Why Philanthropy is not Sanctimonious

Philanthropy is a process that’s extremely practical,
a strategy whose benefits are more than merely tactical,
providing help to human beings in a manner not sanctimonious.
Willingness to spend money philanthropically the greatest thank to money is,
behavior that is generally regarded as more prestigious
than selfishly motivated contributions to campaigns of politicians,
or impecunious behavior, pelvic theology, whose rules restrict religious
permission to reproduce by means of sexual emissions.

The last line of this poem was composed before I learned about the concept of “pelvic theology” reading “Pope Leo Chooses Social Justice Over Pelvic Theology,” NYT, 5/22/26, in which David Gibson,  the director of the Center on Religion and Culture at Fordham University. discusses the first encyclical of Pope Leo XIV, “Magnifica Humanitas,” or “Magnificent Humanity”:

Dedicating his first encyclical to social justice would show how much Leo, like his predecessor Pope Francis, is trying to shift Catholicism away from the near fixation on “pelvic theology,” or sexual morality, that has come to define Catholicism, especially in Leo’s home country, the United States. The concern is that decades of focusing on “sins below the waist,” as Pope Francis memorably put it, has fueled the church’s culture war agenda and driven many people away from the central teachings of the Gospels. It has also left workers and the marginalized with a weakened moral voice against the predations of powerful financial interests.