Jubilee, Student Loans, and the Nature of Forgiveness

Post Author: Katie Callaway

On August 24, 2022, President Joe Biden announced his long awaited plan to forgive some student loan debt. It was a promise he made to would-be voters almost three years ago during his campaign. Throughout his presidency, various talking heads and Twitter hot-takers have wondered when he would finally do it. 

Well, he did it, and the reaction was just as predictable as his presidency. 

On one side, commentators and public figures are cursing his name for forgiving student loans, when they had to pay their own student loans back (all the while sitting in offices supported by fully forgiven PPP loans). It’s not fair, they cry. 

On the other side, millennials (hello, YCW) with crushing student loan debt rushed to Twitter to express their disappointment. Ten thousand dollars is just a drop in the bucket. They voted for Biden with hopes that he would do something bigger, sexier, more progressive. It’s not fair, they cry. 

Obviously, there is a vast difference between those on both sides — after all, this is not a “good- people-on-both-sides” kind of article. As with all situations, there is a spectrum of people in between: people who are glad for the drop in the bucket, but hoping this is just the beginning of real change with regard to federal student loans, people who are fearful for what this will do to the economy (hint: it will have very little effect), but also gladly take their $10,000 in forgiveness. 

Biden’s action on student loans once again reveals to us the grip that the Empire has on our souls: Mammon’s influence that inhibits and hamstrings moral action for the sake of our neighbors. Pastors, chaplains, organizers, non-profit workers went to school—taking on student loan debt—to attain a degree that would help us help others. The changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program certainly helps in this regard (and if you haven’t signed up for it, clergy are eligible). However, the student loan crisis that young clergy have experienced is a crisis that carries with it an important responsibility for theological and moral reflection. Young clergy women in particular experience this due to significant limitations and implicit biases in denominational and local church board rooms. 

In the Hebrew Bible, the concept of jubilee is inspiring. In Leviticus 25, we read of the command: “You shall count off seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the period of seven weeks of years gives forty-nine years. Then you shall have the trumpet sounded loud… and you shall hallow the fiftieth year, and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you: you shall return, every one of you, to your property and every one of you to your family.” (NRSVue)  The text goes on to lay out various situations of debt that must be forgiven during the jubilee. What is described—no, commanded—is a radical economic restructuring. An opportunity for reset. A leveling of the playing field. In theory, generational wealth was something that could only be carried so long. We could even conclude from the Biblical text that our forebears in faith believed that God was against the non-stop building of generational wealth and the creation of systemic poverty. Yet, there is little evidence that the Hebrew people ever practiced jubilee. 

We must then ask, why not? 

Was it that the Empire just does not allow for radical moral action—especially when economics are concerned? Perhaps that is what we are seeing today, too. Maybe, like us, the Hebrew people would have had growing excitement and a sense of relief in anticipation of a jubilee only to feel let down and misled when their debts remained. Or what if the powers-that-be also only excused a part of their total debt—a “just-be-thankful” moment that was also incredibly disappointing? 

The fact is that the issue of student loans is a real problem affecting young clergywomen. In a letter last year to the President and Vice President, more than 300 faith leaders presented the grim statistics: “On average, students now enter seminary with about $20,000 in debt and in 2018, Master of Divinity recipients graduated with an average of $54,600 in student debt.” For clergy, who are grossly underpaid to begin with and who often are in jobs that keep us at or below livable wages (all in the name of calling), this means we will likely never entirely pay off our student loans. We will be responsible for paying a tithe–10% of our monthly income (though thanks to this recent announcement, that number appears to be cut in half)—not to the church, but to the Department of Education in worship of the god of Mammon. 

A lot can be said about the student loan crisis; fully capturing the various issues, the culpable parties, and the contributing dynamics is almost impossible. But at the heart of this conversation—as with any discussion of moral public action—are people. Children of God. What do these numbers mean to real people? What might they mean to young clergywomen? 

In some cases, student loans are keeping young clergy women in toxic systems because the pay is decent. 

For several people I spoke with, student loans affect the way pastors can live out their calling: one chose an affordable seminary program over a more desirable program, knowing her calling was not going to afford her an opportunity to pay off loans if she had made the opposite decision. Another is faced with the decision of having to shift attention from her call, taking multiple jobs in order to afford to pay the required amount of her loan. 

Student loans are preventing young clergywomen from pursuing dreams of starting non-profits that could create real progress in their communities. 

Student loans are preventing young clergywomen from buying homes, an expectation many congregations have of their pastors, but more than that, a vehicle of stability for clergy and their families. 

Paying at least 10% of their salary each month is putting a strain on young clergywomen’s abilities to save money; money that could be used to start families, to invest in retirement, to pay for childcare, to care for aging parents, to invest in their communities. The list could go on and on. 

As businessmen rake in their six- and seven-figure checks and regularly find tax loopholes while bemoaning the millennials “whining” about student loans, as politicians and celebrities who rejoiced at the forgiveness of their PPP loans while casting judgment on those who took on debt during the pandemic (looking at you, Dave Ramsey), as the hypocrites open the doors of the kingdom for themselves, I believe that the God who levels mountains is weeping. 

The fact is, it is hard—dare I say impossible—to claim Judeo-Christian values or religion and be against forgiveness of debt. Some might even say, it is harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle.