Turning from the hunger of excess to the balance of life together.
In What is Happening we named the collapse of illusions. In An Invitation to Face Ourselves, we called one another into clarity. In The Distortion of Sacred Wealth, we unmasked how wealth was twisted from a shared good into a personal god. Now we must go further. If distortion is to be overcome, renewal must be chosen.
Human beings have always needed meaning. Wealth was never only material; it has always been symbolic as well. From the earliest hearths where families gathered to share bread and stories to the vast temples and empires that later rose, wealth was not simply food or shelter—it was a sign of what a people held sacred. When shared, it bound communities together. When distorted, it glorified the few at the expense of the many. To renew sacred wealth is to return it to its true purpose: sustaining life in balance, coherence, and common good.
Wealth is not inherently sacred. It becomes sacred only when it sustains life for all. Wealth is bread on the table, water at the well, and a roof strong enough to withstand the storm. At its most basic, wealth keeps fear at bay and secures the home. At its fullest, it creates space for rest, joy, beauty, and culture to flourish. But in both forms, survival and flourishing, wealth only carries sacred meaning when it is held in moderation—enough for all, never in destructive excess.
Coherence shows itself when homes are sustained rather than emptied, when wealth circulates rather than accumulates in vaults, when the earth is honored rather than stripped bare, and when people live without fear of deprivation. This is the sacred pattern of wealth: not an idol to be worshiped, but a rhythm of life where provision is steady, balanced, and shared.
Yet we must also confront the deeper truth: the distortion of wealth was not created only by oligarchs and empires. It draws from impulses woven deep into the fabric of life itself. Evolution taught every species to survive through strategies of competition, dominance, hoarding, and exploitation—even cannibalism. These impulses once served survival in conditions of scarcity and small scale. To compete for resources, to dominate rivals, to store up what one could find—these were advantages when life was fragile and every day uncertain.
But at a planetary scale, with human power multiplied by technology and global reach, those same impulses have become lethal. Competition now devours the very commons on which all depend. Dominance justifies oppression of entire peoples. Hoarding starves whole populations while surplus rots. Exploitation drains the earth past recovery, burning soil, forests, and waters alike. What once secured survival now undermines it. Renewal begins when we name these evolutionary impulses for what they are: instincts that can no longer guide us. They must not be sanctified. They must be countered.
To renew sacred wealth, humanity must take up new practices that reflect coherence rather than distortion. Sharing and sufficiency must replace hoarding so that no one fears hunger or exposure. Moderation and restraint must become virtues so that the idolatry of excess is refused. Community and commonwealth must be rebuilt, with homes and hearths once more at the center of life rather than markets that commodify survival. Sacred vigilance must be exercised, for the old distortions will always seek to return, dressed in new disguises.
This renewal is not charity, nor is it ideology. It is coherence—the recognition that humanity can only endure when wealth sustains the whole body of life. To re-sacralize wealth is to root it again in life itself, to reject impulses that destroy, and to choose balance, moderation, and the common good.
We have already named collapse, faced ourselves, and unmasked distortion. Now comes the harder work: living differently. Renewal is not an idea to affirm but a discipline to embody. It begins when we recognize that wealth is sacred only when it sustains the home of life. Anything else is distortion.
Let us live as keepers of that sacred balance.