10 ms·

There’s a reasonable conversation to be had about when to spend and when to save. I don’t pretend to have all the answers there. But as someone on the inside,

There’s a reasonable conversation to be had about when to spend and when to save. I don’t pretend to have all the answers there. But as someone on the inside, I’ll say this: local congregations have very strict budgets allotted to them, but the welfare component of the budget is essentially unlimited. Local leaders are encouraged (and it is part of their mandate) to “seek out the poor”. Most individual welfare happens at the local level, and local leaders are not expected to limit their assistance to the money the local unit pulls in. This is a simplification of the process, but welfare assistance is one of the few places where local leaders are not given explicit caps. For a very centralized organization they give a lot of leeway to local leaders to let assess local needs.

darksaints 7y ago
And yet, with no explicit cap on welfare spending, the church only claims about $40 million per year on charitable giving. As a percentage of their revenue, that is monstrously pathetic. I have a better chance of feeding the poor by giving my money to a Fyre Festival who will take 95% of the money and skip town but pay 5% to a local vendor who buys shitty bread from a local company who employs a poor person for minimum wage.
- sturgill 7y ago
  Bad comparison when you’re skeptical of an entity investing money in businesses who employ lots of people...
  - darksaints 7y ago
    I see you're admitting the church is a business. Too bad that's not how they tell it to their members. I'd be perfectly fine with the church's actions if they would just admit that they're a profit seeking enterprise and charity is only of value for the PR it brings. At least then I wouldn't have felt swindled when I found out that all that money I spent on tithing while working 80 hours a week as a truck driver to pay my way though college was actually just sitting in an investment fund making a handful of people rich. I would have known from the beginning that that was where my money was going, and I would have no room to complain.
    - sturgill 7y ago
      I called it an entity that invests in businesses. It very clearly has an investment arm (which I have known about for decades). The Church owns physical assets and I’m okay with that. I’d rather it have liquid assets than struggle to pay its bills like in the 1800s - early 1900s. I’m a fan of financial prudence. At the end of the day, and as unpopular as it is, I believe Joseph Smith saw the Father and the Son. Other things are details. I’m not a naive or ignorant person, but I honestly have no issue with how the Church handles its finances (as an organization). Given that we do not believe that anyone is infallible (including the Prophet) I will stop short of absolute statements of any one particular person. But, as an organization, they handle their finances prudently. Which I appreciate and respect.
      - darksaints 7y ago
        The modern church teaches that you should pay tithing irregardless of living condition, income level, destitution or poverty conditions. I taught this principle to people who were literally starving to death in Honduras. It was extremely hard for me to tell people who didn't even have a cup of rice in their 4x4 corrugated steel shack that they needed to donate 10% to the church before they could buy food for their three kids. Later I learned that it hasn't always been this way. The church has deliberately misrepresented its own doctrine to extract everything they can from these people. In 1899 the Church was almost bankrupt. President Lorenzo Snow and the GAs went around Utah shaking the members down. The 1899 General Conference was "the tithing conference" and where Lorenzo gave pivotal instruction about tithing - which defined the church in relation to tithing going forward. Lorenzo Snow said in the 1899 Conference Address "...I plead with you in the name of the Lord, and I pray that every man, woman and child WHO HAS MEANS shall pay one tenth of their income as a tithing..." Conference Report Oct 1899 page 28 (3/5th way down column 2 on page 28) [http://archive.org/stream/conferencereport1899sa/conferencereport692chur#page/28/mode/2up http://archive.org/stream/conferencereport1899sa/conferencer... However, in the 2011 Lesson Manual, in Lesson 12- Tithing, the Church quote this talk as: "....I plead with you in the name of the Lord, and I pray that every man, woman and child ... shall pay one tenth of their income as a tithing...." Teachings of Lorenzo Snow manual, page 160 [https://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of-presidents-of-the-church-lorenzo-snow/chapter-12-tithing-a-law-for-our-protection-and-advancement?lang=eng https://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of-presidents-of-the-ch...] THE HISTORICAL IDEA THAT YOU ONLY TITHED IF YOU HAD MEANS HAS BEEN REDUCED TO AN ELIPSES. So yeah...the broke church from the past only asked for tithing from those who had means, but the "prudent" multibillion dollar corporation of the present expects it from people whose children will only grow to 5 feet tall as an adult because their diet consists of rice and yucca and parasite-infected water. The church is a wealthy corporation today. Sure they manage their finances well. But their coercive tithing policies that are misrepresented by their own modern literature are extremely burdensome to a huge portion of their membership. They don't need their money, and they should stop asking for it and pretending like their salvation depends on it. And if it really is the case that their financial secrecy is hiding their personal enrichment off the backs of those experiencing poverty, I really hope that a hell exists that is as bad as they deserve.

