit card debt, as we move inexorably past the trillion dollar mark. I do appreciate the idea of the moral value in paying one’s bills. Still, the Constitution recognizes bankruptcy protection to get a fresh start. ((Remember we still had debtors prisons for the bankrupt).

I would ask us to consider easing the burden of college loans by collectively sharing them. We could consider pushing for a law to ease, if not forgive, the debts of students.
After all, we have forgiven the debts of foreign nations, often corrupt ones. In the developing economy, college seems to be a necessity for many positions. For people going into graduate or professional school, the numbers reach dizzying, if not nauseating heights. Even with scholarships. a good liberal arts college may well require 1000,000 dollars from the student for four years. I know of precious few part-time jobs that can generate that sort of income.

It is obvious that we need to get more money circulating in this sluggish economy. A large part of the income of younger people is shifted directly into college loan payments. In part, young people have to put their independent lives on hold as they cannot afford a decent apartment or even considering saving for a home, as a large percentage of their income pays student loans.

The American Dream will continue on the wings of education, but it is impeded if we place the burden on the backs of young people. Instead of speaking of future debt burdens due to our share in the budget deficits, we could act decisively and for the current crisis in helping out people being squeezed by a system over which they have no control.

The usual word for forgive in the Greek New Testament is aphiemi, literally not to hold on to, or to let go, release. Student loan forgiveness, or even partial release could help energize this economy for the young. Socially, we know that education is still the ladder for personal achievement in this country, as generation after generation has shown. We cannot shackle the dreams of this generation to the sinking weight of student loans.