Catholic Tourist Week

A poor play on the title World Youth Day I know, but it's a far more accurate description of the event befalling Sydney in the coming week. Maybe the title is the church's way to delude itself into thinking it's still relevant, maybe they are genuinely trying to touch the youth of the world in a non-paedophilic way, maybe the misnomer of the title comes from the international and diocesan differing in the range of events, I'm not sure. What I am sure of is that spending hundreds of millions of dollars of public money to facilitate an archaic and nutty belief system is detrimental for society and the planet as a whole.


The cost of belief
I know I'm going against the majority of secularists on my views, but I wasn't completely opposed to the public funding of this event. There's a good part of our population who is Catholic and it's a major event that could showcase Sydney as an ideal tourist location. State governments help fund major events all the time that can't financially support themselves, the Formula 1 race in Melbourne each year is an example. There is a need to promote tourism, and having a city host glamorous events really puts it on the world stage. It may not be a financial winner right now, but if it goes well it could help attract tourists in the future. Though the same was said about the Olympics but Australia's location meant we didn't cash in like other cities that host the Olympics did. In any case, potential for the cities reputation and the local businesses looking to reap in tithes.

There is a grave concern over the separation of church and state. Now while it's impossible to keep the two completely separate, the financial independence of the two is well established. Religious organisations (and any corporate offshoots) don't pay taxes and in exchange the government staying away from the affairs of the church. So to have a church, one of the richest organisations in the world, receive funding after paying no tax is a violation of that financial boundary between the two institutions. This not only bodes poorly for having a secular government but opens the way for other religions to do the same with public money. How long now until Hillsong demand 10's of millions of dollars to bring a Ted Haggard out from the US? How long until some Muslim's demand the same to bring some radical cleric out to address the Islamic masses in Sydney? Or the Scientologists gaining public funding to bring out Tom Cruise?

It must be recognised that by giving money to one religion that others will ask for the same handouts to host similar events. And that is exactly the reason why there is a need for separation of church and state in a multicultural society. We can't have a government promoting one religion over another, nor can we have the government promoting religion over non-religion (or vice versa). Part of the reason there is a separation of church and state is to protect the church from state influences, so while it may seem like a helping hand from the government can do no harm it weakens the church's position of independence. Of course for an organisation that is of the size of the catholic church, being in bed with the government is a subversive means of keeping power it has otherwise lost to a liberal democracy, and that is something that should be a concern to anyone who wants a secular government. That's the real cost of publicly funding a religion, the cost of the freedoms that are lost.


I'm annoyed, where's my $5,500?
Above all else, the biggest concern out of world youth day is the annoyance laws brought in to stop protesters from harassing the pilgrims. Of course this was done in consultation with the church, though the erosion of civil liberties seems to be something that recent governments have no problems with. Maybe the ridiculous fines are a means to offset the spiralling costs of world youth day, because if it's a reduction in protests and harassment of WYD patrons that was the aim of the legislation then they have gotten it horribly wrong.

World Youth Day has been treated with a lot of apathy, people were indifferent to the concept apart from the fact it would be disruptive in the Sydney CBD. Now the laws are in, it's painting the protesters as the victims instead of those being harassed, which will lead to more widespread support of those protesting and it will lead to more people protesting who wouldn't have before. There is now a market for anti-WYD t-shirts, people trying to be as offensive as possible, people are now going to go out of their way to show civil disobedience. All that is fantastic because it's drawing focus towards the problems of the catholic church. It's anti-gay, anti-contraceptive, draconian message is being exposed for what it is, and it's no longer being hidden under a veil of religious tolerance.

The Catholic Church has had influence over our society and affairs for a long time. And as is always the case with power, comes corruption. As with all dogmatic systems (whether they be religious or otherwise) the rationalisation for the corruption becomes a part of the dogmatic systems. The stance on contraception in Africa means that over 100,000,000 people are at risk of AIDS, the stance on protecting paedophiles has meant that not only have kids been molested but those doing it have been afforded the opportunity to do so again and again as they are moved to different areas. The church has been more worried about protecting it's image than seeing those priests brought to justice for committing heinous crimes. Those who have been affected both directly and indirectly deserve their chance to protest, just as those who want to preserve the freedoms afforded by the separation of church and state. It needs to be known that the Catholic Church is fallible, that is has problems, and it's causing problems with the only rationalisation of that methodology being faith. Using the law to ensure the corruption and underhanded tactics of the church goes unnoticed is a grave concern.


A question of resource distribution
Paedophile-protector George Pell recently came out and defended the commercial aspect of world youth day. With over 40 different shirts, around 13 different hats, Guy Sebastian CDs, this event is really going to be a money spinner for a church. This is on top of the estimated $160 million that the state and federal government has put in to ensure this event would happen. Is the commercial aspect there to pay back the state government's generosity? I hope so. But sadly I think it'll be used to help line the church's coffers. One Sydney catholic priest came out critical of the event, saying the money could be better used to help the homeless. And with that comment, I could not agree more. The church's backbone in society has been it's ability to help those in need, and right now having a grand parade of sycophants flocking to the pope is not going to help with that image. The Catholic Church is an archaic institution daring people to show it's irrelevance in modern society, where it has the power to show it still has relevance; but that is being ignored in favour of promoting it's own grandeur. No wonder Catholics are lapsing in their faith and chuch attendance is lowering. Cease to be relevant and face the consequences.