Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales Theology Religion Essay

Geoffrey Chaucers The Canterbury Tales Theology Religion Essay Avarice is defined as an extreme desire for personal material gain or wealth. It is also considered to be a deadly sin among others like gluttony and wrath. One of the main themes in The Canterbury Tales is that greed is the root of all evil. The message about avarice is clearly ironic, however, because each of the pilgrims on his and her way to Canterbury displays a greedy and self-centered quality. For example, the Pardoner sells sinners religious relics, to which he admits in his tale are not even real. He pockets the money in order to live lavishly instead of putting it towards improving the church. The Monk disregards his monastic order to never kill a creature, and instead engages in hunting for entertainment. The Summoner uses his position as a method of taking advantage of young women. The Summoners immoral choices are especially ironic because it is his job to punish those who violate the law of the church or act immorally. Nearly every pilgrim, with the exception of the Par son, demonstrates a sort of sneaky method to manipulate their surroundings into a way to experience personal gain. It becomes obvious that the entire message about greed in The Canterbury Tales is ironic. Ultimately, greed in the clergy is a main factor that contributes to the loss of followers for the church in the Middle Ages. They were no longer setting positive examples that others wanted to live by. With a morally weak and undependable clergy came a corrupt and undependable church. The Pardoners Tale is a specific part of The Canterbury Tales where Chaucer puts the most amount of irony and satirical content. The Pardoner starts his tale by talking about the disastrous effects of possessing drunkenness, swearing, gambling, and being greedy. He says that The Bibles words you cannot well deny: drinking by magistrates is called a vice.. and now that I have told of gluttony, Ill take up gambling, showing you thereby (Chaucer 125-128). At first, he seems like an honest man who is without corruption. However, he then tells the others that relics are fake and that they are simply used for him to gain money. He admits that instead of returning a sinner with salvation, that the money is kept to himself no matter how poor the sinner is. The Pardoner tells the entire tale while drinking alcohol and relaxing while the others gave him their attention. Halfway through his narrative yells N for the love of Crist, that for us dyde..sires, now wol I telle forth my tale (Chaucer 196-198). Immediately after shunning those who swear and drink, the Pardoner uses Gods name in vain before continuing his story and is brutally blunt, perhaps because he is drunk. Instantly, he shows himself to be a hypocrite and a nonbeliever in the very message that he preaches. He goes on to tell a tale about three young men who set out to kill Death for taking so many peoples lives when they discover a ton of gold at the roots of a tree. They forget about their incentive and they all become too individually greedy to want to share the gold they find. Two of the men kill the third and then are poisoned by the first man by drinking tainted wine. None of them get the chance to enjoy the gold. At the end, and one of the most shocking parts of the tale, the Pardoner preaches to the people like he would in a regular town or a village. He asks if any of the pilgrims want to buy a relic or indulgence, as if theyve forgotten that he openly admitted the falseness of his offerings. Those l ike the Pardoner are the typical hypocrites that were found in the Middle Ages. He is one that preachers to others about how to live a life free of sin, yet exemplifies everything that is immoral to him. His words can not be taken seriously by others because he does not take them seriously himself. Those like the Pardoner are believed to be a major reason in the decline of the Catholic Church. Decameron focuses more on relationships between men and women in order to show a decline in morals similar to those portrayed in Jeoffrey Chaucers work. It takes place around the time that the bubonic plague struck Europe and began to kill nearly a third of its entire population. The Black Death marks a time where even the most religious people questioned God for letting so many innocent people be swept up by disease. The European people were already discouraged and there was no longer a strong religion to turn to. The tales are about a group of people who join to escape the plague. They go on to tell tales every night like the pilgrims in The Canterbury Tales. The stories begin with open topics but go on to center the truth of the changing church. Decameron is another work that shows the nature of church officials by exploring their personal desires, such as lust and greed, despite the Bibles words. Another serious sin spoken of in the Bible is lust. Lust is described as a desire for pleasure for the body or physical company. In Corinthians 6:18 of the Bible, it is explained that sexual immorality is a sin against ones own body because longing for physical pleasure is wrong internally. In Europe, the Catholic Church enforced a doctrine that states that sex should be saved for marriage, and that even then, it is only to procreate. On the third day of the journey of those in Decameron, a story about lustful nuns is told explicitly by Filostrato. The tale is about a man who pretends to be mute and deaf and gets a gardening job at a covent for nuns. One day when he is laying, two of the nuns explore their lust. A quick dialogue between the two says what is t thou sayst? Knowest thou not that we have vowed our virginity to God? Oh, rejoined the first, think but how many vows are made to Him all day long, and never a one performed: and so, for our vow, let Him find another or others t o perform it' (Boccaccio 26-27). They both decide to lay with the man. The nonchalant manor in which the second nun says that tons of people make vows and that none are performed shows that even she had lost faith in God. In time, every single nun in the covent and their Abbess have made love to the man solely for pleasure. The tale goes to show that even the purest of women who devote themselves to God become suspects of lust and disregard their promises to Him. The tale focuses on young women longing for lust and not only men. Tales like Filostratos in Decameron are those that cause the book to become a forbidden read in parts of Europe during the Middle Ages. Those who read Decameron were engaging in pornography and could therefore be excommunicated by the church. Whether its tales were true or not, the church was certainly trying to hold onto its followers and mask any evidence of its impurities. The loss of morals and virtue of the Roman Catholic Church is ultimately what discouraged many people from joining. People viewed it as a greedy and corrupt organization that only wanted to take money by selling indulgences and stealing from its followers. Stories like Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio and The Canterbury Tales are a few of many novels published that capture the essence of the changing church by means of exposing its unjust leaders. A era then began where tons of Europeans still wanted to follow their religion but the Catholic Church became too dishonest to be seen as a holy center. The decline in churchgoers during the end of the Middle Ages leads to a time of new ideas presented to Europe by Martin Luther. While the end of the Middle Ages changed the general attitude to distrust the church, its consequences can be seen as positive as it leads to monumental changes in years to come.

