According to the observation, once a year Catholic clergy receives bounty in the form of money. This is the Cash money clergy receive from the huge amount of Church collection done from Maundy Thursday till Easter Sunday. One of the “Sankistao” recently told me that he found the job of counting this money very tiresome because the amount was in lakhs. He was also frank in confessing that he keeps for himself at least 10 thousand rupees every year which he claims as his illegal annual bonus, of course clandestinely but with the silent nod of his equally guilty Pe. Vigar.
In Kuwait a few of those who count this money are become rich in a similar manner as our Sankistao because such amount collected in Kuwait is too big. All those faithful who contribute their mite and tithes to the Church in the name of God must also know that their hard earned money many times goes into the pockets of Devils and sometime their contribution in such a manner create robbers out of holy men because money tempts even the disciple of Christ.
There are some Churches during this season look like minting money and finally where this money goes nobody knows because there is neither accountability nor transparency. This huge collection done in certain Churches indicates the financial affluence of the faithful from those villages and also the generosity of the faithful to contribute their mite. However, if the faithful think that the notes and coins they put in the Collection Box in their Churches go to the good use then they are sadly mistaken because the Church authorities are silent on this. They neither clearly indicate where this money goes nor disclose after what this money is spent. In view of this the doubting Thomasses strongly feel that the utility of this money collection is done for wrong purposes and this opinion of the Thomasses will never change until the Church authorities come out with clear answer.
There is a saying in Konkani “Piddeacho uzo ani Padrichi zodd kollona kaim”.
According to one observation the luxurious purchases of some of the Pe. Vigars including new cars are done immediately following the Easter Sunday or at least planning for such luxuries are done after Easter based on the cash collection. Also the money spent on conspicuous consumption by some Pe. Vigars starts after the Easter. Even their foreign tours are decided after Easter. Not only this, the expenditure done by their concubines after the Easter clearly point finger to this money.
The collection done during the last holy week till Easter Sunday was in lakhs of rupees in some coastal villages. If this money either fully or partly used for Damao mission the faithful would have escaped from collecting extra money for Damao mission in which case the faithful would remain without taxing their purses further and as such they could utilize this money for their other necessities. Our Church has got one very bad habit of taxing the faithful in the name of God and religion.
Our Church and our Pe. Vigars in our localities could use their religious stature by collecting donations and thru separate collection in the Churches to raise funds to be utilized for the good of the poor faithful when they fall in dire need of money for major operations such as Heart Surgery, Kidney Surgery, Kidney transplantation, Brain Tumor surgery and other such major surgeries where heavy sum of money is required. Also, Church can easily organize Tiatro shows to raise this fund.
Will our Goa Church and our Pe. Vigars take initiative to come forward for this welfare and humanitarian activity for the cause of downtrodden faithful in a true Christian way?
During my long years of stay in Kuwait I have helped many visiting priests to raise funds for their activities in Goa but never ever even once they came to me with a humanitarian proposal as indicated above. They came with the proposals of collecting funds for the Church ventures only to enrich the Church coffers and their personal pockets. Never ever they touched the humanitarian issues. One of them even tried to prevent me from collecting fund for Konkani Martyrs when we from Kuwait embarked on this mission, saying instead we should collect fund for his Church school in his village. Inspite of doing so much for them, some of them now in Goa don’t even hello me pretending to be strangers. Is ingratitude your hallmark oh Goan priests? Believers and other such denominations are also taking care of the material needs of their followers for this reason more and more Catholics are leaving Catholicism and joining them. If Catholic Church and its priests do not change their attitude towards grabbing more and more wealth for them then very shortly Catholicism will thin down from our soil. The mushrooming of non-Catholic denominations and other sects in Goa is the strong challenge to the arrogance and money greed of the Catholic Church.
Candolim, Goa.
7507394349.