Vatican Billions

August 21, 2006

[quote name='Budge' post='1047305' date='Aug 21 2006, 01:07 PM']
The Virgin of Guadalupe, is just an updated version of the pagan Aztec goddess Tonantzin.
[/quote]
You have no idea :lol:

August 21, 2006

The Virgin Mary is the polar opposite of that demon god which demanded human sacrifice.

I think it's great the Christ was able to take all their misplaced devotion and worship to a demon and teach them to be devoted to his Mother and to worship Him.

August 21, 2006

So if your not protestants what are you, or rather, what do you 'classify yourselves as'.
I too condem any thing that uses any religion for greed etc
I can't make sense of your point #3. The language just aint workin for me.
Some priests were not priests all their life. Example: My pastor has a 50 inch flat screen and surround sound and drives around in a jaguar. He was in the military and worked for the government before his wife died and he became a priest. He gets a pension and has money from his past life. But for the most part priests live VERY modestly and get very little. Easy for you to sit and point ur finger.....
I don't know where you're getting your information about "lavish vacations"

The pope has a popemobile if thats what you mean about brand new cars- and thats to keep him from getting shot. Likewise the body gaurds.
Benedict is by no means traveling as much as JPII. And his traveling was not vacationing. It was going out to meet the faithful and the people that made up the church that he was head of. It was not 'I'm pope so I'll tour the world now for the heck of it'. But in your narrow view of things............

The Pope has his own money. If he wants to spend it on prada let him. Personally I'd rig up the Papal appartment with an xbox 360, an internet connection, subscription to xbox live, and a home theater kit.... but thats just me. Is he now the devil in your all authorative eyes because he likes fashion?

Likewise- because he takes a vacation? As do alot of people.

The castle is church property and has been for idk how long. Might as well use it. Its not like he's going and staying at Tides in Miami beach for how many thousand a night.

Get over it. Lets talk about doctrine and what matters- not what kind of sunglasses the Pope is wearing.

August 21, 2006

[quote name='stbernardLT' post='1046760' date='Aug 20 2006, 01:17 PM']
Wow, I know we don't have protestants talking about making money through religion. I think we've all seen TBN. I know pastors around here that are filthy rich (blessings from God) eventhough most of them set their own salary. They collect W2 from parishioners and make them feel horrible if they can't meet the tithe every month. While they flash, the fancy cars, houses, and jets. I've never read about one of the followers of Christ living so extravagant in the bible. Our priests make close to nothing and our pope lives in a little apartment, but we are rollin in the dough. It seems to me like someone has a beam stuck in their eye.

How about the "Mega Churches". Forty thousand people at one time. Now that is some cash mister Olstein. Forget about the fact that there is no possible way to make sure all the spiritual needs of 40,000 people are being met, let's past the tray (or should I say dump truck).

Our priests take a vow of poverty, what do your pators take, a vow of prosperity. Even if they have families to support, they are still abusing their leadership role.
[/quote]
:clap:

August 21, 2006

[quote]
Both of you come out of the protestant tradition, and thus are accurately labeled as existing within Protestantism. But whatever. [/quote]

Sorry I don't.

And you know what I am HOW?

Not one memember of my "ekklesia" has EVER protested Rome.

[quote]Our priests make close to nothing and our pope lives in a little apartment,[/quote]

Little apartment? Have you EVER been to Rome and the Vatican? I have. That little apartment is bigger than most aparment complexes, furnished with umpty million dollars of artwork. Not to mention the entire CASTLE that he has for summer vacation.

[img]http://www.nathanhuber.com/blog/archives/papal%20apartments.jpg[/img]

Just a little hallway ceiling....

[img]http://www.cs.unm.edu/~aaron/images/europeweb/VaticanPapalApartmentsChamb.jpg[/img]

[url="http://www.castelgandolfo.org/Sito/Entra%5FIn%5FComune/Link/Guida_turistica/html_ing/ville_pontificie_ing.htm"]THAT LITTLE NOTHING OF A SUMMER HOME -> CLICK HERE[/url]

Edited August 21, 2006 by Eutychus

August 21, 2006

[quote name='Eutychus' post='1047451' date='Aug 21 2006, 04:02 PM']Not one memember of my "ekklesia" has EVER protested Rome.[/quote]That's funny. I thought that the majority of your church members were ex-Catholics.

August 21, 2006

I am still trying to figure out why it is always assume that the Catholic Church exploited people to get money, wealth, and works of art.

:idontknow:

I know plenty of people who give things to thier churches, donate money, and who are superb artists that do not mind beautifying thier house of worship.

Maybe you two can give a response to that.

August 21, 2006

[color="#CC0000"][b]In the course of this discourse, I have resorted to insult, and have become rather annoyed, forgive me, I have been stretched taut, and have broken. [/b] [/color]

Mat 19:21 Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be perfect, go, sell your possessions, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me."

