Are people with low incomes poor?

[nordskoven]

Who said that all property is for common use? Gimme your toothbrush, please. And lend me your Chapstik. Madness…Radical materialism, whether laissez faire “hands off” unregulated Capitalism or Communism that insists that we don’t need morality we need stuff is off-limits to Catholics.

Commons, lands used for community grazing, were seized by Protestant monarchies across Europe. Why not get a non-profit going that will open untaxed land to community gardens? Sharing isn’t anarchy.

 

[Mrs_Sally]

A very basic Natural Law principle is the right to own property. Society is predicated on it.

You mightn’t like the fact that I own a private jet and holiday in the Bahamas each year, but that doesn’t give you any moral right to come take it all off me. You also can’t go around assuming that I got my private jet and Bahamanian holiday resort by ripping people off. This line of thinking begins with the sin of envy and results in the sin of theft.

PS: I don’t really own a private jet and I’ve never been to the Bahamas.

That is not the concept the church is talking about. Nobody says you can’t have a private jet. What the church teaches is that as a person who has enough, you need to be concerned about those who don’t. If you aren’t willing to give, the starving person can take the bread they need to live.

The church doesn’t say the working poor deserve a TV or ipod or 50 outfits. But Pope St Basil did say that the extra things we have belong to the poor. So instead of buying yourself another new outfit, you should clothe the “naked” (who might not be literally naked, but who might not be able to afford a good suit for work interviews or proper safety shoes…)

 

[Mrs_Sally]

I was a career sailor for many years and have seen many parts of the world that very few Canadians or US Americans rarely visit. Until you have seen real poverty such as is common in South America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia you do not know what poverty is. please note I did not include Europe because like Canada and the US most European countries have eleminated real, abject poverty. No one in these countries starves to death except through mental deficiency or the neglect of those who are supposed to take care of the poor.
The poorest people in modern European countries, Canada, and the US would be considered wealthy in many parts of the third world, and we should never forget it. We may not be perfect and we all have or social problems; but overall, G*d has truely blessed us here in North America. If you really want to give alms to the needy, I strongly recommend either Catholic Charities, or the Foreign Mission Society of your local Diocese. Unlike most modern charities like the Red Cross or other lay organizations in which their staff earns many thousands of dollars a year (in the US the head of the AMRC earns over $500,000 a year.) The Catholic Church uses over 95% of the money collected for the purposes it is given.

I’ve seen it also. And we in North America need to remember that the Church is a worldwide organization and her teaching appplies to all situations. Again, the church does not teach that all property is common, but she does teach that the well-off cannot neglect the poor. I agree that charitable money goes much farther in the Church.

However, it does us no good to neglect the less well off (if not outright poor) in our own neighborhoods and then complain about problems in our schools, our streets, our workplaces.

St John Bosco, pray for us.

 

[Mrs_Sally]

Who said that all property is for common use? Gimme your toothbrush, please. And lend me your Chapstik. Madness…Radical materialism, whether laissez faire “hands off” unregulated Capitalism or Communism that insists that we don’t need morality we need stuff is off-limits to Catholics.

Commons, lands used for community grazing, were seized by Protestant monarchies across Europe. Why not get a non-profit going that will open untaxed land to community gardens? Sharing isn’t anarchy.

Again, no one said that all property is for common use. Read the church’s documents on the subject first. The idea of common grazing land, neighborhood gardens, etc. is right in line with what the church advocates.

 

[themeginthemoon]

I was asking “if someone doesn’t have a tv, do they have a right to take one (everything being equal) by analogy with a starving person who has the right to take bread?”

I’m sorry if I asked this before; I don’t remember it though.

Heck no, no one has the right to steal a TV! That’s a non-essential. Sorry, I thought we were talking sustaining items, not comfort

 

[fakename]

user"silicasandra":

I don’t mean to be uncharitable, but is this a genuine question?

There is no way that these could be equal situations. TV is not necessary to life (no matter what some punk kid says ), but food most definitely is.)

It’s just that sometimes, (I think even Mater et Magistra said it but I’ve read things wrong before), people say that the poor (as a matter of justice) deserve not just “what they need” but also “to consume at a socially unembarrassing level”; that is, their consumption should not portray a lower status or force them to feel bad about getting other’s property.

It’s a pretty common attitude among those who want to broaden the definition of poverty; they want to expand the definition of needs to include “those things that you must have to live in a civilized manner and not just physically need.”

 

[Ridgerunner]

Having a low income does not necessarily make a person “poor” any more than having a high one necessarily makes a person “rich”.

Being poor, like being rich, has more to do with what one has and what one’s opportunities are, than with one’s income. One of my friends, for example, has a modest older house, inherited by his wife, which they own free and clear. He has mechanical ability and tools, acquired through the years, and buys older vehicles for next to nothing and fixes them up for his and his wife’s use. He works for a meat processor and buys better product from the “company store” than most of us feel ourselves able to afford, and at ridiculously low prices. His health insurance is through his employer. He also has a very nice garden.

His wife doesn’t work.

Going by income alone, most would consider him “poor”. But he lives a very nice life.

 

[edwest2]

I invite everyone to read the following:

worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/us_hunger_facts.htm

Peace,
Ed

 

[bmullins]

2408 The seventh commandment forbids theft, that is, usurping another’s property against the reasonable will of the owner. There is no theft if consent can be presumed or if refusal is contrary to reason and the universal destination of goods. This is the case in obvious and urgent necessity when the only way to provide for immediate, essential needs (food, shelter, clothing . . .) is to put at one’s disposal and use the property of others

Notice it says essential needs. Food is essential, a television is not. The problem is that stealing is a last resort, it’s not an encouraged action. A person who has just missed a single meal should not be stealing bread. A beggar who is starving to death is the person this is written for, the young street urchin stealing a biscuit in order to survive etc.

 

[gardener50]

It is written:“Gd helps those who help themselves". But it is also written "Gd help those who get caught helping themselves”.

Coming out of lurkdom, and this may be getting a little off-topic perhaps.

But I would like to point out that this phrase, God helps those who help themselves, is not found anywhere in the Bible.

Patricia