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“In neoliberal society, the capitalist market is no longer imagined as a distinct arena where goods are valued and exchanged; rather, the market is, or ideally should be, the basis for all of society.” Politics is no longer primarily a negotiation of where the line between public and private falls (as in classical liberalism), for neoliberalism “works to erase this line between public and private and to create an entire society – in fact, an entire world – based on private, market competition. … Consequently, contemporary politics take shape around questions of how best to promote competition.”

“Significantly, God in Genesis 1 pronounces the rest of creation "good" before humanity is created. The psalmist and the prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel can speak of mountains, trees, sun, and moon praising God. Unlike an office complex or gymnasium, which have no value if people do not inhabit them, creation can glorify and bring God delight apart from human presence.”

“What worries some people about consumption (and I confess at the outset to be one of these ambivalent creatures, fat but troubled in paradise) is that the affluent, technologically advanced West seems more and more focused not on consuming to live but living to consume. The problem with consumption, and the consumer capitalism that has pushed it to feverish historical extremes, is that it has become so all-consuming.”

“It was only in the late nineteenth century and then the twentieth century, with the maturation of consumer capitalism, that a shift was made toward the cultivation of unbounded desire. We must appreciate this to realize that late modern consumption, consumption as we now know it, is not fundamentally about materialism or the consumption of physical goods. Affluence and consumer-oriented capitalism have moved us well beyond the undeniable efficiencies and benefits of refrigeration and indoor plumbing.”