“Mankind was my business!”
-Jacob Marley, in A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens“His wealth is of no use for him. He don’t do any good with it.”
-Fred, in A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Last week, Jana Reiss wrote a follow-up article to her 2020 article announcing her decision to stop paying tithing to the LDS Church. I won’t reiterate her reasoning here–you can read it for yourself–but I have been curious about some of the responses I’ve read to her position both on her article and in a recent BCC post.
I will state at the outset that I stopped paying tithing to the Church after the news of the Church’s 100B+ investment fund broke. I had been on the fence about it for a while because the Church was spending money on amicus briefs supporting employment discrimination against LGBTQ+ folks, but I paid anyway in 2019–just days before the news broke (and the Church issued its absurd response). In 2020, I attended tithing settlement and declared myself a non-full-tithe-payer. I haven’t been to tithing settlement or renewed a temple recommend since then.
I’m not telling readers this to say you should do what I do, but to be fully transparent about how I’ve approached it. I do not think people who tithe to the LDS Church are evil or wrong or stupid, and my purpose in writing isn’t to persuade anyone with respect to their own practices That said, I am skeptical of the arguments that many “ProgMo’s” are making in response to Jana’s piece and in justifying the Church’s definition, expectations, and practices around tithing. (I don’t like the term “ProgMo”, btw, but for my purposes here it’s my best umbrella term.) Those justifications don’t pass the smell-test for me. I have to wonder if there is something else going on … and I think there is. But I’ll get to that. First, let’s discuss the public justifications–again, with the massive caveat that my point is to engage with arguments and reasoning, not to cast judgment on the people making those arguments. Then I want to talk about what I think might really be going on with these justifications.
- Justifications & Responses
- “God defines tithing as money given to the Church, not to other charities.”
At the outset, I fully acknowledge that the current teaching of the LDS Church is that tithing = a tenth of your income to the Church. While I know some people who declare themselves tithe payers even if their money goes to other organizations (Jana is in that camp), and I also know of Bishops who accept this version (leadership roulette strikes again), I’m not in that camp. I do not declare myself a full tithe payer because I don’t pay the kind of tithing that the Church obviously means when it asks that question. I simply think that’s the wrong question to be asking.
That said, I struggle quite a bit to make the leap from “a Church leader told me that God told him that tithing must be paid to the Church that the leader runs” to “God has defined tithing as money paid to the LDS Church.”
First, we know that the definition of tithing has changed over time within the LDS Church itself. Indeed, there is no scriptural basis for the current definition of tithing–Malachi isn’t talking about people paying tithing; he’s talking about religious leaders hoarding the offerings (sound familiar?) and the D&C’s iteration of tithing doesn’t resemble what’s done today (plus, it’s the D&C – the same book of scripture that brought us Section 132, so I mean come on).
Second, while I realize that this is a common line of thinking among many Church members (“when the prophet speaks, the thinking is done”) it’s typically not one you see among “ProgMo’s”, so it’s jarring to see people who are otherwise fairly comfortable grappling with things Church leaders have done or said in the past (or present) refusing to engage on the tithing piece.
This is particularly true here where there is such an obvious conflict of interest between the speaker and what’s being said. Of course, I’m not arguing that Church leaders are lining their own pockets with tithing dollars–they aren’t (well, not exactly, although it is their salary and living). But Church leaders’ jobs are to protect the institution of the Church. So of course, it’s convenient for them to tell members they have to financially support the Church before doing literally anything else (including meeting their own sustenance needs). I remember the day I realized (way too late in life for a thinking person) that when a bunch of men say that God says that men should be in charge, maybe I should treat that with a bit of skepticism. Likewise, when a bunch of Church authorities say that God says that we should our money to the Church … well, perhaps some skepticism is warranted.
Of course, we can’t know the inner thoughts of Church leaders. Perhaps they sincerely believe in the definition of tithing that they teach–they probably do. I’m not saying that they are doing any of this in bad faith. But when it comes to judging right and wrong, and whether something comes from God or not, I do not think it is sound to make that judgment based on the identity of authority of the person who makes the statement. Rather, I think we have to make that judgment based on the fruits of the teaching and whether it it consistent with the teachings of Jesus Christ.
To me, nothing about a Church amassing 200B+ of wealth and giving only a pittance to people in need is consistent with the teachings of Jesus Christ, and I’m not seeing good fruits from the hoarding. So I base my judgment about what God might think of how we use our resources based on that, not based on the bare fact that someone with a particular calling has told us what God thinks.
