CHURCH BUYS AND SELLS STOLEN GOODS

Wed Dec 01, 2010 5:39 pm » by **Eliakim**

CHURCH BUYS AND SELLS STOLEN GOODS
Church is planning to sell off works of art to fund the clergy. These historic paintings hang in the home of the Bishop of Durham and are worth in the region of £15m.

There is two ways to look at this. How did these works of art come into the hands of the Church in the first place and second what is the Church doing sitting on such wealth while there is people starving in the world. Can you imagine Christ having expensive works of art sitting on his walls? No, of course not, he stood against materialism.

The paintings are by a Spanish Baroque artist, Francisco Zurbaran and wiki state that the paintings were on a ship at sea when they were seized. In other words they were stolen property when the then Bishop of Durham purchased them for £125.00. So in effect, the Church purchased stolen goods and are now selling those stolen goods. The Church hopes to gain from their sale of the theft to boost their coffers. So where did the Bishop get the £125.00 from to purchase the paintings? Was that stolen as well?

As far as I am concerned the pictures should be returned to their rightful owners and that is more than likely to be Spain.

However, if we have any art historians on DTV you might know who commissioned these paintings in the first place.

1. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-11886622
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francisco_Zurbarán

Wed Dec 01, 2010 5:44 pm » by **Probablysane**

I think I agree with you there, but surely most items of worth that are old have so much history that for all we know they could all have been stolen at some point in their rich pasts. By this definition nobody actually owns anything... In fact ownership goes against everything Jesus taught as you said in your post. Claiming ownership over anything is absurd in my book. If only everything created was forgotten about at the point of its creation there would be no ownership just appreciation.

Wed Dec 01, 2010 6:09 pm » by **Eliakim**

probablysane wrote:I think I agree with you there, but surely most items of worth that are old have so much history that for all we know they could all have been stolen at some point in their rich pasts. By this definition nobody actually owns anything... In fact ownership goes against everything Jesus taught as you said in your post. Claiming ownership over anything is absurd in my book. If only everything created was forgotten about at the point of its creation there would be no ownership just appreciation.

Well the Greeks have been asking for their national treasures to be returned to them as well and I agree with them. If nations understand that they will have to give back what they have taken, then maybe morals will improve all round.

What example does the British Museum give to children when there is so much in there that was stolen from other nations? Do children then respect their own nation when they find out what as been done in the past? Many don't.

Materialism is different to ownership IMHV. You can own something but that doesn't necessarily mean a person is materialistic. Christ didn't have a problem with enjoying expensive aromatherapy oils. So it comes back to a matter of degree and how that is measured. The oils were good for his health and what was good for you was his measure.

The Bishop of Durham could say he has appreciated those paintings for a long time, they have been shared. In fact, the local council of Durham are hoping to fight to keep the paintings in the county.