'Millions' Essay Money is a vital part of how society around the world runs. Without money, people would lose the ability to buy essential items that they need to live; such as clothes, heat, electricity, and water. However, having too much money can bring about many problems. With a lot of money, people could have lower self-esteem, and cannot buy things such as love, friends, and happiness. The film "Millions" demonstrates three tenants from Catholic Social Teaching: human rights and responsibilities, the preferential option for the poor, and subsidiarity. The movie, 'Millions' gives us a glimpse into this by introducing us to Damian Cunningham, and his older brother Anthony who acquire £265,000 and are faced to make decisions on how to spend the money with England's upcoming deadline to change the country's currency to Euros. Damian finds the money when he is playing in his fort and chatting with one of the saints. The bag of money falls and breaks Damian's fort and he goes out to investigate. Damian is a very religious child who loves to read and interact with the saints in his everyday life. When Damian retrieves the money, he goes to tell his brother Anthony. The film then follows how Damian and Anthony try to spend the money, as well as attempting to convert it into Euros, in different ways. Anthony prefers to spend the money to raise his social status at school by paying his friends to treat him like he's a big shot. He also looks at real estate to help save the money and raise his, and Damian's, economic status. Damian, on the other hand, tried to spend the wealth by attempting to help those who are less fortunate than him. Damian believed that the money was from God which is why he wanted to help others with it. The movie deals with ethics such as what is right from wrong, and how human emotions come to play in dealing with money and power.
The first Catholic social teaching tenent addressed in the movie is human rights and responsibilities. Damian is the character that best shows this tenent in the movie. Damian shows this tenent by donating a 1000 pound roll of cash into a bin that was used to donate money to Africa. Damian felt compelled to do this because he wanted to help those that were not able to afford to have water. The money he donated was going to be used to build water wells in impoverished nations. However, Damian was caught trying to donate the large sum of cash and ended up getting in trouble with the school as well as the lady collecting the cash, Dorothy. Despite getting caught, the thought that counts. Damian showed a responsibility for all the people who do not have water by helping give them the water they need to survive and feed their families. It supports the right to life that the people living in the poor villages have by providing them with what they needed. Damian showed his compassion for human rights and his responsibilities.
The second Catholic social teaching tenet addressed in the film is the preferential option for the poor and vulnerable. Damian shows this tenant when he goes around asking people if they are poor. Damian does this in a very obvious manner which sometimes led to people answering him with awkward and confused responses, like the man on the bike. Since Damian is younger, he didn't think anything of him randomly asking people if they are poor since he just simply wanted to help them. However, some people still take advantage of Damian's kind gestures. When Damian and his brother Anthony were walking around the town and they saw a group of people. Damian asked them if they were poor and then decided to feed them pizza. After feeding them, the large group of people left the boys behind to foot the bill which most likely cost a lot of money, especially with all the food the group ordered. Anthony tried to show Damian how selfish people can be, however Damian still believed that he did something good for others. Damian shows the preferential option for the poor and vulnerable throughout the film and helps the viewers to see good in helping others.
The last Catholic social teaching tenet addressed in the film is solidarity. Damian is also the character who demonstrates this in the film when he goes around the neighborhood giving money out to his neighborhood. Damian was approached by a saint, who he is friends with, and decided to do this. By giving out his money to his neighbors, Damian shows that he and his neighbors are one human family that supports and helps each other. Damian thought that the Mormons were poor which is why he decided to put money into their mail slots. With the money, the Mormons bought new TVs, electronics, and other luxury items. However, Damian believed that he did a good thing and what matters is the act of him trying to help his neighbors out.