- “Of course we should also donate money to other charities. Tithing is not the entirety of a person’s charitable giving and doesn’t take away from that.”
This is of course technically true–you can give money to the LDS Church AND you can give money to other causes–but we need a reality check here. For tithe-payers or former tithe-payers, how many of you gave the same amount to other charities as you did to the LDS Church? 10% of your income to the LDS Church and another 10% to other charitable causes? Most years I have given money to both, but I wasn’t giving anywhere near the amount to other organizations as the Church. Who really has 20% of their income to give away? I would suspect that there is a large number of people for whom the Church is their *only* form of charitable giving, and an even larger (probably the majority) of people for whom the Church is the lions share and they also give to other charities but in smaller amounts.
Charitable giving is literally zero-sum. What you give to the LDS Church, you no longer have to give elsewhere. If you are interested in maximizing the amount of good your money does to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the earth, or whatever else it is you think God wants you to do, then every dollar you give to the Church is a dollar of yours that’s not going towards that.
- “It’s not my job to judge how the Church uses my tithes. I may disagree with how the Church spends money, and I hope that they start donating more to worthy causes. My job is simply to exercise faith and pay my tithing, and if I do that I know I am square with God and God will hold Church leaders accountable if they mismanage funds.”
I am very troubled by this line of reasoning. This is the same line of reasoning people use when they say “when the prophet speaks, the thinking is done.” It’s the same line of reasoning people use when they absolve themselves of any responsibility to make their own moral judgments and instead say that if a leader leads us astray and we follow, then the leader will be held accountable, not us. That’s an outsourcing of our moral authority and agency, and an abdication of responsibility over our stewardship of resources we’ve been blessed with.
Again, what surprises me is that the same people who are making these arguments might, say, oppose the Church’s position on gay marriage or the way the Church is handling the BYU’s. So why does the Church get a pass when it comes to tithing? I can’t really square that.
Not only that, but I believe we have different experiences on earth and in life so that we can learn more about God and contribute to the Body of Christ. If we rely on the Church to decide who needs what help, the Church is not going to be aware of needs that we might be aware of because of our own life experience.
As an example, this summer my family became aware of a conservation project for the last wild tributary to the Colorado River, and we donated money to that project. Is that what everyone else needs to do? No, although that would be great! But it’s an example of a need that we became aware of through our own personal experience. Other people become aware of other needs. Why would God put these needs in our paths if we aren’t meant to address them but rather to count on Church leaders (who do not have the same life experiences as we do) to address them?
- “Tithing isn’t about money, it’s about faith. God doesn’t need my money, but He does need me to sanctify myself through paying tithing.”
First, it is absolutely correct that God doesn’t need our money. And the LDS Church definitely doesn’t need our money either as it’s got quite the nice nest egg.
You know who needs our money?
Hungry people. Refugees. Widows. Orphans. Queer kids. The mentally and physically incapacitated.
I don’t think it takes any less faith to part with our substance and donate to organizations that are using money in ways we feel good about than to give the money to the Church instead. As one commenter noted on BCC, do we have the faith not to pay tithing?
Second, by making tithing about our own personal development and sanctification, doesn’t that kind of make it about us? About our own worthiness? If we are paying tithing because we believe it will help us become holy, even if the tithing is totally pointless to pay because the organization we are paying it to doesn’t need it, doesn’t that make us selfish?
Not only that, but I don’t see how it’s any less sanctifying to donate to organizations in need. Shifting from the majority of my contributions going into the black box that is the Church financial institution to the majority of my contributions going to needs I see around me has put me more directly in touch with those needs.
I pay attention to what my community needs. I pay attention to what my kids and family value and how we can use our resources to support those values.
Rather than just checking a box and donating to the Church, then assuming that the Church will figure out to do with my money, I have to be actually open my eyes to the world around me to identify needs and research how I might be able to contribute. Now, do plenty of full tithe payers do that? I’m sure they do. There are probably a lot of people out there who are better than I am. But my point is that tithing in a perverse way encourages us to look to the Church to solve problems and to ignore what’s around us. Maybe that’s not its intent, but I suspect it’s the impact for many.
- “I’ve been blessed for paying tithing. I would never deprive myself or my family of the blessings of tithing.”
I’m not here to challenge anyone’s testimony of tithing, but the reality is you can never prove that whatever blessing you got was a result of paying tithing. Correlation is not causation.
