Posted on 04/30/2013 10:51:14 AM PDT by marshmallow
Is this the Franciscan message? On the final Monday of Lent, Mass at Thomas More College was celebrated by one of the monks from St Benedict’s Abbey in Still River. It is always a pleasure to have them here because they celebrate Mass and chant the Latin so beautifully. Beyond this, their homilies are always interesting and stimulating.
The gospel passage on this occasion was about Martha and Mary: Martha tended to the guests and Mary washed Jesus feet with expensive nard, a fragrant ointment. Unusually, (in my experience at any rate), the homily spoke not so much to the contrast between Martha and Mary, but between Mary and Judas. It was the latter who suggested that the money spent on nard would have been better given to the poor. Here was a lesson about allocation of resources. Mary made the right choice, we were told, in choosing Christ even before giving to the poor. Then an even more interesting point was made. There is an equivalent choice facing us today every time we have to decide about having beautiful churches and art, intricate vestments, ornate jewel-studded chalices and so on. Is it right to direct money to these things when there is poverty? The answer is yes when these things, through the liturgy, elevate the souls of the faithful to Christ and this is greater than giving to the poor.
However, in order to understand how this can be so, some additional points must be made. First is that there is a point beyond which spending money on ornamentation of churches would constitute extravagance. But provided that point has not been reached then spending money on that nobler end, it is not asking the poor to make a sacrifice either. The first point is that all of us.....
(Excerpt) Read more at thewayofbeauty.org ...
Put it on eBay........
I have no opinion about the most desirable or appropriate fate of the art but if it’s sold, don’t distribute the money, create an ongoing fund.
Better would be to charge a fee for the tours, and give that to the poor.
The poor will always be with us.
The poor you will always have with you, Mat 26:11
If selling this stuff would cure poverty, then it would be a worthwhile goal. But to sell it merely to give to this generation of poor would be idiocy.
You give a poor man a million dollars and invariably he will be poor again in a very short time. You give a poor man the opportunity to work hard for a decent living and you give him a ticket out of poverty.
Perhaps they should put the poor to work restoring old churches rather than stripping them to the bone and selling off the vestiges to satisfy some temporal misplaced spiritual empathy.
There are rumors that JP II wanted to do this early in his Papacy and he faced what has been variously described as an uprising, a mutiny and a revolt.
Who’s “we”? I have no intention of telling a private organization what to do with its own property.
Mexico is a good example.
I say to look to the Cure”of Ars.Every dime that came in went to his little orphanage for the girls and to the church.Art inspires us and for some souls it is needed.
No. make it available for everyone to see for free. All that art is kind of irreplaceable, and if it is sold into private collections, the poor of the world, and everybody else, will never see it again.
Better plan: Christians who are good at making money from sources that are not one-shot, one-of-a-kind, should support the poor on an ongoing basis.
Once you’ve sold the art, it’s gone. But an ongoing community of believers who create wealth and share it voluntarily can help the poor until Kingdom come, if they want to. And the community needs the spiritual discipline of a lifetime of giving, just as the poor need the help to overcome their difficulties.
And many American “poor” are overweight, ride SUV’s, live in air-conditioned apartments watching sitcoms of flat screen TVs, have food stamps and are single mothers.
The Vatican has about $1.6 Billion in total assets. US government spends $10.6. The Vatican’s money wouldn’t last two hours if spent on the poor.
As it is, the poor can enjoy priceless art, tons of it, either in person at the Vatican or other cathedrals around the world. Sell it off, first it would lose value, but would end up where? At museums, private owners? Most museums charge steep entrance fees, and most private owners don’t let the riff raff into their homes, so it all goes off the grid. Not really a solution.
Not to mention, the USA alone has spent how many TRILLION of DOLLARS to eradicate poverty (War on Poverty) to what avail?
Frankly, I get more than a little tired with these do-gooders who think tossing more $ after causes will eradicate anything much less poverty.
“The poor will always be with us.”
My mother told me once, the poor are poor because of a state of mind. We don’t have money, but the money we do have goes to food and clothing. We’re not poor and we’ll never be poor. Somebody who is really poor will spend their last dime on wine and let their kids starve. There’s nothing you can do to help somebody who is really poor. You could cover them with money and it would all be spent in a month and they’d be back on the street.
I don’t care, but the money would be better spent by investing it in ways that will create jobs for the poor. The thing about charity in general is that it comes and goes, and the recipients, though fed and clothed, are likely to end up just as destitute further down the road. Jobs and economic health offer a future.
Why did you post that to me, it had nothing to do with my post.
I can’t even finish reading something so blasphemous. Christ said: ”the poor we will have with us always....”
This art IS Western Civilization. We might as well blow up the entire world as let the art go - and at least blowing up the world solves the poverty problem.
No, even if it would end poverty forever and cure all diseases, it could not be other than a destructive, heretical goal.
Think how many obamapones for the no-information voters. They probably could get a four-year porn subscription and free condoms too.
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