But without money, one cannot mount a mission. If you sell everything to give to the poor you won't even have a Bible. ... Nor equipment to place on street corners. The Catholic Church does things in a bigger way, but who can say that the treasures of the Vatican, such as the Sistine chapel, and its works of art would be better off in private hands rather than on public display. If a Christian were in charge of what the city owns, would he sell off the library to feed the poor? What about the art museums? Governments and established religions both serve a useful function in preserving art works that feed the mind of the population, and selling them off to feed stomachs will provide only temporary relief to hunger, with a permanent loss of historical and beautiful artwork from public view. [Presumably, if money were obtained from selling the artwork, some non-Christians would have to buy it, as no Christian could own it; therefore you would be depending on the money from non-Christians to feed the poor.]

By the way, we can't discuss real estate holdings of the Church, because an institution with, according to the Annuario Pontificio, 1.114 Billlion people world wide. Angelo Cardinal Sodano, released the yearbook, which state that in, 2001, the number of priests declined by 111 compared to the previous year. However the number of seminarians increased 1.5% in the same period, which Africa and Asia making a disproportionately large contribution. On the whole, the number of people committed to pastoral activities of the Catholic Church are 4,270,069, distributed so: 4649 bishops, 405,067 priests (of which 266,448 diocesan), 29,204 permanent deacons, 54,970 monks and friars, 792,317 nuns, 31,512 members of secular institutes, 139,078 laic missionaries, and 2,813,252 catechists. To the number of active nuns, one must also add 51,973 nuns who have chosen a contemplative life. These statistics aren't precise, they may be slightly higher and lower today, since they are from 2001.

These people need a place to live, and facilities to practices their ministry and functions in. Not to mention that their are 219,655 parishes. 1.114 billion people need 219,655 Churches to practice their faith in. Not to mention residencies for clerical or religious members of the Church.

Vatican Assets are not entirely known, now understand the difference between assets and the budget. Vatican assets are estimated at a range from $1.5 billion to $15 billion and more. They include works of art and buildings which for the most part cannot be sold. Large parts of the Vatican's assets are in securities and gold reserves. Additional assets are in rental revenues, the sale of coins, stamps and souvenirs as well as monies from church taxes in the dioceses and the so-called Peter's Pence - a special, annual collection for the pope and his personal charities.

Despite the wealth, the Vatican's budget has shown a deficit of several million dollars since 2001 but which is secured by assets. In 2003 the Vatican showed a deficit of $11,853,206. That's just a small loss to you, Budge. Of course, you assume the Vatican is making a profit, other than miniscule museum entrance charges, on it's massive art collections, many of which are not on public display, but must nonetheless be cared for, and housed. The Vatican Secret Archive has collections of manuscripts that are of priceless historical value, and they have to be preserved. Of course, two thousand years of history means nothing to you, even though our cultural history keeps many people from seeing the corrupt edifice of tawdry commercialism that is bursting the moral foundation of society.

2005 was a lucky year for the Church, she actually made a $12,000,000 dollar surplus at the close of the year. This hadn't happened it a while, and probably had much to do with the Papal election, even though the death of John Paul II, the Conclave and the accommodating of huge crowds of faithful, and tourists amounted to 8.9 million dollars, which by the way is about a ladle full of the ocean of the worlds wealth. The cardinals were given the results of the 2005 Peter's Pence collection, which is not part of the budget since the money is used by the pope for charity, disaster relief and aid to churches in developing countries.

[quote]In 2005, donations amounted to $59,441,654.64, an increase of 14.95% compared to the previous year.

The Holy Father allocated these resources to charitable endeavors to express the Apostolic See's and the universal Church's closeness to the populations of several countries hit by disasters such as floods, famine, war and illnesses.

The Holy Father also used these funds to support numerous initiatives of Third World ecclesial communities, oriented to human promotion and assistance to the poorest local Churches.[/quote]

Just because you feel that to build a Church to God, by the way read about Solomon, and that 176 years of devoted work on this massive structure amounting to $48,000,000; and annual up-keep being about $39,000, a sum that is only exceeded when actual renewals of the artistic features [such as gilding, repairing the pavement, and extensive marble work on the pilasters] becomes necessary, means that the Church is greedy, you need to reorder your thoughts, a Church is a tribute to God, reflecting the devotion we have for him. Precious metals, jewels, and the finest stone, are sacrificed to him.

As for the pomp of the Papal Court, perhaps you have never tried to be the leader of 1.114 billion people, if you lived in rags, what respect would you receive, and if the Pope was not a sovereign of the Vatican State, he would have no temporal power, and not having temporal power would mean that he may have to abandon 1.114 billion constituents, if civil rulers, decide they don't like the Church, as a sovereign he is made equal to them in a secular sense. This has nothing to do with his own want of material possessions, even though it can, that is not the principal driving it. If you observe the personal lifestyle of Pope Benedict it is not that flamboyant, and try looking at the lifestyles of the last centuries popes, and even father back, Medieval Papal corruption is not present in these men's daily lives. It actually makes me furious that such noble individuals can be slandered by a piece of work like you, who have no basis for any argument you present, and argue in a futile manner, by dragging the argument from topic to topic so as to confuse the debate and actually come to no conclusion whatever.

