And a significant portion of that ends up being spent trying to convert people, instead of helping them. I took up my own 10% donation practice despite having

And a significant portion of that ends up being spent trying to convert people, instead of helping them. I took up my own 10% donation practice despite having left the baptist church because my leaving was a matter of principle, not a way of getting out of social responsibility. But let me tell you: having seen how that money gets used when it goes to the church, at least in the evangelical sphere, it is laughable to put it in the same category as real charities that actually work to improve real people's lives. Every expenditure, every event, even the stuff that might otherwise fall under actual charity, all of it was to the end of converting people. All of it. They would talk about this explicitly: the primary purpose of painting that school, or handing out food to those disaster victims, was all about getting attention so people would become Christians. All of it. It was manipulative and shameful. That is not charity, much less "effective" charity.