I also really challenge the idea that God only blesses people who tithe to the LDS Church. Would you honestly argue that God will “bless” someone who paid 10% to the LDS Church but not someone who paid 80% to Catholic Charities because they chose the wrong Church?
Finally, this is pure prosperity gospel and it’s, frankly, quite disturbing when you really think about it. My friend was a full tithe payer and her husband died, leaving her with several young children. A family in our community were full tithe payers and two of their three young children were hit and killed by a distracted driver as they walked to school.
I don’t believe in a God from whom we can purchase blessings or protection, let alone who picks and chooses who to bless or protect.
- “Charities don’t use their money well, they pay a lot of overhead, and I’ve read research that says they do more harm than good.”
Do you know why we know what charities spend on overhead? Because they are transparent about their finances! Do you know who isn’t transparent? Yeah, that’s what I thought!
Spending money on overhead is a debate that is beyond the scope of this post, but I have dear friends in the nonprofit world who are well-educated, extremely skilled, and could be making a lot more money in the private sector. If we want people to run organizations well, we need to pay them a competitive salary. If they can’t prove their worth, then the nonprofit board can get rid of them.
But in any event, we can all do our own research about how to use our resources in a way that is consistent with our values and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Cherry-picking problems with charities isn’t really a reason not to face the question of tithing.
- “Tithing is particularly unselfish because I have to let go of my ego, pay with no strings attached, and I don’t get any attention for it.”
Charitable organizations typically do not allow donors to specify exactly how their funds will be used. Yes, you can pick general categories, but once you give the charity your money, it’s gone. As for attention, while philanthropy is typically associated with lots of attention (naming buildings, museums, news articles, etc.), run of the mill charity work has never brought me any meaningful attention and if I was worried about that I could always donate anonymously.
- “I pay tithing because God gave me everything I have, nothing I have is actually mine, and it’s a sign to God that I understand that.”
I’ve already addressed this point. Sure, it’s good to acknowledge that God gave us everything and to give some of that back. But giving money to the LDS Church is not the same thing as giving money “to God.” (If anyone has God’s routing info, LMK.) Conflating “the Church” with “God” is highly problematic.
- “I prayed about it and I felt the spirit confirm that I should pay my tithing to the LDS Church.”
Look, again, I’m not trying to discredit someone’s personal spiritual witness. Maybe it’s great for you to pay tithing to the LDS Church.
Or maybe you have confirmation bias and the social pressure to conform on tithing is tipping scales in its favor. Just saying. Feelings aren’t facts.
- What is really going on?
I’m struggling with how to express this because I want to reiterate for the millionth time that I don’t want to judge anyone for paying tithing. I’m not them, I don’t have their life experience, I haven’t had their spiritual promptings, I don’t know what’s in their hearts or minds.
But I do know my own heart and mind, and my own life experience. And this I can say for sure: the decision for me not to pay tithing in 2020 felt like a true crossing of the rubicon. It was an unusually tough decision even though it was very clear to me that the Church was not spending money in a way that aligned with my values or with the gospel of Jesus Christ as I understood it, and even though I had felt comfortable “disagreeing” with Church leadership for some time, and even though I personally really didn’t feel good about paying tithing (as defined the Church).
And the reason for that is simple: not paying tithing immediately disqualified me from holding a temple recommend in a way that no other action (at least no other action I was interested in) would do.
While some people declare themselves tithe payers despite paying to other organizations, I wasn’t comfortable or interested in doing that. So not paying tithing meant that I couldn’t accompany my only daughter to her first temple trip to help her change for baptisms. It means I’d become a second (actually third, as a woman I’m already second) class citizen at Church. You can nuance your way around a lot of temple recommend questions (and some people nuance their way around this one), but for me this was a bright line.
Because that was my experience, I do wonder if the carrot of a temple recommend / the stick of a spiritual and social demotion is lurking in the background of people’s insistence on paying tithing despite their having deep reservations about the way those funds are being used. I can’t speak for anyone but myself, but I also suspect my experience is somewhat common. And that–the way that the Church tethers tithing to temple recommends–is troubling to me, as is the continued defense of that practice and the continued insistence that we look the other way as the Church sits on its investment like Smaug while the homeless sleep in zero degree weather in the shadows of our temples.
Questions:
- What reasons for paying tithing (to the LDS Church) have I missed? Which arguments are more or less compelling to you?
