Banking in Sarajevo

Oh what a week. I have been in the ministry 19 years. I preached the Sundays following the start of The Gulf War, 911 and The Iraq War. I have spoken at many funerals, some of which were very difficult. But I don't think I have ever been as anxious about my words as I am today. I suspect the reason for this is that the economic meltdown that we have been experiencing over the last year or so is not some distant disaster that we get to safely watch on T.V. This is happening right here and the present and future impact is likely to reach us all.

Charlotte is the home to both Bank of America and Wachovia. [My spellchecker is telling me this isn't a word. I hope it's wrong...] Banking has always been a mystery to me. But judging by the houses around here, it must be a lucrative mystery. When I was growing up in Clear Lake, Iowa, there were four banks in our town of 7,000 permanent residents. Of these, I think only one still carries the same name. It is Clear Lake Bank and Trust. As a kid, I learned that the bank was "owned" buy one of the prominent families in our town. I always thought this must be a mistake. How could anyone own a whole bank? Years later, I moved to the High Country of North Carolina and watched three or four brand new banks being built at the same time. This was in addition to the five or six that we already had. Each of the buildings were nicer than most all of the other buildings in Boone. I often wondered where they got the money to build them. Did they borrow it from themselves?

Most recently, I have noticed that people don't much work in banks anymore. They work in banking. If I go to the bank closest to my house, I have to wait for a long time in a single line while one or maybe two agents work the counter and the drive through at the same time. Meanwhile, many many people who live in Charlotte work in what is called "the banking industry." These are the people that I care about because I have actually met some of them and I know them by name. I don't want them to lose their jobs.

I understand that people outside the United States can purchase stock in publicly-traded U.S. companies. I understand that foreign governments as well as private and public entities within this country have a great deal invested in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Things have changed a lot since Clear Lake Bank and Trust was owned by a single family.

You can see now why I am a bit anxious about my words. I just don't know much about what is going and this makes me nervous because I don't know how to help my friends or myself. I noticed the president took a couple of minutes today to tell the American people that he canceled his travel plans to "keep a close watch" on the markets. But I don't even know what that means. Is there something he might be able to do to help my friends here in Charlotte? If so, that would be great because I think helping them would help me too.