Passionists Invest In Broadway Musical

The Passionist Province of St. Paul of the Cross invested $50,000 in a Broadway production of the 1992 Steve Martin movie, "Leap of Faith":

The Passionists say that their financial security does not hinge on whether “Leap of Faith” is a smash, although box-office success would certainly provide much-needed help. As it is, they are selling off retreat centers and residences to ward off bankruptcy.

Instead, they see their investment — in a play about the path of a flimflamming faith healer to redemption — as a novel way to deliver their spiritual message and, who knows, attract a new member or two. “It’s more to break out and do something creative,” the Rev. Edward Beck, 52, the treasurer for the province, explained. “If people aren’t joining us, and we’re closing our retreat houses, maybe this is a way in a secular culture.”

Finding their way in today’s world looms large for the members of this Passionist province, which covers the eastern United States, a bit of Canada, and Jamaica, West Indies. Their central missions — preaching the Word and promoting prayer — remain the same as when the order was founded in 1725, but basic survival is not far behind.

In the early 1960s, the province had about 630 members; young men drawn to the Passionist brand of religious life routinely replenished its ranks. Today, it has about 144 members. The average age is 78. And very rarely, as in nearly never, does anyone knock on the door to ask about becoming a novice.

This story seems to be an interesting comment on the recent issue over Paul Ryan's budget and Catholic social teaching and subsidiarity.  Here's a bit of the discussion:

But Ryan’s budget does more than simply reduce the debt: It increases spending on defense, and it cuts taxes by trillions of dollars. His spending cuts need to pay for those priorities, as well as for deficit reduction, and for that reason, they need to be quite deep. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that 62 percent of Ryan’s proposed $5.3 trillion in budget cuts comes from programs that serve low-income Americans.
In cutting government spending, however, Ryan argues that he would “revitalize civil society instead of displacing it,” allowing local community and faith organizations, among others, to play a bigger role. “Government is one word for things we do together. But it is not the only word. We are a nation that prides itself on looking out for one another — and government has an important role to play in that. But relying on distant government bureaucracies to lead this effort just hasn’t worked.”
Not all of the church’s faithful, however, were convinced by his defense. In terms of understanding the Catholic Church’s doctrine on social issues, “we’d give that speech an F,” said the Rev. Thomas Reese, a Jesuit priest at Georgetown’s Woodstock Theological Center. “Catholics believe that problems should be dealt with at the lowest levels. But if families could take care of themselves, and the local government could, we wouldn’t have the crisis that we’re facing right now.”

I've got to wonder, if Catholic religious orders can't count on the Catholic laity to support them financially, how well will churches be able to support social welfare programs without government involvement?  As Fr. Reese says, if families and local governments could take care of themselves, we wouldn't be in the mess we are.  Paul Ryan is just trying to use subsidiarity as a smoke screen to cover his and conservative Catholics' own selfishness and greed (now Ryan is denying faith in Ayn Rand, much like St. Peter and Jesus).  He claims local communities would take care of their own, but since our communities are so segregated by race and economic level, it is pretty easy for the wealthy to take care of their own community.  That just allows them to to ignore all the people in real need.  Meanwhile, communities which are actually suffering can't afford to take care of themselves.  Yes, Paul, I'm sure your budget is just what Jesus would want.