Brought up an active Catholic, a number of things went wrong in life shortly after being married. Nothing to do with relationship between my wife, Iris, and myself. But I blamed God, either directly or indirectly for what happened. Of course, blaming God for things soon turns into doubt about God, and doubt is then second step into unbelief.

So for next twenty-plus years I found myself without any real belief in God. I was not an atheist. I could not say that God did not exist. But I could not say that he did exist either. For all that time I was really an agnostic. But I continued going to church - just as insurance! In case he did exist. I though I would then be okay. Both a foolish and illogical position, but...

Without any belief in God my values became determined by self interest. I began studying again and then went to university for three years, to read economics. That was followed by a years Postgraduate Certificate in Education to qualify for teaching. I moved into university level teaching and worked for a Master of Philosophy, a research degree. So I became almost totally focussed on my career as an academic.

All that mattered was making a reputation, promotion, publishing learned papers, earning more money and so forth.

After a piece of prolonged research, I felt that I needed a temporary change and knocked-off for a short while. Suddenly, after years and years of having my mind preoccupied in sorting out academic problems of one sort or another, my mind was free. But all these mental problems had been rather like a hand holding a ball down below surface of water - as soon as downward pressure was taken off ball shot to surface. The "ball" was problem of God's existence.

The problem had always been there but I had never allowed it to get in way of all other things to which I had given priority. In Mass one Sunday, one of Scripture readings included Luke 11:9 where Jesus tells his disciples to: "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and door will be opened to you".

It was as if I had never heard this before. Perhaps I never really had. But then, of course, reading went on, because Jesus added that "everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, door will be opened".

It seemed to me that, if God did exist, then these promises should be worth all that they claimed. So I said to God, quite literally: "Okay, I'll take you at your word. I will seek, and ask, and knock. But if I don't find you, it will not be my fault. It will be yours, because you will not have kept your promises. So you will not be able to take me to task for not doing what you wanted".

My first problem was: how do you find God, find whether he exists or not? As a Catholic, first thing that occurred to me was to begin going to Mass each day. I did that surreptitiously, without telling Iris. She had always had a very close relationship with God and I felt a bit self conscious about what I was trying to do.

What else? It occurred to me that I had never actually read Bible through from one end to other. So I decided to do just that. We were coming towards Christmas and when my two sons asked me what I wanted as a present, I told them, "A Bible". They thought it was hilarious that I should want a Bible! I suppose they did not consider me to be quite bible-reading type. But I began reading it at night when everyone else was in bed.

I sometimes had a strange experience in New Testament part. I would read and, although not understanding much of Paul's letters, for example, nonetheless it was as if my mind took over and began to explain to me what I was reading. How that happened, I did not know.

Two and a half years after I had begun this search Iris developed a serious illness: emphysema. Her lungs were filling with fluid and, because of other conditions, doctors could do nothing. They gave her six weeks to live.

For reasons of space, we have to be very concise in this article. By Christian we mean people who put Christ first in their lives as their guiding principle. These are not those who call themselves Christians but who live independently of Body of Christ.

What Is A Capitalist A capitalist is one who owns capital. From an economics perspective capital is not money or finance. Capital is what is used to produce goods or services: machinery, tools, equipment, etc. It used to be said that distinctive feature of a capitalist is that he can wait, in distinction from a worker who cannot wait because what he acquires from his work is what he needs to live from week-to- week or month-to-month.

Labout And Capital To be a capitalist, therefore, one must have means to wait. Mainly this is because goods and services all come into being only through some process of production. And such processes inevitably involve time and therefore waiting. This is initial source of capitalists market power, and inherent cause of labour's market weakness. One sees this power struggle in every industrial dispute, especially when it engages ultimate strategy of strike, when called by labour, or lockout, when called by capitalists.

Capitalists And Markets There is another aspect attached to waiting which is central to question we are discussing. How do capitalists behave within a competitive market environment?

Behaviour is considerably determined by market. His basic objective is to survive. What does his survival depend on? Profits. Without profits he will not continue into long run.

On what do profits depend? There are many parts to this answer, but principle components are efficiency and establishing a market advantage. The latter, in turn, depends on out-thinking and out-performing competitors. That means producing at a high quality level or, what amounts to same thing, a lower real price level.

This takes us to real nub of question we are addressing. Where markets are highly competitive, out-performing competitors is difficult. So long term survival is difficult because every organisation will be pressured into using same most, efficient technology and prices will be competed to levels which produce relatively low levels of profit.