- Do you think that social pressure & temple recommends tend to factor heavily in people’s willingness to look the other way when it comes to tithing? Has this factored into your feelings or decisions? Have you changed your tithing practices over time? Why or why not?
Wheat & Tares 
Fantastic piece! The issue of tithing has weighed heavily on my mind all year, more so in recent months as I’ve deeply considered what a Christ-centered, as opposed to an LDS church-entered life looks like.
For December, my husband (who has a temple recommend) and myself (I don’t currently – but might get one next year), we decided to take about 15% of our income and give it to other causes. It’s opened up a whole new world for me! I have paid more attention to causes in the community this season and been so much more generous. We’ve given to recovery programs, foster children, the food bank, a small nonprofit I care about, etc. I feel like I’m finally awake and paying attention to the world around me. Tithing has had a way of dulling my sense of connection to humanity and the world. I never had that much to give, because, to your point, who can afford to give 10% to tithing AND be equally generous to other causes. For tithing, all I had to do was write a check and trust that as long as I had that little recommend card in my wallet I was good. I didn’t have to notice or think. Any critical thoughts I had of the church’s lack of transparency or how they hoard their money I just ignored.
After this 1-month experiment, I’m not sure where to go next. Like you, I don’t know that I could feel right about saying I pay a full tithe when this is so obviously outside the church’s definition of tithing. So, to your question, the temple recommend being attached to this particular definition of tithing is a hang-up for me. To decide to pay tithe’s in a more generous/aware/considered manner = losing ability to ever go to the temple. Which makes me angry and sad.
To top it all off, I learned yesterday that the church bought a huge industrial complex in Kent, WA for $260 million dollars!!! https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/zrvpw6/what_does_the_lds_church_need_a_multimillion. Unless they come out fairly soon and disclose what this is for, and it ends up being a charitable cause, it might be the straw for me.
The question that haunts me now is “Do you have the faith NOT to pay tithing?”
Many years ago, I was taught that the LDS church did not want people to gamble. If someone did gamble and won, the LDS church did not want tithing from those winnings. They saw gambling is morally wrong.
My entire life, I was also taught that women should focus on home and family. I was taught that women should only work if extreme financial hardship absolutely required it. I find it odd that the LDS church had that viewpoint and yet expected tithing to be paid from the money that working women earned.
For a church that historically refused to hire married women with children still living at home and refused to even call women as temple workers if they had minor children, it seems like a double standard that the church would still expect tithing from the paid labor of women. Weirdly enough, the church has always allowed married women with young children to do extensive hours of labor for free.
I think tithing in LDS culture is becoming a more complicated topic for many.
I think that the real reasons are that people have a testimony of the principle of tithing. They have lived it and proved it. You acknowledged the possibility in your comments about “I’ve been blessed for paying tithing. I would never deprive myself or my family of the blessings of tithing.” and “I prayed about it and I felt the spirit confirm that I should pay my tithing to the LDS Church.”, but then you immediately discounted the idea that a person could actually know these things. I think that this points to a glaring hole in your cognition. You do not really accept as valid that people actually do receive spiritual direction and confirmation (or at least believe that they do). You say “I’m not trying to discredit someone’s personal spiritual witness”, but that is the overall impression that I get.
“And that–the way that the Church tethers tithing to temple recommends–is troubling to me, as is the continued defense of that practice and the continued insistence that we look the other way as the Church sits on its investment like Smaug while the homeless sleep in zero degree weather in the shadows of our temples.”
Your piece hit every point, Elisa.
And That sentence. Oof. It will haunt. Like Matt Taibbi’s “blood sucking vampire quid”.
LH, Damascene- Ditto!
My mother was a stay at home mom with 7 kids in the 70s, including a disabled one, and a successful but abusive husband who went to prison partly for failure to pay taxes when she still had 4 of the kids at home, the others on missions & newlywed. She ironed clothes in her wealthy stake to make ends meet. With no health or dental benefits for herself, and seeing her overall dire situation, our bishop told her she was released at the time from paying tithing and could of course still have her temple recommend. The love and care this bishop and the ward showed my mother in this way, and more, carried my mother and our family through a very hard time and made us believe that God cared about us. We pretty much all stayed active in the church for a very long time; my mom-faithful, temple-serving, & tithe-paying to her death.
We give to our city Community Action program and the homeless shelters here. And my husband insists on handing cash out his car window. Being an older woman now, I have my reservations about that but also always wondered if that was really a good way. I don’t know.
