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 QUESTIONS FROM ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST

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Question 13

Father, yesterday I became extremely upset about a piece of Art that was posted in an arts group on Facebook which portrays an Orthodox priest molesting a child. The artist herself apparently is portraying her disappointment in priests in General because of what they do. I did not post the art out of respect to you and the members but I have it upon your requests.  We know that such despicable things occur but I am fed up with the way Christianity is always targeted. I do NOT feel this is creative art. And for this particular artist to express her disappointment in priests in general, I have expressed that I do hope she has reported this to the police and not just expressed it through Art. What are your thoughts please. Thank you father    

 

Answer to Question 13

 

The Church has always been persecuted from the very beginning so it is nothing new. Sadly child molestation has been in the forefront of media news for many years because of priests belonging to the Roman Catholic Church. It cannot all be fabricated so there must be some truth in the accusations. For many people catholic, Orthodox, Anglican and any other denomination are all the same, they see only that they are Christian churches and do not understand the differences, so when one is guilty everyone is guilty. It is the same in any public occupation: if a policeman commits a crime then all policemen are guilty of committing crimes, if a lawyer commits fraud then all lawyers are guilty of fraud. In the same way people have freedom of speech, artist have the freedom to paint what they believe. There are many unchristian and blasphemous paintings and we cannot fight them all. But just like the artist has freedom to express his thoughts in art, we also are free to express our criticism of his work. The best thing is to simply ignore the painting and if it as offensive as you describe and has been used as the cover photo so you are faced with it every time you visit the page, then ask them to remove the offence or leave the group.