quote:

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Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
A correspondent to yesterday's "i" newspaper suggests that the proposed use of the sale money is wrong and that it should be used to fund Food Banks for the needy.

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I don't know the letter writer, but I'd be willing to make a bet that he's never given £1 to the food bank. That type usually feels entitled to tell others how to spend their own money.

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It's typically the mean-minded rather than the charitable who complain.

I've seen some very haunting and beautiful church art commemorating WW1, so more power to the priest.

If the letter writer really cared about food banks he might perhaps be more concerned about tackling the causes of them - the deliberate policies of the Coalition.

This is an artificially-made hunger crisis, where the sudden sharp rise in the need for food banks is driven to a great extent by attacks on the sick, working poor, and unemployed which have been dressed up as welfare 'reform'. The recession was used as an excuse to attack those least able to fight back in the name of highly dubious austerity policies. Meanwhile privatisation has also made things worse. People often have to choose between food or heat thanks to expensive privatised utilities. Winter leads to more hungry people. For the first time since WW2, the Red Cross has had to ask for donations to pass out food parcels in Britain.

So if people want to help the hungry they can (1) give to the food banks but (2) they most of all need to act politically.

It's not individual charity which will stop this, but political action to remove the Conservatives and their fellow travellers, and most of all to push the Overton Window of 'thinkable' political policies towards rejecting attacks on minimum social welfare provision - the latter must be done otherwise voting Labour will create the same problems on a lesser scale as they currently offer little better than 'Tory Lite' policies.

The priest's windfall ultimately isn't going to solve this, and we still need a world with art, music, the sacred and material for reflection and contemplation in it.
 

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Posted by Albertus (# 13356) on :
 
Louise:

 

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Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :
 
One of my fellow-teachers commented on the existence of "Employment Insurance":
"Be thankful you pay into EI, because, otherwise, the poor will be rioting in the streets"

This could also apply to the various supports that the working poor* should receive. Meanness will eventually get meanness in return.

In relation to the OP: there are simply not enough donations being made for the churches to cover the expenses of the needy. With over half a million foodbank users, how much difference will one lump of $400,000 pounds make?

The Tories have actually been successful in their aim to punish the poor.

*Working poor= actually have employment, but between not enough hours and low rates of pay, not making enough to cover basic expenses.

WalMart in the US famously relies on food stamps to allow their employees to make ends meet. What happens when the Food Stamp program is cut? Naturally, the employees go on strike and demand the right to unionise, something that employers dislike.

But if employers push the workers to the wall, the employers get what they asked for.
 

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Posted by Chamois (# 16204) on :
 
Small businesses are also getting hammered by current government policies. So if the vicar commissions one of the two UK foundries (both small businesses, one family-run) to cast and hang the new bells he will in my view be doing A Good Work.

Of course, I'm a ringer too, so maybe I'm biased. But the number of small businesses and sole traders going OUT of business around here is truly alarming, especially given that the majority of the working population is either self-employed or working for a small or medium-sized enterprise.
 

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Posted by Chamois (# 16204) on :
 
Apologies for the double post

 

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Posted by que sais-je (# 17185) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Zach82:
If the reporter doesn't live in one room, make his clothes out of old potato sacks, and amuse himself only with old magazines he found in a dumpster, thus freeing up money he could give to the poor, he's really in no position to criticize someone not adhering to strict utilitarian ethics either.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Chamois:
Apologies for the double post

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quote:

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Originally posted by Louise:
It's not individual charity which will stop this, but political action to remove the Conservatives and their fellow travellers

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quote:

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Originally posted by que sais-je:

quote:

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Originally posted by Zach82:
If the reporter doesn't live in one room, make his clothes out of old potato sacks, and amuse himself only with old magazines he found in a dumpster, thus freeing up money he could give to the poor, he's really in no position to criticize someone not adhering to strict utilitarian ethics either.

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I'm not quite convinced. If a literary critic points out flaws in a novel should we ignore her because she couldn't have written the novel?