Best Christmas and New Year wishes to you all.
@mike s I am sure that is true for a lot of people. But if you are trying to tell me that there is not a chunk of people who are paying only because they don’t want to lose their recommend and believe that God would be OK with them donating elsewhere otherwise, I’m not buying that.
See also cognitive bias / confirmation bias.
I paid tithing into my late 40s because that’s the way I was raised. I had also been financially blessed throughout my life, and thought that was because I had paid tithing. I quit paying tithing about a year before the news about the $100B fund broke. Some things had happened at Church, and I just felt awful about paying tithing; it made me physically sick to my stomach to pay any longer, so I stopped. I felt it was very risky because I knew my job was ending soon and I’d have to find a new job. After quitting tithing, I found a new job that came with a raise and better benefits than my previous job. It’s exactly the sort of thing I would have attributed to a tithing blessing.
I don’t give 10% of my income away to charities; I give about 3% or thereabouts. I’m contributing everything I can to retirement (about 17% of my income). Thanks to Church teachings, I spent the most lucrative time of my life as a SAHM. Now that I’m divorced and very unlikely to marry again, I’ve got to fund that nest egg if I ever want to retire. I’ve also got three children to provide for; their father isn’t able to contribute financially so they are 100% my responsibility to house and educate.
I read the comments on the BCC post you mentioned. It surprised me to see several commenters attributing their miraculous survival of life-threatening situations to paying tithing. I mean … tithing as protection money wasn’t a rationale I’d ever heard before. God protected you from al-Qaeda because of tithing? Would he have let you die if you only paid 6%? I dunno. The longer I live, the more I’m uncomfortable with the prosperity gospel.
Correction: Matt Taibbi’s “blood sucking vampire SQUID.”
LH, I currently live in Kent, WA. The industrial complex that the LDS Church just bought is next to a huge Amazon Fulfillment Center. Common sense tells me that the Church will lease space to Amazon. There are many other “logistics” companies in Kent which could also be potential clients. I applaud the LDS Church for its business acumen. But these types of investments, including the Church’s 100 million resort in Maui, seem to have nothing to do with helping the poor. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” (Matthew 6:21)
@lh, love hearing your experience with looking for ways to use your resources to help others.
@damascene, I had forgotten about the “don’t tithe on gambling earnings” rule. I remember that too! Hilarious. As a working woman I should never have tithed in the first place, dangit!
@eaglelady, I’m glad your mom had that bishop. I have a family member who had the opposite experience – a bishop told her to pay her tithing, and then essentially reimbursed her through Church welfare. That seemed really odd to me and fostering a kind of dependence and strings-attached that I don’t think is healthy.
@janey, God as a Mob Boss from whom we purchase protection – hah! Never thought of it that way. I don’t want to make fun of anyone’s experiences, but agree I found some of those examples to strain credulity in more ways than one.
I thought about posting a comment on the BCC post a couple days ago, but decided against it. This might be a better forum for it.
Sure, giving a full tithe will get you a recommend. But there are more important places to give, and if you’re a believer, there are better rewards than a temple recommend. See Matthew 25:34-46.
To be more specific, 10% of your income goes a lot further when given to a refugee organization or to member of your ward in need than it does when given to the church. I wish that wasn’t the case. I wish the church was more righteous in their handling of large sums of money. But right now I fully believe it’s more Christlike to give 10% to those in need rather than to the church.
I am quietly not a believer in the church anymore. I talk about it here in this forum but very few people in real life know yet. However in a few months my oldest will be ready to go to the temple and my absence will be noticed. And really the only reason I can’t go is tithing. But like Elisa, I find the church’s use of the funds probably does not align with my values. I say probably because in truth no one really knows what the church is using the money for other than hoarding it.
People often speak of the widow’s mite when they talk about spending the church money prudently: the leaders don’t want to spend the money because it would be wasting the poor widow’s mite. I think the church gets the whole point of the story backwards. The church seems focused on making sure every window pays their mite, when the whole point of the story was that people were hypocritically making a show of how much they contributed. People were making their offering to be seen or because of social pressure. The church seems to be trying to use social pressure (gotta have that recommend / attend the sealing) to force people to pay their tithing.
I think of the early saints who sacrificed so much to see the fledgling church get on its feet. And now that it’s standing tall–let’s be grateful and do our part to make sure it continues to stand.
