Eh, is it even really a gold cross? Looks brass to me. Cheap Catholics and their crazy brass crosses (and starving children).
If you want to be seen as the infallible representative of an omnipotent power you need to look the part. Or, you could have chosen to go the other way.
Do you feel that a thread over a Scumbag Steve macro is warrented? It's just some kid on the internet, not an op-ed from a major newspaper.
Yes. Your post was about disparity. My post was about disparity. Or so I assume that is what you were getting at.
Well then you can say a statement like "Excuse me.....while I take a breath and others a dying"......your logic fails.
The difference is that if the Pope gives up the gold cross, some of the people he's asking to pray for could actually be fed. If Gandhi gave up his books, that wouldn't somehow teach illiterate Indians to read.
The question is, shouldn't the church itself be "poor" and keep its "overhead" to a bare minimum, and re-distribute whatever funds they get to the poorest (or, rather than re-distributing it as donations, "teach the poorest how to fish"), instead of amassing wealth, status symbols, and gold? I don't really see that happening at all. I know that the Catholic church owns A LOT of real estate and shares in various companies, and they get a huge amount of tax money from Germany alone, every year (in 2010 alone, it was 5 billion Euro). The net worth of the Catholic church in Germany alone is at least around 500 billion Euro, and that still doesn't include a lot of stuff like pieces of art, etc. Is it not a legitimate question to ask how that is justified when people in other areas of the world are starving? I know that the church also does a lot of charitable work, but still... Exactly, thanks for spelling it out, I didn't think it would be necessary.
I wasn't commenting on whether or not the vatican should give up their treasures or how many starving children would be fed for how long. I was merely pointing out the difference in the images and the message. I'm torn on the actual subject. The churches I like don't have gold ornaments and don't spend any money on flashy things. I like the Catholic church for different reasons other than spiritual. I love the ceremony, history and tradition of it. I like their charity and outreach as well. I think there are spiritual people in the Catholic churhc that I admire, and always will admire as well.
I think a more appropriate criticism is staving kids and telling people they will go to hell for abortions or birth control. But the only reason I am posting here is the Scumbag Steve hat made me think of this
You don't have to agree, believe, or support a religion to acknowledge or appreciate the good things they do in the world. I would venture to say that outside of the Red Cross and maybe a couple of other large NGO's, that the Catholic church provides more charity outreach and assistance to the world's poor than any other NGO. You can debate the good/bad, mythology, crusades, killings, hatred, etc. spawned by "religion" all you want but that tends to overlook the good that the vast majority of individual religious adherents seek and live. That is why many on here take offense when posters attack and denigrate something that others hold dear. That is why I often find myself defending something I don't even believe.
I don't disagree with you, but the question is, if someone gave me 500 billion Euro, and I would provide assistance to the poor of 100 billion Euro...as long as people don't know exactly how much I have and what I do with the rest of the money, everyone would love me, right? I am wondering - I think there is little to no transparency with regards to how much the people "running" the Catholic church keep as their "management fee", so to speak. No doubt, they do a lot of great charitable work - but if the management fee is higher than what is spent on charitable work, is it really so great?
This is an entirely fair criticism, considering greed was one of the major issues that Martin Luther had with the Catholic church, and helped shape the last 400-500 years of religious and political conflict in the West.
When we were in Catholic High school (many years ago) -- my brother got sent to detention for asking why the church doesn't sell it's priceless artifacts and use the money to feed the poor. The only answer he go was detention for asking the question.