Obviously we can criticise the letter writer for not having the same standards, but I still think they are entitled to be critical. Is anyone here really saying they never criticise vice unless they are sure they are more virtuous? I wish I could say I managed it.

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quote:

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Originally posted by que sais-je:

quote:

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Originally posted by Zach82:
If the reporter doesn't live in one room, make his clothes out of old potato sacks, and amuse himself only with old magazines he found in a dumpster, thus freeing up money he could give to the poor, he's really in no position to criticize someone not adhering to strict utilitarian ethics either.

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I'm not quite convinced. If a literary critic points out flaws in a novel should we ignore her because she couldn't have written the novel?

Obviously we can criticise the letter writer for not having the same standards, but I still think they are entitled to be critical. Is anyone here really saying they never criticise vice unless they are sure they are more virtuous? I wish I could say I managed it.

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But it’s good to be mindful of the point made by Sandy Millar on HTB’s Godpod programme, when he was asked how a Christian could wear a watch worth £500 when people die daily of preventable diseases. “If their income is £5m,” he said, “and they give away £4m, and they have a £500 watch, I don’t feel honestly able to be very critical of them.”

Sandy steered commendably clear of one of our great hypocrisies in the Church – to criticise the rich, rather than recognise that on a global level that’s exactly who we are. If you earn the UK minimum wage, you’re already amongst the top 7% richest people in the world. Even my modest £50 throne from B&Q represents comparatively luxurious bottom-servicing… shockingly, most people on the planet do not have access to a flushing toilet.

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quote:

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Originally posted by The Undercover Christian:
I find it hard to see how Jesus would spend the money on the memorial rather than a more pressing social need...

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"There came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured it on his head, as he sat at meat.

But when his disciples saw it, they had indignation, saying, To what purpose is this waste? For this ointment might have been sold for much, and given to the poor.

When Jesus understood it, he said unto them, Why trouble ye the woman? for she hath wrought a good work upon me. For ye have the poor always with you; but me ye have not always. For in that she hath poured this ointment on my body, she did it for my burial.

Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her." Matt. 26:7-13
 

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Posted by The Undercover Christian (# 17875) on :
 
Going to offer an explanation for how that applies, Zach?
 

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Posted by Zach82 (# 3208) on :
 
Is the connection really that distant?
 

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Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on :
 
At the risk of tangenting, one of the things that irks me most about these "bought old junk at a yard sale for $5, turned out to be priceless" stories is this:

The buyer profited from some seller's ignorance. Isn't that at least as bad as using those profits in ways (some of) the rest of us disapprove of?
 

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Posted by Starbug (# 15917) on :
 
I'd also like to Louise's post.

We had a debate at our church discussion group before Christmas. The group leader (a lay preacher) said that he plays Grand Theft Auto and had just bought the latest game. Someone else then said vehemently that it was immoral to spend £40 on a computer game (in a 'I am right and you can't disagree with me' tone of voice). This had the effect of shutting down any further discussion on the subject. She then went on to make us all feel guilty for giving/getting Christmas presents because she and her family weren't giving any.

Afterwards, I reflected on this, wondering if I should feel guilty for buying the latest Professor Layton game. I decided not to feel bad about it, as if everyone stopped buying these games it would put a lot of people out of work. I just wish I'd been brave enough to say that during the group.

As Chamois says, commissioning a bell may create work for crafts workers, so it wouldn't be all bad even if the money doesn't go to foodbanks.
 

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Posted by The Undercover Christian (# 17875) on :
 

quote:

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Is the connection really that distant?

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quote:

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Originally posted by The Undercover Christian:

quote:

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Is the connection really that distant?

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Kinda, old chap... given that the way that Jesus asks us to show our love for him now is how we treat others, as he does only a couple of lines before the story you quote(i.e Matt 25:31-46). Most scholars I've read tend not to argue that the anointing story is a justification for spending on stone rather than people, nouns rather than names.

So I'm not sure I'm following how your passage justifies this spending.

Genuinely interested to hear more.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Zach82:
It's not distant at all.

Disciples: You can't spend money on luxuries when there are more pressing social needs.

Jesus: Yes you can.