Those of us who have been to the temple know that the Lord requires a lot more than 10%. I understand that some folks may feel that their offerings are better spent elsewhere. Even so, if we’re giving all of our time, talents, and substance, to build the Kingdom–then 10% is really a rather small portion of our total offering. So why not pay it and support the church’s building program?
@jack, part of my problem with the temple is the way that it requires us to pledge allegiance to the Church and not to God. Placing Church at the center is problematic to me.
I would be, and was for a long time, totally ok tithing to the Church when (a) I was under the impression that it needed the money to keep the lights on and (b) I felt it was spending money wisely BOTH to build the “kingdom” and to benefit humanity. I no longer believe either of those is the case.
The church has an unfathomable amount of money and it’s not spending even a fraction. So I don’t see what it’s building.
@rockwell, I’m really sorry. I really hate that the Church forces these choices on us. I’m not interested in attending the temple but if any of my children choose to I would sure like to be there as it’s our spiritual and family heritage and a potential rite of passage for them.
I had to walk away from the BCC post. Before I did, I emailed one of the admins I know over there and gave them quite an earful to which they kindly listened. I have so many thoughts on this topic but will keep it brief:
1. Not paying tithing to the church is a complex issue that didn’t just arise when I heard about the $100B fund in late 2019. It started with the church building a shopping center in downtown SLC, then carried over to money spent on the Prop 8 campaign, was negatively influenced when I was told that the donations don’t actually go where we specify they go, and was also probably influenced by my faith journey. I wanted to stop paying tithing when the November 2015 policy was issued but was in a bishopric at the time and didn’t want to make waves. But when I personally decided the church wasn’t what it claimed to be, and learned about the $100B, I was done. So to be fair not paying tithing for me is more than just about the church hoarding money. It’s voting the only way I know how to with my resources that the church is in desperate need of reform.
2. When I realized I could no longer attend the temple, I had many sleepless nights. Not because I would miss the temple, as I never really enjoyed the temple and could never square a God of tokens and signs with the God that judges our hearts. But I lost sleep over fear of being excluded from so many important future family moments. Fast forward a few years. My oldest child had a limited use recommend but currently does not have or want one. They don’t enjoy the temple either. My second child didn’t want to go based on the fact that my wife and oldest child were choosing not to attend. But to their credit, my oldest child told their brother to try the temple for themselves. My son seems to enjoy youth baptism trips. I’m the deacons advisor and I go and sit outside and take the kids to In N Out after then drive them home. It’s not great but I’m trying to show up as I am. All of my kids have committed to me that I will be a part of their milestones. I’m lucky to have kids that care about that.
3. The saddest thing about this whole topic is how divisive it is. The BCC post talks about tithing being the only way to Godhood for example. I disagree. The comments suggest that I’m faithless. Which I suppose is true with respect to tithing. I don’t have faith the money is being handled properly. I don’t have faith that God will intervene in my family either way (for what it’s worth, my life seems largely similar pre and post tithing but who can really say if God is indeed a vending machine?). But I really wish we could just show up at church and be accepted for trying our best. That post reminded me that’s now how our faith tradition works, and it’s a sad reminder during the holiday season.
4. For me personally, finding organizations that align with our family values has been extremely rewarding. For Easter we stopped giving gifts and instead on Easter morning I have a list of charities and money to donate and I get out of the way (mostly) and let my kids figure out what to do. One year they wanted it all to go to the animal shelter and I felt that humans needed some love to but I do try to let them decide. I understand it’s personal and different for everyone but for me it’s been transformative to be more connected to my giving.
TL;DR: How we spend our time and money is personal. Let’s be kind and celebrate the good we do with what we have rather than telling people they are doing charity wrong.
@chadwick, thanks for sharing your experience.
I agree that tithing for me wasn’t just about how the Church was spending money but was also about what kind of support I was comfortable lending to an institution that was and is doing harmful things. I have to decide at what point my participation crosses some kind of line from just doing good in my corner of the universe (by participating in my ward) to supporting with resources a corporate church that is doing harm. And tithing to me was crossing a line I didn’t want to cross, and part of why I decline to declare myself a tithe payer is because I affirmatively do not want to pay tithing or for the Church to still think it’s earning my trust. Tithing is too far down the path of supporting institutional objectives and activities that I oppose. I know the church doesn’t need or miss my money but there’s a (petty, admittedly) part of me that hopes that some church bobblehead sees that I contributed quite a lot through 2019 and then stopped 100%.
