Question to anyone representing a faith that builds extravagant buildings to glorify their gods, why all the wasted money?
Posted on: November 4, 2009 - 11:14pm
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Question to anyone representing a faith that builds extravagant buildings to glorify their gods, why all the wasted money?
How do you justify this??? Would you not agree the money could be better spent helping people? Is it not hypocritical to claim humbleness and the spirit of giving while supporting a religion that builds these buidings? Imagine the billions/trillions that could be saved if the buildings atleast were not extravagant, not mind if no religious buildings were built atall. Nothing pisses me off more than (for example hypothetically) a nice church with a gold plated statue of jesus in poor city.
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Ok, I actually agree with you on this. Building extravagant buildings should be low on any church's priority list.
I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. --Galileo Galilei
While I think its stupid for religion to build extravagant buildings (you know because its religion), I do like these buildings. I believe that public art should be made at the expense of private art. You know, because it benefits more people.
Just the fact it is built to me is a statement to the hypocracy of their position on being humble, giving all you can and being jesus-like. Jesus spoke directy against the belief that man made buildings are needed to be close to god in the gospel of st. thomas
That's because they don't give a crap about people. It's all about their gods. A long time ago there were human sacrifices... Now it's all about who's got the biggest building! That's fine, because this stuff makes people think, and when you think, sometimes you are able to open your eyes.
Its a cosmic dry-humping.
I can see where you'd find waste in it and not being very humble. But I think it's more than just a huge building. It represents their "strength" and credibility. For example, a makeshift church built out of a garage is hardly going to be as credible as The Trinity Cathedral in Boston, MA.
Plus it's really great art work. I've tried to draw some of the artwork on the Trinity Cathedral:
And a lot of the time, it's a money maker. The revenue from tours of old churchs has probably paid for the cost of building it by now. Especially in places like Notre Dame, St. Paul's Cathedral, Sistine Chapel, etc.
I'd also like to point out that many churches(especially in Texas), have started using warehouse buildings as churches. They're huge but look crappy, imo. But atleast they're cheap right?
ciarin.com
To be honest, I think that in the past people looked at these buildings and were so impressed that it made them humble at god. Keep in mind this was back when the biggest building you were likely to was your own thatched roof house and there were no flash special effects when the bard came to town. Nowadays they are still impressive, so you can sort of gleem at what it must have been like for them.
Also, its all about power. People like showing off how much power they have.
I remember thinking about this very subject while visiting Florence, Italy as a tourist.
The contrast between the scale and beauty of the central domed Cathedral, or Duomo, The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore, with its surroundings, even today, was just so evident to me.
Such constructions seemed to have been the central focus of the society, the place where virtually all art was expressed, and so on.
No doubt this overwhelming physical presence helped encourage the peasants to flock to Mother Church.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
I was thinking about this the other day. I went to a small church a few times, at the time they were busy building their new church. They were using a single large room as their church, but it could still hold a decent amount of people. The church however, is absolutely massive. It is probably the biggest in the province. At the time it cost about R12 million, which was apparently somewhat over budget. It holds upwards of 5,000, has multiple projectors, sound system, and media control center. This isn't a church, it's a concert arena.
I think part of it is a financial decision. This pastor now has the biggest church around. Even if he was in debt after the build, he's raking in money now. It gets used for internation (christian) bands when they decide to venture to Africa, bringing in thousands of concert goers. At the end of the day, I think it's all about making money..you can save souls in a little room too. If that's what they were really concerned about, why didn't they spend a few million on spreading the word.
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
"poor flopsy's dead, and never called me mother."
my personal favorite is southeast christian church in louisville. google it and make sure you get a look at the interior. it has a bookstore, coffeehouse, and fucking escalators. the locals call it "six flags over jesus."
and of course there's robert schuller's crystal cathedral in california, a monument to 1980s prosperity gospel greed:
"I have never felt comfortable around people who talk about their feelings for Jesus, or any other deity for that matter, because they are usually none too bright. . . . Or maybe 'stupid' is a better way of saying it; but I have never seen much point in getting heavy with either stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I. . . . And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there's a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of them every once in a while, I do the best I can between high spots."