I am sick and tired of listening to these old arguments, of course the Vatican has money, look at the statistics, a bureaucracy of that size is going to need a little bit of money, for maintenance, not to mention that Catholic charities, whether you feel they are social organism that behaves like a leech, but out billions of dollars in relief help, mission work, and health care for the terminally ill and the not so terminally ill. If you have an issue with priceless, meaning that no one wants it, art that doesn't make a profit and the distribution of collected funds to charitable organizations that do more good than your incessant ranting then I pity you for your shallow and undeniably hard heart and blackened soul.

I like to be nice, and charitable in conversation, but you try without regard for the wellbeing of your fellows to slander the organism of the Catholic Church, which you can’t successfully argue doctrinally, and thus resort to mindless libel against it. This is not human compassion it is human stupidity and human evil, even Dan Brown in his Da Vinci code admitted the good the Church does. Even if you think the Church is damning souls to hell, with so-called paganistic doctrines, it nonetheless makes the world a better place.

Some one quoted once about the Churches real estate holdings, 'that his church probably ranks second only to the United States Government in total annual purchase.'

That is actually sort of sad that the United States Government which only has 299,532,769 citizens, and it has more real estate holding that the entire Roman Catholic Church, with its 1,114,000,000 members.

Dan Brown, enthusiastically put forth as it had significance that Opus Dei recently built a $47 million National Headquarters at 243 Lexington Avenue in New York City. I would like to see Dan Brown, try to construct anything for less than $47 Million dollars, on LEXINGTON AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY. As realtors constantly preach, "Location, Location, Location."

Your vile arguments are baseless drivel, produced by the bitterness that you possess for an institution that is obviously the stalwart foundation of a large majority of world’s people, a foundation that taken in secular sense, promotes virtue, charity, and faith in something that humbles us, and makes us better people. Even if God didn’t exist, then the Church is still doing something worth doing.

As for history perhaps you should read real history. Most modern scholars admit that the majority of history regarding the inquisition and the crusade is anti-Catholic propaganda, and even if it was as terrible as you say, "The many grave disturbances which the Church experienced in the Middle Ages were not true crises since through them all the Church was never in danger of changing its nature or dissolving itself into something else. Low moral standards among the clergy and lust for riches and power disfigure the face of the Church , but do not attack its essence by attempting to alter its foundations."

As for your affiliation, there are three Christian Groups, THREE. Protestants, Catholics, and Eastern Sectaries, otherwise known as the Orthodox faiths which are almost entirely confined to the Slavic and Greek ethnicities. Protestants exist because:

Let us return to English etymology: Protestant, French, from German, from Latin prōtestāns, prōtestant- present participle of prōtestārī, to protest.

To protest, let me not be sarcastic, but I have never heard you protest. As for the definition of the word, maybe you should pick up a valuable and trustworthy reference material, a dictionary.[list=1]
[*]A member of a Western Christian church whose faith and practice are founded on the principles of the Reformation, especially in the acceptance of the Bible as the sole source of revelation, in justification by faith alone, and in the universal priesthood of all the believers.
[*]A member of a Western Christian church adhering to the theologies of Luther, Calvin, or Zwingli.
[*]1. One of the German princes and cities that supported the doctrines of Luther and protested against the decision of the second Diet of Speyer [1529] to enforce the Edict of Worms [1521] and deny toleration to Lutherans.
[/list]You fit right in definition one, and perhaps in definition two. Furthermore, the literal meaning is "a person challenging an action of an administrative agency", of which you are a prime example. I am tired of you ignorance, you will not listen to sense, reason, and will not understand faith.

In response to the newest post, by Oik, I know a Catholic Church that has been built brick by brick, at no request from the clergy, by laymen, who have actually abandoned their homes and moved onto the residence. The man we call "the marble man" moved nearly 800 miles so he could help build, by hand, a huge marble alter, and baptismal font, another man moved out of his home to do the stain glass windows. The parishioners donate graciously for a place to glorify God, since... isn't that what we were created for, God's glorification.

I am done, and I need a coffee, and need to go check my blood pressure.

AN ARGUMENT LIKE THIS NEEDS HARD FACT, SOMETHING YOU BUDGE, AND EUTYCHUS DO NOT HAVE, AND BRETHREN DO NOT FEEL ASHAMED OF THE ELEGANCE AND WEALTH OF THE CHURCH, WHAT SHAME CAN COME FROM THE GLORIFICATION OF GOD AND THE MISSIONARY AND CHARITABLE SPIRIT OF AN INSTITUTION THAT IS HERE TO SAVE SOULS. YOU DO NOT NEED TO MAKE EXCUSES, MY BRETHREN.