But seriously, where are you really from? Korea?

A foreign country that begins with C.

I'm just gonna leave this here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBJphSkgKAM

Thanks for the idea! I've looked over the website, prices are reasonable, and it has a beach! ! ! I've booked for the 11th-13th. Got a pretty big room to rattle around in, yay! Now all I've got to do is avoid the pit and play the 20 at Bellagio. That's going to be tough.

Whoa, you don't look Canadian!

The 20 O8, right?

No, the usual LHE bec, every time I've played at Bellagio, someone threatens physical violence upon someone else and I really, really like that part.

There is a reason why Mandalay Bay is fairly cheap.

Why go to Bellagio to play 20, you can play with us in town!

Do you ever follow through on the threat?

W/ the resort fee it's costing me a bit above $500 for three nights mid-week, not exactly cheap. If the room looks like it does in the pics I'll be happy. And the point isn't that there isn't a 20 game in Phoenix it's that my mother won't be in LV.

heh.

Yes, there is some sort of convention that's driving up prices that week, because I had been looking to go at that time also.

FYI I checked a couple of the emails they've been sending me. For some weird reason my Mandalay offer code wasn't working, but the Delano one did. Arriving the 11th, checking out the 14th for $302 with $150 food and beverage credit. Dunno if the code will work for you, but try it - ZLCFS18D.

edit: I forgot resort fees, so that would be $100-$120 more. I didn't include parking either.

resort fees are ****ing BULL****

Cliff's: Rob could be making a credible argument about hypocrisy regarding poverty, but instead he's lapsing into absurd micromanagement about what sort of building should house a homeless shelter. I would love to see the better-informed version of his case, because the one presented so far isn't doing much to convince me.

The corollary I'm interested in: How much does a person or an organization need to be involved in helping the homeless in order to have the moral authority to encourage others to help the homeless?

Obviously there's been a lot wrong with the Catholic church but they have a documented history over centuries of engaging with poverty. I'm not Catholic but frankly I wish Protestant/Evangelical churches would emulate them in a lot of ways.

Dorothy Day is pretty interesting: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Day

Rob, I can understand an argument like, "This org does a little bit to help the poor, but it doesn't do as much as it should, and here's why." I don't get the sense your case is that developed. Truthfully I'm not even sure what you know about Catholic teaching and practical engagement with poverty. In your eagerness to claim hypocrisy you're ending up in silliness like the priest should have to shoo people out at 8:00 am on Sunday because church pews are a better solution than funding a homeless shelter with actual beds.

Specialization of buildings is a pretty fundamental characteristic to modern civilization.

The Pope is speaking as the leader of a religious org that claims 1.3 billion adherents; his personal wealth isn't the point here. And although the Vatican is quite nice and everything, it's not like the Pope lives extravagantly in the same sense as Joel Osteen or Joyce Meyer.

If you don't think any moral teaching on poverty is legitimate, fine, but then the stuff about turning churches into homeless shelters instead of building separate homeless shelters is just a red herring. It doesn't make any coherent case.

But if you're looking to make a credible allegation of hypocrisy, there are chances to do. You'd need to start with Jesus' teachings on poverty, compare them with what the Pope (or any other Christian leader) says or does, and point out the difference. Maybe only 15% of Catholic parishes support a homelessness outreach, or they all do but some of them are scams, or whatever.

With evidence, something like that could be a convincing case, but it's not the case you're making right now.

I do know plenty about the Catholic church, having gone to 13 years of Catholic school and attending mass regularly during those years, until I became an adult and was no longer forced to attend.

I wasn't really trying to make any convincing logical argument about the church, nor to I have the desire to put the effort into doing so. I just have have always thought churches were a huge waste of shelter and so found it hypocritical that the leader of the church that owns the most wasted real estate would speak about helping the homeless. Even if they spend billions building shelters, while there is still wasted shelter and people needing homes, that is a problem in my eyes.

I'm not really sure if any moral teaching at all is legitimate. Personally I would be wary of accepting any moral teaching on any issue by a leader who was clearly complicit in enabling the molestation of children, as is certainly true of all the current church leadership, and likely all the leadership of at least the last hundred years, possibly even for the history of the church.

I don't think it was meant to be a coherent case. I suspect that Rob has decided not to be charitable (as is his right), and bristles at the prospect of anyone - rich or poor - telling him to be. That the Pope is rich is indeed a red herring, if a Syrian refugee were to plead for help, Rob would find a different reason to ignore.

It's more that I bristle at the head of a dishonest, corrupt organization lecturing about anything. The same as I do when the current president speaks. It doesn't concern my own behavior. I'm not in a position to give money to any cause. In fact I could claim public assistance if I tried, but I guess I have always been too proud to do so. I guess maybe my leaving the assistance for those who are even needier than me could be considered my act of charity.

It helps to know that you have a Catholic school background. I can imagine that would make almost anyone cynical, and I mean that sincerely, not in any catty way. There's plenty of ground to criticize the Catholic hierarchy all the way up to @Pontifex but compared to the popes that came before I think he's probably a much needed breath of fresh air.

Again, I'm not Catholic but admire the parts I think are worthy of admiration.

Most organizations that size are going to have some corruption (although the sex abuse scandals are way worse than almost any of them). You could argue trying to reform a corrupt organization is hypocritical and he should just resign or something. But anyway, the lead paragraph in that America magazine link is:

Seems pretty clear his scope there is adherents to the particular faith-based organization of which he is Chief Theological Officer. I could see your objection if he hands out moral advice to atheists, agnostics, Muslims, or even Orthodox and Protestant Christians. But aren't you lambasting him for setting exactly the tone that you would like to have set for that organization? You think a faith tradition's spiritual leader should refrain from teaching that faith's adherents?

As I suggested last post, I think the health-and-wealth Evangelical Protestants like Osteen, Meyer, Creflo Dollar, etc. are clearer in their hypocrisy.

Eh, to me he's just another corrupt businessman with a large salary and $2 million in the bank, telling average income people with no savings about how they should be more generous with the little they have.

I did see some bishop on tv explaining that the pope doesn't have time to waste on trivial things like rape of minors by church officials because he has more important things to worry about, like protecting migrants.

Story checks out. :thumbup:

That's stupid of course but I don't even understand the point. The pope issued a contrite apology for the rape coverups. Why would this bishop feel the need to weigh in? Was this before Francis apologized?

It's part of a much larger movement. Many insiders feel that the church is theologically soft, and this leads to the abuses we now see.

The bishops openly criticizing the Pope are more generally interested at undermining the authority of this_pope.

At the risk of sounding like I'm trolling you, I think you belie your true feelings about charity with the words you have chosen, e.g. "too proud."

I read speculation about some bishop being critical of the pope because he didn't like the recent soften policies towards homosexuals. Maybe implying that being soft on gays = being soft on pedophiles.

I think it's silly though, mostly because I'm sure nearly every bishop in the worldwide church has been complicit in the abuse of children. There's no way they could not have known about it happening. The ones who have faced negative publicity about it recently are just the tip of the iceberg.

I hope it results in many members of the church leadership spending time in prison as well as the church losing large portions of its assets to civil suits.

Eh, you've trolled me worse than this before, but I still love your shapely buttocks.

Maybe not sure exactly what you mean though. I don't think there is anything wrong with the truly needy accepting charity. I have had such a low income recently that I would qualify for government assistance, but since I still have assets I haven't used up, I wouldn't really feel right signing up for them.
"Too proud" may have been the wrong terminology for this feeling.