generalspeaking

Piety and Extravagant Excess

In a backlash against the fraudulent piety of the established 14th Century church with the common knowledge that the clergy of the day would sell blessings (indulgences) for salvation to those who could afford the freight, and in contempt of the wealth that the Holy Roman Catholic Church had amassed in properties and goods, Lutheranism was born, eschewing the excess and the sacrilege of all that was holy and blessed.

There were two polarizing symbols of human excess at play in that drama. On the one hand, the seemingly inevitable persuasion of most human beings to benefit themselves by any means, taking advantage of the gullible and the desperate to further their opportunities to enrich themselves, and the polar opposite; the penchant and drive by some individuals who are pious by nature and self-sacrificing to the concept of an Almighty Spirit, prepared to sacrifice worldly goods for holiness.

On the evidence, Catholicism's new Pope Francis is a sterling example of the latter, just as was the German reformer Martin Luther, in his contempt for display and falsehood. And perhaps that says a great deal of the new pope's predecessors who accepted the pomp and ceremony and pompous display of wealth that surrounds the Holy See with its treasures and its ostentation that Pope Francis now sets aside.

And just as evidently, he is grossly out-numbered by the clergy who feel it incumbent upon them as representatives of the Holy Father and the Christ, to surround themselves with luxurious trappings emblematic of their status and the sublime nature of religious devotion. Limburg's Bishop Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst is most certainly one of the former, a man who appears to revel in excess.


Photo © Holly Hayes

And in response to the scandal that has erupted in Germany over Bishop Tebartz-van Elst's costly private apartments, unheeding of Pope Francis's calls for a "poor" church, the Vatican has announced that the Bishop of Limburg "could no longer exercise his episcopal ministry". Having failed to demonstrate a true mission to administer to the poor and the faithful by spending an amazing $44.4-million to present to the world his new diocese headquarters.

Limburg an der Lahn
Cathedral with the old Lahn bridge

When the disgraced bishop travelled to India, ostensibly to visit poor communities of the faithful there, questions erupted about the expense of his flight, and presumably his accommodations. And according to Robert Zollitsch, head of the German conference of bishops, the bills run up by the bishop for the work he has ordered has 'mystified' him. Mystification and faith go very well together.

For his part the bishop insists he doesn't lead a "grandiose lifestyle"; it simply appears that he does. Such huge expenses have a habit of persuading people that they are unwarranted for the cause at hand. After all, $44-million would go far in easing the life of hordes of the faithful in India, for a start. Or even the poor, living squalid but faithful lives in Germany...?

And in Germany, where a church tax compliments billions yearly to the German church, it can honestly be said that those who pay taxes are dumbstruck and angered that this is where the German church -- or at least one of its bishops -- chooses to use that windfall.

On top of which the authoritarian character of Bishop Tebartz-van Elst presence has antagonized over 4,000 people who signed an open letter of criticism.

Off with his head!

Labels: Corruption, Germany, Vatican

posted by Pieface @ Friday, October 25, 2013