I suppose your comment ties in well with the "needy are not our brethren" theme.
The evidence shows that the Church evangelized the "least of these". That's the reason for disparity in wealth.
A theme of Rome's devising, contradicted by the evidence that Protestant missionaries evangelized the world.
And where the seed of God's word grew and flourished, so too did those countries. No coincidence.
In your dreams, because it had nothing to do with that comment but rather with the comment about Protestant work ethic. It's a real shame that Catholics simply cannot address the actual substance of a post but must rather create some fantasy to attack.
The evidence shows that the Church evangelized the "least of these". That's the reason for disparity in wealth.
Hardly, considering the extravagance and opulence with which the RCC decorates its buildings and the luxury with which the pope and his subordinates live and the abject poverty the people in the most heavily Catholic countries live in.
The Catholic Church did not *evangelized* impoverished countries. Look at the Spanish Conquistadors. They conquered countries in South America that have vast wealth in gold and emeralds, and other natural resources. How can you say that they chose the poorest to *evangelize* (read:conquer)
You can excuse and rationalize all you want, but your argument has no merit because all the countries started on pretty much the same level and where they ended up is directly tied to which branch of Christianity was dominant. In Northern Europe, where Protestant Christianity flourished, prosperity was evident.
In southern Europe, Central and South America, and the Philippines, where the RCC dominates, although those areas have geography and climate that favor prosperity, they are poor as all get out.
Why doesn't the Catholic Church do something about teaching them to help themselves? They've had hundreds of years in many of those countries to accomplish it, and they're still not in much better condition than they were when Catholicism was first introduced.
Or the more likely answer,
Rome raped many of the poor countries and their riches are now squirreled away in the Vatican while the Protestant work ethic built countries like America.