darksaints 7y ago

And yet, with no explicit cap on welfare spending, the church only claims about $40 million per year on charitable giving. As a percentage of their revenue, that is monstrously pathetic. I have a better chance of feeding the poor by giving my money to a Fyre Festival who will take 95% of the money and skip town but pay 5% to a local vendor who buys shitty bread from a local company who employs a poor person for minimum wage.

sturgill 7y ago
Bad comparison when you’re skeptical of an entity investing money in businesses who employ lots of people...
- darksaints 7y ago
  I see you're admitting the church is a business. Too bad that's not how they tell it to their members. I'd be perfectly fine with the church's actions if they would just admit that they're a profit seeking enterprise and charity is only of value for the PR it brings. At least then I wouldn't have felt swindled when I found out that all that money I spent on tithing while working 80 hours a week as a truck driver to pay my way though college was actually just sitting in an investment fund making a handful of people rich. I would have known from the beginning that that was where my money was going, and I would have no room to complain.
  - sturgill 7y ago
    I called it an entity that invests in businesses. It very clearly has an investment arm (which I have known about for decades). The Church owns physical assets and I’m okay with that. I’d rather it have liquid assets than struggle to pay its bills like in the 1800s - early 1900s. I’m a fan of financial prudence. At the end of the day, and as unpopular as it is, I believe Joseph Smith saw the Father and the Son. Other things are details. I’m not a naive or ignorant person, but I honestly have no issue with how the Church handles its finances (as an organization). Given that we do not believe that anyone is infallible (including the Prophet) I will stop short of absolute statements of any one particular person. But, as an organization, they handle their finances prudently. Which I appreciate and respect.
    - darksaints 7y ago
      The modern church teaches that you should pay tithing irregardless of living condition, income level, destitution or poverty conditions. I taught this principle to people who were literally starving to death in Honduras. It was extremely hard for me to tell people who didn't even have a cup of rice in their 4x4 corrugated steel shack that they needed to donate 10% to the church before they could buy food for their three kids. Later I learned that it hasn't always been this way. The church has deliberately misrepresented its own doctrine to extract everything they can from these people. In 1899 the Church was almost bankrupt. President Lorenzo Snow and the GAs went around Utah shaking the members down. The 1899 General Conference was "the tithing conference" and where Lorenzo gave pivotal instruction about tithing - which defined the church in relation to tithing going forward. Lorenzo Snow said in the 1899 Conference Address "...I plead with you in the name of the Lord, and I pray that every man, woman and child WHO HAS MEANS shall pay one tenth of their income as a tithing..." Conference Report Oct 1899 page 28 (3/5th way down column 2 on page 28) [http://archive.org/stream/conferencereport1899sa/conferencereport692chur#page/28/mode/2up http://archive.org/stream/conferencereport1899sa/conferencer... However, in the 2011 Lesson Manual, in Lesson 12- Tithing, the Church quote this talk as: "....I plead with you in the name of the Lord, and I pray that every man, woman and child ... shall pay one tenth of their income as a tithing...." Teachings of Lorenzo Snow manual, page 160 [https://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of-presidents-of-the-church-lorenzo-snow/chapter-12-tithing-a-law-for-our-protection-and-advancement?lang=eng https://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-of-presidents-of-the-ch...] THE HISTORICAL IDEA THAT YOU ONLY TITHED IF YOU HAD MEANS HAS BEEN REDUCED TO AN ELIPSES. So yeah...the broke church from the past only asked for tithing from those who had means, but the "prudent" multibillion dollar corporation of the present expects it from people whose children will only grow to 5 feet tall as an adult because their diet consists of rice and yucca and parasite-infected water. The church is a wealthy corporation today. Sure they manage their finances well. But their coercive tithing policies that are misrepresented by their own modern literature are extremely burdensome to a huge portion of their membership. They don't need their money, and they should stop asking for it and pretending like their salvation depends on it. And if it really is the case that their financial secrecy is hiding their personal enrichment off the backs of those experiencing poverty, I really hope that a hell exists that is as bad as they deserve.