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quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
I do suspect a similarity between the pharisee's false piety/ hypocrasy and the journalist's.

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Originally posted by Ricardus:
In other words, the story of the oil shows a clear Scriptural precedent for non-essential spending at a time when there are pressing social needs.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Garasu:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
I do suspect a similarity between the pharisee's false piety/ hypocrasy and the journalist's.

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From memory, it's not the pharisees, it's the disciples. And, according to the OP, it's not a journalist, it's a correspondent.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Zach82:
It was asserted that Jesus would never condone spending money on luxuries when there are more pressing social needs. He condones just that. It is objectively not a stretch.

Why, what contortions do you put the text through to make it say otherwise?

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quote:

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A few times a week I get an e-mail or a drive-by comment from someone very upset that I'm defending or advocating for a position they regard as contrary to the Bible. This happens often. Regularly. Constantly.

Yet as often as it happens, none of my accusers has ever been angry that I seem to be "glibly dismissive" of the clear biblical teaching of Luke 3:11. No one has ever suggested on the basis of this Bible verse that I am a fraudulent sham and an enemy of the true faith. Nor have they ever suggested that my failure to heed and revere it's clear instruction constitutes an attack against the sacred "authority of the scriptures."

And that's odd, because I would seem to be vulnerable on this point.

"Whoever has two coats must share with anyone who has none," the Bible says in Luke 3:11. And I have a lot more than just two coats. I have a closet full of coats, jackets, suits, shirts, dress pants, jeans, sweaters and nearly a dozen different pairs of shoes. My wardrobe would seem to be a sinful extravagance that's biblically indefensible

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This is a unified, unambiguous, relentlessly repeated commandment not just of John but of Moses, Isaiah, Amos, Jeremiah, Jesus, Paul, Peter … of everybody, really.

We're not talking about just a handful of scattered verses — not just a few obscure texts plucked from the lists of Leviticus and one or two Pauline tangents. This is a major, dominant theme of the entire Bible: Whoever has more than they need must give to whoever has less than they need.

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quote:

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by St. Chrysostom
Give him the honour prescribed in his law by giving your riches to the poor. For God does not want golden vessels but golden hearts.

Now, in saying this I am not forbidding you to make such gifts; I am only demanding that along with such gifts and before them you give alms. He accepts the former, but he is much more pleased with the latter. In the former, only the giver profits; in the latter, the recipient does too. A gift to the church may be taken as a form of ostentation, but an alms is pure kindness. Of what use is it to weigh down Christ’s table with golden cups, when he himself is dying of hunger? First, fill him when he is hungry; then use the means you have left to adorn his table. Will you have a golden cup made but not give a cup of water? What is the use of providing the table with cloths woven of gold thread, and not providing Christ himself with the clothes he needs? What profit is there in that? Tell me: If you were to see him lacking the necessary food but were to leave him in that state and merely surround his table with gold would he be grateful to you or rather would he not be angry? What if you were to see him clad in worn-out rags and stiff from the cold, and were to forget about clothing him and instead were to set up golden columns for him, saying that you were doing it in his honour? Would he not think he was being mocked and greatly insulted?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Maybe the answer is not to give money to the 'Build them and they'll come' food banks, but to actually challenge the way the benefit system is administered - which has nothing to do with government policy but, in my professional experience, has an awful lot to do with the attitudes and actions of local jobsworth benefit agency and JobCentrePlus staff and managers.

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As if to confirm my view on the benefit system, today i delivered some toys to a woman whose daughter is disabled. She is 16 and for some reason that changes her entitlement to benefit so what does the benefit agency do? They stop her benefits while she's assessed for further benefits and the mother has to apply to us for toys. Why do they have to stop the money?? Why can't they estimate or give an average and then adjust it when the proper amount is decided upon? Can they not see the hardship? THIS is why people go to food banks.

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It seems such a stupid thing to do. Why cancel everything if the clients are just being reassessed?? It reinforces my view that the increase in the use of food banks and other charitable provision is a mixture of their well-publicised availability and cash flow problems caused by BA administrative procedures rather than simple 'poverty'.