Human Resources Information Essay

Introduction This report on data management; has been compiled to explain to you the reasons why HR data is important to an organisation, the types of data that should be recorded, the methods for collecting HR data and some of the UK legislation surrounding the recording, storing and accessibility of HR Data. Types of Data That Should Be Recorded and the Reasons Why â€Å"HR records include a wide range of data relating to individuals working in an organisation, for example, pay or absence levels, hours worked and trade union agreements. This information may be stored in a variety of media, such as computer databases or paper files.† (http://www.cipd.co.uk/hr-resources/factsheets/retention-hr-records.aspx#link_0, accessed 3/3/2015) There are some statutory records that need to be recorded and stored; these statutory records must be kept because the law requires them. Statutory records will include things like the job title, address and emergency contact. Records such as pay and working hours will  be stored to help management adhere to the Working Time Directive and the Minimum Wage Act 1998. Non-statutory records are kept for the internal purposes of the organisation. These records such as attendance, punctuality, skills, strengths and weaknesses can all be used to recognise trends within the company and aggregate management or big data so that managers can act on any trends that may need sorting. For example at P.P. Plasma Ltd there is only one person in the sales department who is trained to read and understand technical drawings. This person is currently in line for a promotion within the group of companies and will no longer be part of the sales team in the next eighteen months. After aggregating the records it has been identified that the manager of the drawing office has the skills to teach the other sales team members enough to fill this skills gap. Other reasons for storing records could be to review capability issues; induction records, training records and health and safety documentation should all allow the organisation to challenge staff on the reasons that they are not following procedures when they have had training and have signed to show understanding. These will also show any other training that may be necessary. As evidence in case of any tribunal or discrimination challenges; recruitment and selection data and termination of employment data will show the organisation has been fair and unbiased in its selection process or how they have dealt with a termination without discrimination. Methods of Storing HR Data Paper Method The paper method of storing records has many more disadvantages than advantages; but for small organisations would still be a viable solution to storing HR records. â€Å"Data relating to employees is of a highly contentious and potentially litigious nature and has to be managed in accordance with compliance regulations. To do this manually is a daunting task and often liable to malpractice.† (http://www.ipcgroup.co.uk, accessed 7/3/2015) There are time limits on the information that can be kept and if you are storing this information manually then this also means that you must remove or redact information every so often. This means that data could be stored for too long. Aggregating all of the data collected into big data can also be a challenge; most of this data will need to be entered into spreadsheets  manually in order to create the management data needed. Other issues with paper records are the cost of floor space needed to store the information, the difficulty of backing up such a system; this would require the same amount of floor space on an alternate site and the security of the records; some filing cabinets may be locked with a key but if somebody were to forget to lock the cabinet then these files are open to anybody with access to the room. Digital Method The digital method could be a cheaper, much more secure, simple and timesaving solution to all organisations but especially the larger ones. â€Å"Given the low cost and the easy accessibility of electronic records storage, many employers are making the digital leap to â€Å"paperless† HR. These days, most records are created and maintained electronically, and some never even make their way to paper.† (http://www.businessmanagementdaily.com, accessed 7/3/2015) Security on a digital system whether it be local or cloud based would be much easier to manage, an electronic record of anybody that as accessed data can be kept automatically and permissions can be set to allow some people to see records that others do not have permission to see; for example at P.P. Plasma Ltd the Managing Director will have access to the HR of everybody in the organisation whereas a departmental manager will only have access to the records on their own staff. Space is only an issue of how much cloud space you can afford or how big a hard drive you can have in your server if you are doing it locally. When using a cloud based service you need to ensure that the cloud service that you are using has a backup system in case of a failure or natural disaster and what the time constraints on these being implemented if needed. Whereas if you are using a local system you will need to speak with your IT department and ensure that the system is backed and removed from the site, this solution will also need a time constraint on how long the system will need to be put back into place. Other reasons to use a digital HR system would be that the data could be aggregated into management and big data easily, whether the HR system has this built in or the data needs to be copied into a spreadsheet or database in order to create graphs, charts , tables and reports. Searching digital records could be done with a few clicks of the mouse and as long as the permissions are set up correctly this could also tell you who you need to  speak to in order to gain access to the information that you are searching for. UK Legislation regarding HR Data There are many pieces of legislation surrounding the recording, accessing and storing of HR data but the two that I am going to explain are the Date Protection Act 1998 and the Freedom of Information Act 2000. The Data Protection Act 1998 controls how your personal information is used by organisations, businesses or the government. Anybody responsible for storing and accessing HR data has to follow the data protection principles. They must make sure the information is: used fairly and lawfully used for limited or specifically stated purposes used in a way that is adequate, relevant and not excessive accurate kept for no longer than is absolutely necessary handled according to people’s data protection rights kept safe and secure not transferred outside the UK without adequate protection Anybody who feels that there data has not been used in accordance to these principles can make a complaint to the organisation themselves and if they are still unhappy with the response can contact the Information Commissioner’s Office. The Freedom of Information Act 2000 gives the general public right of access to all types of recorded information held by public authorities and those providing services for them. It also sets out exemptions from that right and places a number of obligations on public authorities. Recorded information includes printed documents, computer files, letters, emails, photographs, and sound or video recordings. In order to adhere to the Freedom of Information Act; any person making a request to a public authority for information will be entitled to be informed whether that information is held. The Freedom of Information Act does not give people access to their own personal data such as their health records or credit reference file. If a member of the public wants to see information that a public authority holds about them, they should make a subject access request under the Data Protection Act 1998