What’s too bad is that it creates a caste system of recommend vs non-recommend holders in our wards. And I actually hope we can make room for non-holders because I think there are increasing numbers (see eg my post about women quiet quitting church) and if they are only willing to fill callings with recommend holders at some point they’ll be strapped for options.
My bishop is great and super understanding and supportive of my journey, and kept me in my calling. But I did ask to switch from a member of the YW presidency to an advisor and a big reason was bc I knew I wouldn’t be able to take the girls on temple trips and I didn’t want to face that awkwardness every few months.
Tithing is a complicated topic for me personally and I think for more members than most orthodox members might realize.
Am I wrong to recall that the roots of a more strongly encouraged 10% payment came under Lorenzo Snow because the church was close to insolvency at the end of the 19th century? So it’s roots in the restoration are not as cleanly tied to a fundamentalist reading of Malachi as is often appealed to. In fact, I seem to recall Snow admonishing those who had the means to pay 10% to do so, and later in the teachings of the prophets manual featuring Snow’s teachings, this quote was modified to sound more like a 10% payment mandate for every member was required, regardless of means.
While I understand the church’s need to be a going concern, what bothers me the most is the lack of transparency and honest representation around its tithing policy history, and how it was roped to accessing the most sacred and needed ordinances the church teaches: temple admittance.
Once news of the $100b broke, Bishop Causse held one of the church’s faux interviews where he was given softball questions from a church public affairs specialist. He didn’t address the scope of the fun…at all, it’s purpose or justification, but focused on the integrity of the church’s policies when it cames to its own financial management. It was pure gaslighting. So I was quite aghast by the raw honestly a month later when the head administrator of Ensign Peak Advisors came out and said what everyone was wondering, they didn’t want members to know about the fund for fear members would stop paying tithing. Once again, we can’t get honest answers from general authorities, but the truth squirted out through an unofficial source.
For me, the $100b isn’t a problem per se, it is the lack of transparency around it and the lack of reported plan the church has for its use. There is no such thing as a “rainy day fund” of that magnitude in the corporate world. Since the time Microsoft used to keep a enough cash on hand to pay all expenses for a year assuming not one dollar of revenue realized have we seen an example of corporate cash hording like this. Why? It is irresponsible financial management. Many analysts were critical of MS’s cash hording policy, but it was on some level defensible because MS presented a reasoned explanation for it. The church provides no insight into the future planned use of the money–it is true hording behavior, and for this reason, thinking members of the church have just cause to be bothered by the behavior. Idleness like this in regard to liquid resources management would be considered malfeasance by any business fiduciary. Capital responsibly managed needs to be put to use. Under this reasoning, the Maui hotel project may be justified–all it has to do is clear the church’s average weighted cost of capital and it’s a smart investment. But there is a problem here. We are supposed to be a church operating under Christly mandates, and not principles of raw capitalist interests. So the church has $100b. Fine. Except not fine because there is zero transparency into the plan the church has for it. This is a problem.
The church recently reported it had donated close to $1b to charities in the previous calendar year. This wasn’t a financial report. This isn’t transparency. This is raw score-boarding and self-interest protection on the part of the church to argue a win. This is marketing communications, not financial reporting. This was intended to give orthodox members something to feed their ego and fill their need to be better than the next church. But it didn’t include the donations against a charitable giving investment thesis. There was no year-over-year comparisons, no ratios against prior year spending, or ratios outlining how much of the donation went to administrative costs versus to aid. To progress against plan, along with future goals and expected outcomes. No charitable ROI. Nothing. Just “We gave away a crap ton of money. We are generous. Stop asking questions and contribute more.”
I think if the church were transparent, they would receive even more support and more donations, if they were acting in parallel with Christly mandates to help the poor and care for the vulnerable. Can you imagine full transparency that included a charitable giving prospectus with full reporting on goal attainment and difference realized, along with a 20 year plan to transform the world? I might contribute more than asked. As it is, I feel like I can do more good donating to the Gates Foundation (or any good cause) rather than the to the church. But all we get is “don’t think, no questions, and if you are faithful you pay your tithing,” as if it is some cheap and fallacious Abrahamic test.
The combined impact of these inactions by the church, in addition to many, many other church expressions (like Elder Holland’s attack on the LGBTQ community, mandating their silence, and making an ad hominem and unrighteous attack on Matt Easton) pushed me over the edge. I have no desire to donate to an organization–no matter how much I love my heritage within it–that practices immorality like this.
