My parish, St. Louis de Montfort of Sound Beach, has begun a crusade to larn parishioners to “increase your commitment to the parish.” This, of course, agency “give us to a greater extent than money.” In response, I’ve asked a interrogation that’s non oftentimes asked, too fifty-fifty less oftentimes receives a noun answer:
The exclusively justification our pastor, Monsignor Christopher Heller, has offered hence far is “to proceed to grow the parish.” But what does that mean? Does he facial expression to construct a larger church? That seems unlikely, inasmuch as the parish held a uppercase crusade to heighten $1.2 i G m to refurbish the existing church building exclusively a few years ago. Have the living expenses of the parish’s priests risen appreciably? It doesn’t appear so. Then what close rising taxation, which has afflicted hence many Long Islanders? Uh, no, church building donations too belongings aren’t taxed. Well, hence does roughly ongoing activeness appropriate to a Catholic parish demand amend funding? Or is at that spot roughly activeness the parish ought to undertake as role of the Great Commission, but can’t for lack of funds?
At a fourth dimension when at that spot are 2 class collections on every other Sunday, when many parishioners are scrimping to afford crude too gas for the heating season, too when other parishioners are all the same struggling to recover from the depredations of the Obama years, bespeak us to “increase your commitment to the parish” should come upwards alongside specific reasons it would live the Christian affair to do. “Growing the parish” doesn’t cutting it; it’s likewise vague, too likewise easily applied to whatsoever project whatsoever, including undertakings inappropriate to a Christian ministry.
These days Christian religious institutions are constantly panning for dollars. The devotion too generosity of many Christians is such that they never inquire “What produce yous demand the coin for?” And those who produce inquire don’t oftentimes have adequately specific, verifiable answers.
One premise must live established to brand the exploration of this dependent champaign worthwhile:
And roughly are not.
Obviously, the promulgation of the Gospels, the management of the Sacraments, counseling for the troubled, religious teaching for youngsters, too judiciously administered charity for the produce goodness of the genuinely needy are all appropriate. Christ Himself exhorted us to produce these things. But at that spot are an awful lot of things I wouldn’t desire to encounter my parish fund. Political lobbying comes to withdraw heed at once. Yet many American clerics, including roughly of the really highest, get got immersed themselves inwards politics, to the detriment of their duties as ministers of God.
As usual, C. S. Lewis had something to enjoin close that:
At the other church building nosotros get got Fr. Spike. The humans are oftentimes puzzled to empathise the attain of his opinions—why he is i twenty-four lx minutes menstruum almost a Communist too the adjacent non far from roughly variety of theocratic Fascism—one twenty-four lx minutes menstruum a scholastic, too the adjacent prepared to deny human argue altogether—one twenty-four lx minutes menstruum immersed inwards politics, and, the twenty-four lx minutes menstruum after, declaring that all states of this globe are equally "under judgment." [The Screwtape Letters]
(If why interest inwards politics is inappropriate to a Christian parish is unclear to you, delight reverberate on the nature of the Christian faith, too on why Christ Himself told us to “Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, too unto God the things that are God’s.” [Matthew 22:21])
But parishes that are over-funded for their pith missions inevitably larn involved inwards activities inwards which a Christian ministry building has no place.
There’s a give-and-take that denotes the sale of holy things: simony. Simony was a mutual practise inwards the medieval Church. Ecclesiastical positions were oftentimes for sale, as benefices whose holders would derive a net from them. That practice, too the associated practise of selling indulgences, were of import fuels for the Protestant Schism.
Funding drives aren’t simony. But a funding drive that divorces the coin from the reasons the coin is needed – if it is needed – comes really close. If there’s anything close which Christians should live inwards no doubt, it’s that Christian ministries too institutions are non commercial enterprises, aimed at profit.
The Church Temporal drifts away from the Church Mystical, too from the missions laid forth for it past times its divine Founder, when it pursues worldly gain. The interrogation “What produce yous demand the coin for?” must live asked — too Christians who inquire it must demand specific too verifiable answers earlier they accomplish for their checkbooks.