Analysis Of `` Fences `` A Generational Story About Troy...

Near the turn of the century, as decades passed by in a prejudiced America, where to be black was to lose all dignity, an emerging provocative spirit of liberation eventually catalyzed a period of great change: a period of enlightenment known as the 1960s. Slowly but surely, black pride began to restore as differences in morals between successive generations caused societal changes. Capturing the essence of black struggles prior to -and during- this dynamic period of change, August Wilson wrote the play Fences, a generational story about Troy Maxson, the son of a black sharecropper father. Highlighted by the play’s title, a particularly important motif of Wilson’s work is the concept of â€Å"fences† regarding how they both â€Å"trap things in†Ã¢â‚¬ ¦show more content†¦On pg. 28, after Gabriel’s sudden appearance, Troy argues to Rose, â€Å"If my brother didn’t have that metal plate in his head †¦ I wouldn t have a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of.† Essentially, he would not have had his land if Gabriel had not been injured. Furthermore, his negative tone, shown through his aggressive word choice throughout his dialogue with Rose, implies agitation and suggests some degree of guilt. After all, Gabriel’s compensatory grant was originally intended to be used for his own well being -and not for the sake of Troy’s stability. While Rose treats Gabriel well with care and concern, shown by her offering to feed him (on pg. 26) and pointing out that â€Å"he ain’t eating right† (on pg. 27), Troy’s guilt leads him to further ignore and cheat Gabriel out of what is rightfully his. On pg. 74 and 75, Rose forcefully confronts Troy for allowing Gabriel to get â€Å"locked up† and â€Å"signing him to the hospital for half his money†, and he responds by claiming that he had been unaware of the release form’s conditions. Intentional or not, this cle arly inconsiderate act supports Troy’s â€Å"pushing away† of Gabriel, showing his incapacity to face guilt and shines a selfish light on him. Finally, on pg. 28, although Troy intends to fix his fence at first, after Gabriel’s sudden intrusion, a mental shift clearly occurs in Troy, who immediately ditches his

Comparing The Political Theories Of Two Philosophers

Dominic Bressi Prof. Catherine Chaput CH 201 15 October 2014 When comparing the political theories of two renowned philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle, one must first focus on the merits of each of their own theories in depth. Plato is often considered as the first writer of political philosophy while Aristotle is considered the first political scientist. Though Aristotle was once a student of Plato, the two differ on the topic of how to best improve society for the benefit of mankind. Thus, both of their theories need to be investigated to establish the varying degrees of how the two philosophers differ. In his work, Apology of the Socrates, Plato explains that he was one of the young people that Socrates had been accused of†¦show more content†¦Plato believed that hedonism would lead to the downfall of any civilization. Contrary to these utopian views set upon by Plato, Aristotle focuses on how to work with the flaws in humanity in The Politics. He explains that the society needs to work on its own to form the best society it can while embracing the elements that Plato considers flawed in order to be truly successful. According to Aristotle, perfecting human society was not the goal that needed to be worked towards, rather improving the systems we already have in existence is the only way to create something close to a utilitarian civilization. Unlike Plato, who focused on inductive approaches to create a system that should be, Aristotle relied on deductive approaches to work towards what actually could be. Because there was no evidence that societies of the world were in need of the drastic reformation that Plato had suggested, Aristotle considered Utopia as an abstract solution to a problem that was less than concrete. Plato’s utopia is comprised of three different, non-hereditary class systems where the Guardians, who were supposed to be skilled in the matters of the government and were the absolute rulers who were charged with knowing what was best for their societies, were divided into ruling and non-ruling individuals; the non-rulers comprised of civil servants whereas the rulers were those who created policies. The auxiliary individuals in such a society were the minor civil servant and the army.