Here is the post that caught my eye...
Proud Catholic:
Another cryptic response which I am expected to magically uncode. Why did the Vatincan Newspaper release a statement praising Hussein Obama? What was the statement? Unless you are going to try to tell me the pope praised his pro-abortion stance I don't see why even Hussein can't be praised from time to time if he does something right. So I need more information.
To save space I didn't post the comment from "Proud Catholic", but that's okay, as it was pretty hard to follow anyway. Regardless, here is my response...
"Hussein Obama"
I'm assuming the reference by Father Bechtel to "Hussein Obama" was a paraphrase from the Vatican newspaper in question, as I'd be disappointed if he (Father Bechtel) were to engage in what I think is a none-too-respectful way of referring to the President of the United States. I note this because while I've written some highly critical things about Bishop Martino and disagreed with Father Bechtel's defense of this actions, I (a lowly lay quasi-Catholic) would & have never referred to Father Bechtel as anything other than his professional title..."Father Bechtel"; the same is true for Bishop Martino (although I will refer to him as "Joseph Martino" on rare occasion if I want to contrast his religious vs his his secular actions).
To the issue at hand: All I can say is "yawn". Raising this extra money has nothing to do with anything other than the economics of running a large organization in this day and age, period. Anyone who stridently believes that this has something to do with some massive scandal can save the mental energy and instead simply chose to not contribute. For every non-compassionate, ineffective priest I've met one who is just the opposite who deserves this kind of support.
4 comments:
Come on Steve-
Cut me some slack.
Your comment is reasonable, but I think I deserve a little slack. Do you expect me to be perfect all the time? Jesus was the only pefect person ever to walk the face of the Earth.
Father Dave Bechtel
Father Bechtel...
Cut you some slack????
Hey, when last I checked, dispensation is YOUR department, not mine. Now if you have any retirement plan questions I might be able to help you...
Steve,
Dispensation is in NO WAY my department. Only God has the authority to forgive our transgressions. When I "give dispensations" as you have said I do not act on my own authority but God's authority bestowed upon me through ordination to the Sacred Priesthood. Your statement should more accurately read "granting dispensations is God's department not mine."
Do you work in retirement investments? Steve, I have no significant money to invest. I grant some priests are independently wealthy but that ain't me. Priests get wealthy through family inheritances, investments from stocks (some invest) lottery, etc. (In essence the same way everyone else gets wealthy: a little knowledge of finance and a whole lot of luck.) I will live on whatever pension I get and social security presuming two things: 1) that there IS still a social security, and 2) That there will be money to give me a pension.
Father Dave Bechtel
Father Becthel, I was mostly kidding about the dispensation thing. In the words of a certain, unnamed cleric, "Cut me some slack".
To your second paragraph, I'm not in the investment side of the pension world; in fact at the moment I am a manager in our company's Learning Organization...in other words I have staff that report to me that teach our employees. I also do a fair amount of that teaching myself. I don't do much with investments, but rather more with technology, regulations, customer service skills, company history and the like. I could really kick butt in a game of "Prudential Trivial Pursuit".
As for priests, personal wealth and social security, I know full well that most Priests do not always come from well-off families. My cousin Pat (who is a priest) is a good example: his father was a mailman. Now he seems to get along alright on the financial arrangements that exist within the Diocese for Priests, but that's what I'd expect...Priests are professionals, so they should be paid as professionals.
Lastly, to your comment about Social Security, as someone who as read about this EXTENSIVELY, I'll give you two bits of advice and one policy recommendation:
Advice 1 - Never, ever pay attention to what they say about Social Security on Talk Radio. This issue is far too complex for the pandering that passes for news and commentary which you hear on the airwaves.
Advice 2 - The best place to get information on Social Security is, in fact, from the Social Security Administration itself. They do not hide at all the current status the trust fund.
A Policy Recommendation - Congress and the President could virtually eliminate the Social Security funding crisis by raising the SS wage cap; this is the wage limit at which you stop paying your 6.2% social security tax...for 2009, that limit is $106,800. In other words, at the present time every dollar that someone earns above $106,800 is NOT taxed. As I said, raising that...or eliminating the cap all together...would most likely solve the funding problem. However, see my point about Talk Radio: that's where this kind of common sense suggestion would run into resistance, in part because even if you raise the wage cap, you would not raise the benefit cap correspondingly, which would make wealthier people upset ("I am being taxed so that illegal immigrants can get SS benefits..." or something like that) and cries of "call warfare".
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