Arts & Humanities Journal

Title: ACCOUNTANTS, ECONOMISTS AND NEEDLES

Abstract:

Accountants may find the journey through the eye of a needle hazardous, since they are implicated in wealth creation. Although there is evidence of a theological critique of economics and the world of business, there seems zero supply or demand for extending this to accountancy. There have been some attempts to provide such broad definitions of religion that virtually everything is included, and in this vein accountancy would be included. However this is a skewed and misleading use of language. In a 'secular' age there remains residual use of religious language, which occasionally infiltrates accountancy, but only in general metaphorical terms, and never with reference to the essence of accounting. As notions of corporate governance are applied to religions, accountancy has an inevitable role to play, as it does in the accounting for religions. This is the impact of accounting on religions. What is difficult to divine is any realistic theologising on accountancy.