--Hunter S. Thompson
This brings me to another question-how much do pastors make? Let's say you have a congregation of 300 ( I would call that large but no impossible for several churches around here. You are theoretically getting 10% of the congregations combined income every month. I'm also guessing that's tax free? Your congregation is made up of educated, middle to upper class people, so this would come to not insignificant amount.
Now compare a church to a business. A business has overheads. They must pay to create their product, which they try sell at a profit. They must pay their staff.They must pay taxes. They must try match competitors prices.
What overheads does a church have? They must pay the utility bills. They have no real 'product' that must be promoted and sold. Their 'staff' is usually entirely volunteer. People may like another church more, but as long as they have a steady congregation they don't have to worry about competitors. And they don't have taxes right? So were does all the money go? I'm sure lots of it goes to charities (more if they didn't keep building huge churches) I would really love to know what the average man of god takes home at the end of the month.
Psalm 14:1 "the fool hath said in his heart there is a God"-From a 1763 misprinted edition of the bible
Argument from Sadism: Theist presents argument in a wall of text with no punctuation and wrong spelling. Atheist cannot read and is forced to concede.
This one?
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
Spread across five campuses, Second Baptist has about 24,000 people attending one or another of its programs each week. The church has fitness centers, bookstores, information desks, a café, a K-12 school and free automotive repair service for single mothers. The annual budget: $53 million.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/26/americas-biggest-megachurches-business-megachurches.html
Thumma, a professor at Hartford Seminary, has since his book reported that the average megachurch income was $6.5 million in 2007, up from $4.7 million in 1999. About 50% of it was spent on salaries, the rest divided evenly between missions and buildings. Meanwhile, he says nine out of 10 megachurches more than doubled in size between 2002 and 2007.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
yup, that's the one. the interior looks like the fucking marriott suites. the bad part is, in the world of megachurches southeast is a middleweight at most.
"I have never felt comfortable around people who talk about their feelings for Jesus, or any other deity for that matter, because they are usually none too bright. . . . Or maybe 'stupid' is a better way of saying it; but I have never seen much point in getting heavy with either stupid people or Jesus freaks, just as long as they don't bother me. In a world as weird and cruel as this one we have made for ourselves, I figure anybody who can find peace and personal happiness without ripping off somebody else deserves to be left alone. They will not inherit the earth, but then neither will I. . . . And I have learned to live, as it were, with the idea that I will never find peace and happiness, either. But as long as I know there's a pretty good chance I can get my hands on either one of them every once in a while, I do the best I can between high spots."
--Hunter S. Thompson
3 parking lots of such size. Well.. at least it can always be converted to something useful. Imagine when these places can no longer fill their seats, and they're forced to sell these buildings. Museums, laboratories...shopping malls...
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
If they didn't squander their money on huge buildings, they'de have just spent it on proselytizing and socially conservative political campaigns. I wish that the catholics and mormons would have spent the money they used to buy lying anti-gay marriage ads on some huge buildings. Maybe all the money spent on the Pope's trips to Africa to tell AIDS-stricken Africans not to use condoms should have been spent on a really big church instead. Some of the building look grand and the buildings don't interfere with American politics or encourage the spread of HIV. So maybe they should devote more of their resources to big buildings and less to politics and harming third world countries. More money spent on golden angel statues on Mormon temples and less money spent on "YES ON 8! They'll make your kids learn about gay marriage in school if they win!" Mormon funded ads on TV would have been nice.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
British General Charles Napier while in India
I like the Mormon ads that I've seen. They try to appeal to the general public so the messages in the ads are kind of nice. The only problem is the part at the end, "A message from the Church of Jesus of Latter-Day Saints."
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare