Jones reportedly stated:
“I do not offer such advice because I think that stealing is a good thing, or because I think it is harmless, for it is neither. I would ask that they do not steal from small family businesses, but from large national businesses, knowing that the costs are ultimately passed on to the rest of us in the form of higher prices. I would ask them not to take any more than they need. I offer the advice with a heavy heart. Let my words not be misrepresented as a simplistic call for people to shoplift. . . . The strong temptation is to burgle or rob people – family, friends, neighbours, strangers. Others are tempted towards prostitution, a nightmare world of degradation and abuse for all concerned. Others are tempted towards suicide. Instead, I would rather that they shoplift. The life of the poor in modern Britain is a constant struggle, a minefield of competing opportunities, competing responsibilities, obligations and requirements, a constant effort to achieve the impossible. For many at the bottom of our social ladder, lawful, honest life can sometimes seem to be an apparent impossibility.”” A heavy heart and light finger.
Jones insisted to critics that his encouragement to shoplift does not break the Bible commandment “Thou shalt not steal” because God’s love for the poor outweighs his love for the rich.
“My advice, as a Christian priest, is to shoplift. I do not offer such advice because I think that stealing is a good thing, or because I think it is harmless, for it is neither. I would ask that they do not steal from small family businesses, but from large national businesses, knowing that the costs are ultimately passed on to the rest of us in the form of higher prices. I would ask them not to take any more than they need, for any longer than they need. I offer the advice with a heavy heart and wish society would recognise that bureaucratic ineptitude and systematic delay has created an invitation and incentive to crime for people struggling to cope.”
The police and the British Retail Consortium and a local MP take a different view. A spokesman for North Yorkshire Police said: ‘First and foremost, shoplifting is a criminal offence and to justify this course of action under any circumstances is highly irresponsible.”
Jones previously attracted national attention in May 2008 by forcing a shop to stop selling Playboy stationery aimed at youngsters as “cynical and wicked.”
Still, the encouragement to commit a crime is a bit new from the pulpit. The Bible left out that part of the story when Jesus helping himself to a few pieces of bling bling when throwing out the shop keepers from the Temple.
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