经济学人下载:宗教审查服务 上帝的外包工作

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宗教审查服务

The Lord's outsourced work
上帝的外包工作

The Vatican introduces price controls on the saint-verifying business
罗马教廷在圣徒核查领域引入价格控制机制

IF YOU came across an essay titled The Cost of Sainthood you might assume it was a homily on the self-sacrificing life of some heroic person.
如果你偶然看到一篇文章题为《圣徒的代价》，你可能以为这是一篇关于某个英雄人物自我牺牲的道德说教。

But it turns out that sainthood has a cost in a more literal sense—and it has been rising.
但是事实上，作为圣徒还有一个实际意义上的花费，而且这个花费在不断增加。

When Cardinal John O'Connor ofNew Yorkstarted a campaign for the canonisation of Dorothy Day, an activist who toiled among the city's poor, some said this was a bad use of church funds.
多罗西·戴是一名挣扎在纽约贫苦人群中的激进主义分子。纽约主教约翰·欧·康纳为其的圣徒册封仪式发起活动，而有人说这一行为滥用了教派基金。

He retorted that the expense was not excessive: an initiative to canonise a Haitian-born New Yorker called Pierre Toussaint, already well advanced, had cost less than $4,000
主教反驳道，此项花费并非多度：为一名出生在海地的纽约人皮埃尔·图森特发起的册封倡议已经花费超过4000美元，而这一活动进展非常顺利。

But that was in the late 1990s. These days a successful canonisation campaign launched inAmericatypically costs around $250,000, and can go far higher, says the Catholic News Service, an agency editorially independent of the church.
独立于教会的编辑代理机构《天主教新闻通讯社》称，但是那是在二十世纪九十年代末期。现在在美国，一项成功的圣徒册封活动大致需要花费25万美元甚至更高。

The procedures for having somebody recognised as a saint are elaborate and bureaucratic.
让某人受封成为圣徒的程序复杂精细而又庄严肃穆。

They require an exchange of documents and expertise over many years between the person's home region and theVatican.
需要主教奔赴候选人的家乡，调查相关文献，并将资料送到教会，获得相关专家的意见。

All sorts of experts may be called in, including doctors, who are asked to comment on the two miraculous cures which are a prerequisite for full sainthood.
这一过程将历时多年。各类专家将会被召集，其中也包括医生，他们将会对两种疑难杂症的治愈过程进行评价，因为这是完全成为圣徒的首要条件之一。

And a key role is played by an expert, often a Rome-based canon lawyer, known as a postulator, who mediates between the candidate's fan base and theVatican, and helps prepare a case for sainthood.
另外，专家也将发挥重要作用。这个专家通常是一个来自于罗马的寺院律师，被叫做列圣申请官。

To the dismay of Dan Brown fans, the role of devil's advocate, who argued against a prospective sainthood, was abolished in 1983.
他将会在候选人的支持者基地和罗马教会之间进行调停，并协助候选人的受封仪式。令丹·布朗的追随者沮丧的是，扮演与候选圣徒唱反调的魔鬼辩护人的角色在1983年被取缔。

The whole business will come under scrutiny this year, with two recentish popes—John XXIII and John Paul II—due to be proclaimed saints in April.
今年，圣徒册封仪式将会在准教皇约翰二十三世和约翰·保罗二世两位的仔细审查下进行。

This helps explain why, in a speech to postulators this month, Cardinal Angelo Amato, who oversees the Vatican's sainthood department, disclosed that it had introduced a reference tariff—in effect, price regulation—for the costs incurred in promoting a possible saint.
这两位将会在今年四月正式宣誓上任。这也就是为什么本月掌管罗马教廷圣徒机构的主教安格鲁·阿玛托在致列圣申请官的讲话中提到的，他们将会针对提名一个圣徒候选人所产生的相关费用引进一项举荐关税。 这项关税实际上是一种价格规章。

The department will also continue to ensure that candidates from poor countries, whose backers are less able to pay for elaborate verification services, get a fair hearing.
这个机构也会继续确保来自贫穷国家的人们有机会成为候选人。这些人们的支持者无力支付详尽审查服务的费用或举行一个公平的听证会。

Even that policy has its detractors.
但这个政策仍然有反对的声音。

Bill Briggs, author of a book on canonisation, has argued that the investigation system introduced by John Paul II, since it is less adversarial than before, was a marketing coup: it facilitated a wave of new saints in emerging markets, helping to recruit new souls to Catholicism.
比尔·布里格斯写了一本关于圣徒册封仪式的著作。在书中，他驳斥由教皇约翰·保罗二世引入的候选人调查制度是一个营销诡计，因为该制度不像以往那样具有反抗意识。它催生了新兴市场里一批新圣徒的诞生，为天主教注入了新鲜的血液。

But sainthood is never just a matter of money.
但是成为圣徒决不是只关乎金钱。

Some see the canonisation of two popes—a Polish conservative and an Italian reformer—as a way to reconcile traditionalists and radicals.
有人认为两位教皇的册封，是传统主义者和激进分子相互妥协的一种方式。

And Meaghan O'Keefe of the University of California,Davissees the promotion of Dorothy Day as a move by male bishops to neutralise the country's left-leaning nuns.
加州大学戴维斯分校的米根·欧·基夫认为男性主教对多罗西·戴的提名，旨在寻求国家重心的平均分配，而不是过度倾向于关注修道院。

Politics comes into the picture, as well as Mammon.
政治问题以及财富收入也成为成为需要考虑的相关因素。