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I believe it's easier for a clerk at the Jobcentre to issue a referral paper and send their client to the local foodbank for three days' food than to actually press a button on the computer and release a payment into the client's post office account! I repeat what i've asked on numerous occasions: Does no one else see the irony of a Jobcentre sending someone to a food bank because they have no money when it's the same Jobcentre that stopped the money in the first place!

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I took someone into the Jobcentre because they had unexpectedly stopped his benefits and he didn't understand why. The reason was simple - he had moved house and while he had told one office his new address he had overlooked the requirement to tell the other. When he was called forward to the desk this was explained to him and it was repeated that because he had not told someone else his new address his money was now stopped. The Jobcentre knew his address was changed because they had written to him at that new address telling him his money was to be stopped because they hadn't been informed of his new address!!!!!!! Anyway, my friend was told he was getting no money. As soon as I heard this I stepped up to the desk in my uniform and asked why he was being sent away with no money and no food in the house and bills to pay. All the clerk would do was repeat his refusal to do anything to help. At which point a colleague intervened and tried to persuade the unhelpful clerk to help the man. Shall I tell you why she intervened? It was because I was in Salvation Army uniform and the previous year she had volunteered at another SA corps for the toy appeal AND SHE WAS EMBARRASSED. The two clerks then had an argument (very professional!) in front of my friend and me (and anyone else who was listening in the open plan Jobcentre) with the first clerk adamantly refusing to help. So she took the case off him and said, 'I will help'. Literally 3 phone calls later and she arranged the payment to be in my client's post office account by 3pm that very afternoon. This had nothing to do with Ian Duncan Smith, NOTHING to do with Government policy, the cutbacks, the recession, austerity measures or the changes in the benefit system. This was entirely down to the sheer awkwardness of a middle-aged Jobcentre clerk who couldn't give a stuff about the hungry and ill man with not a penny to his name whose only crime was not to know enough English to understand the letter properly. It makes my blood boil and I could tell you other stories that show how people are hungry because of the attitudes of Jobcentre staff. Even I in my uniform have been talked down to by the security 'guard' on the door. There is a culture of patronising unhelpfulness and hostility to the clients - as well as incompetence that would make you as angry as me to hear it - and it is THIS attitude that denies people the money they are entitled to and drives them to the food banks.

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Isn't a correspondant a type of journalist? Does the term have a different meaning cross-pond?

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Originally posted by Ricardus:
I thought 'correspondent' in the sense of journalist meant someone who sends reports from somewhere other than the place where the paper is headquartered, e.g. our correspondent in Vienna or wherever.

In this case we aren't talking about a report but, if anything, an editorial, so it's unlikely that the OP means correspondent in that sense.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'm actually sitting here racking my brains to think what Jesus actually did for the poor.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Maybe the answer is not to give money to the 'Build them and they'll come' food banks, but to actually challenge the way the benefit system is administered - which has nothing to do with government policy but, in my professional experience, has an awful lot to do with the attitudes and actions of local jobsworth benefit agency and JobCentrePlus staff and managers.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Porridge:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'm actually sitting here racking my brains to think what Jesus actually did for the poor.

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Like (some) journalists, he brought them constantly to the attention of those who would prefer to ignore them.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Firenze:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Maybe the answer is not to give money to the 'Build them and they'll come' food banks, but to actually challenge the way the benefit system is administered - which has nothing to do with government policy but, in my professional experience, has an awful lot to do with the attitudes and actions of local jobsworth benefit agency and JobCentrePlus staff and managers.

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I don't think there is a disjunct between policy and delivery. If the policy is punitive and unjust, then no amount of niceness on the part of frontline staff will alter that. Also, they are working for departments which are taking cuts and having to 'make savings' - with all the heartening effects on morale and attitude that brings about. Petty tyranny is best delivered by people who themselves feel ground down by the bastards above them.

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Originally posted by pydseybare:
Gah, what a nightmare.

I think you're both right - the policy is punative and encourages individual clerks to lie and make up excuses for avoiding showing any actual humanity to those in need.

