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