After The Gold Rush

You can watch a BBC documentary entitled 'Cash Britain' here.

The documentary looks at what is happening on the ground in the UK as pawnbrokers, knowing that the price of gold has escalated upwards sharply in recent times advertise that desperate customers can get cash for their gold, as your average Joe tries to make ends meet at a time of rising costs.

I'd like to know where all this gold goes once the public have been fleeced into selling it in exchange for paper money which could soon be worthless. China? The vaults of central banks?

Personally, I've seen, here in Brighton, an explosion of advertisements, stores and even stands in and around Brighton station of dealers advertising to buy your gold. I expect that investors somewhere are buying it all up because the dollar's days are numbered - they know a storm is coming. There are even stands in the station distributing envelopes in which you can send your gold to companies who will send you cash in return.

Pawnbrokers are not the only ones making money off the back of the plight of the poor, however. Voracious and rapacious new companies are selling loans at a interest rates which exceed 400% interest.

One company, Wonga. The owners of Wonga, who apparently advertise in commercial breaks of the Jeremy Kyle Show on ITV, have made £50 million through giving short term loans to cash strapped families at exhorbitant interest rates.

The Church's condemnation of usury has been, since Her beginning, stark and plain. Popes down the ages have issued warnings against the practise of usury - lending money at interest.

Since 1830, the year in which the Vatican turned to NM Rothschild and Sons for a hefty loan, the Church's proclamations on usury have been quieter and softer, acknowledging that in a new financial system, a new approach is required.

The truth, however, does not change even if, on this issue, the hands of Holy Church and indeed the whole world were tied long ago.