But what can you do? Corrupt systems encourage/develop corrupt individuals.

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Originally posted by pydseybare:
maybe we're using different definitions, Mudfrog, but to me a system which cannot help those in most need is corrupt. It doesn't have to completely fail to be broken.

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My example of the 2 Jobcentre clerks squabbling over a man whom one wanted to help and the other didn't, shows me that the system is there if they want to use it. The first clerk was just being a bastard and the second was embarrassed into helping because a man in a Salvation army uniform was questioning why their client couldn't have his money. 3 phone calls revealed that the system can work when they get of their arses and press a few buttons.

Can you tell this issue really winds me up?


 

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Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Also, they are working for departments which are taking cuts and having to 'make savings' - with all the heartening effects on morale and attitude that brings about. Petty tyranny is best delivered by people who themselves feel ground down by the bastards above them.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'm actually sitting here racking my brains to think what Jesus actually did for the poor.

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quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'm actually sitting here racking my brains to think what Jesus actually did for the poor.

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Fed them. Healed them. Exhorted the rich to give to them. Do you need texts?

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
What he did for them? He came as one of them.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:

quote:

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Originally posted by cliffdweller:

quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I'm actually sitting here racking my brains to think what Jesus actually did for the poor.

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Fed them. Healed them. Exhorted the rich to give to them. Do you need texts?

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To be pedantic, he didn't feed 'the poor'; he fed the 5000 men and their families who had followed him to listen to his teaching and see a miracle or two. There is not analysis of their income or status.

Neither did he only heal the poor. He healed all those who were brought to him.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:

And yes, he called on people to love their neighbour and their enemy, and indeed to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit the prisoners, etc.

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
But he did not set up feeding programmes, start a charity for the homeless, campaign for higher wages...

I am rather of the opinion that Jesus would have tackled the 'middle men' in order to try to alleviate suffering: he called tax collectors to repentance and forced the money-changers out of the temple. It was the local officials who were cheating the poor that Jesus hated - much like the OT prophets who complained about rigged weighing scales.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Mudfrog:
... or demonise the people who had more money than some others.

Yes, he commented on the difficulty that 'the rich' would have in entering the kingdom - but I guess that is to do with attitudes of self-sufficiency and pride rather than the mere fact that they had money in their purses.

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Originally posted by Chorister:
What this vicar has done, by selling the painting, is freeing his parishioners from having to work really hard to raise money for bells. Instead, they can put all that marvellous effort and sacrificial giving to another cause eg. setting up a foodbank or outreach centre. One definitely does not preclude the other.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Qoheleth.:

quote:

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Originally posted by Chorister:
What this vicar has done, by selling the painting, is freeing his parishioners from having to work really hard to raise money for bells. Instead, they can put all that marvellous effort and sacrificial giving to another cause eg. setting up a foodbank or outreach centre. One definitely does not preclude the other.

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Ahem. It's a little more complicated than that. Fr Jamie's 'parish' website is here.

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Can you direct me to what precisely it is you want us to notice on the website? I saw the brief description of the bells and their historic significance. What is the complicator?
 

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Posted by Qoheleth. (# 9265) on :
 
The Abbey Church at Whalley Hall is not part of the Church of England, having parishoners in the usual sense. Fr Jamie is a priest of the Old Catholic Church UK.
 

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Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :
 
Mudfrog, for your defense of the defenseless

Mate, you can do and say no wrong.

Do you apprise your MP of this? The press?

[ 01. January 2014, 21:19: Message edited by: Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard ]
 

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Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
Mudfrog, for your defense of the defenseless

Mate, you can do and say no wrong.

Do you apprise your MP of this? The press?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Being homeless for three years counts as poor to me. And i see nothing to suggest he had any more belongings than the clothes he was not crucified in. Even his grave was borrowed, and charity gave him a shroud. It wasn't even his family who claimed the body.

As for saleable skills, pish. I've a PhD and every year we have to calculate to see if we''re eligible for free school lunches. Being skilled does not equal financially comfortable.

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