Here is the most ironic part for me: About eight years ago I liquidated some substantial business assets. I’ve been lucky in business. I paid 10% to the church, and then I had this thought that I would double that amount. So I did. A few years later, my family and I decided we would no longer contribute to the church. With a gay family member, we were not about to enable an organization which was actively hurting our family member and others like him, and given my personal frustrations with the church’s lack of transparency and general dishonesty, I was done. It’s one of the easiest decisions I have ever made. I told my bishop I had overpaid my tithing to the tune of have a tithing credit for about six more years against my annual income, but that I had no intention of paying tithing again, or at least until there were significant changes within the general church. My bishop thought for a moment and said, Well, your motive is not my concern, but the fact you prepaid tithing means you meet the temple recommend standard for tithing. I was thunderstruck. It proved to me tithing is purely transactional.
My family is now in the process of finding other organizations to which to donate. While I don’t believe the church is in any way corrupt in a traditional white collar crime way (i.e. I don’t see any evidence of personal enrichment), I do see systemic malfeasance and a culture of dishonestly through lack of disclosure, and that is in and of itself a form of institutional corruption and immorality because we are a church. And I don’t buy this is our challenge of faith, or we shouldn’t question the church. Rubbish, the best thing that could happen to the church would be for it to be open to criticism, and support, through financial transparency. Until we are lead by true pastors and creative theologians, we won’t see this change. As long as we are led by lawyers and Harvard MBA’s, we’ll never see this change.
@bigsky I loved every part of your comment until you went after lawyers :-).
Oops, hasty generalization. My bad and no offense meant. I should have pivoted my gun turret more directly to DHO. [big grin] Many of my closest friends are lawyers, good ones, and some of the best people I know.
@bigsky I’m kidding too. No offense taken. I certainly shouldn’t be running a religious org and claiming it’s on God’s behalf so I guess we actually agree! Don’t even get me started on how the church now uses lawyers as its “historians.”
In my corner of Utah County the big story is that when Jesus comes again He’s going to need all those extra billions of dollars to do whatever with it. Uh, hello, this is the Lord of the Universe we’re talking about here. When He returns, whenever that is, I am pretty sure that a multi billion dollar superfund will be the last thing that He’ll need or want. Just saying.
Aptly titled.. This post has brought up a lot of strong feelings—mourning, anger, shame, frustration.
I transitioned from paying 10% to the church to donating 10% of my income to charities in 2020 after the EPA whistleblower case came out. I split my donations between Doctors Without Borders and a local Food Bank, both of whom are spending more than 90% of donations on medical care or food. I declared myself a full tithe payer in Jan 2021. I think that it is legitimate to pay tithing according to one’s values. I did the same thing in Jan 2022, but the new bishop had been following the donations list carefully and confronted me. He told me that I was no longer worthy and could not attend the temple. Because I am a former bishop and know most of the people in the ward well, it was hard for him to deal with his feelings that I was a liar and an unworthy person. So he gave a thinly veiled talk the next Sunday about how Cain was privileged spiritually and in leadership, but he offered a false sacrifice by substituting his own idea of what God wanted for what God really wanted. And that was the start of him becoming a son of perdition and a murderer. Warning to all the members. This is the first time in my life that I have been labeled unworthy. I didn’t think that it would sting but it did.
Rubicon indeed.
I supported my active wife by attending until July 2022. I stopped attending after the dishonest church statements this summer about the horrible AP abuse article. It is infuriating to see them lie so publicly and so baldly. Because it is socially unacceptable in church for me to share my thoughts and feelings there, as they are not orthodox enough, being there became painful. I can only imagine how hard it is for our LGBT friends and the majority of members that are marginalised by the structure and culture.
Chadwick, the more I learn about you the clearer it becomes (to me) that you are a kind and loving husband and father. And that’s precisely what the world so desperately needs today–good dads.
You say: “I never really enjoyed the temple and could never square a God of tokens and signs with the God that judges our hearts.”
The rites of the priesthood can seem rather counterintuitive in the face of an all knowing God. Even so, I’m of the opinion that they’re given for our benefit. They help us to grapple with sacred knowledge–which can be quite abstract from our lowly perspective down here in the trenches. But as we seek to understand their meaning they become conduits of knowledge–and the mysteries begin to unfold before us. The process can be slow–but, oh, how wondrous it is.
The reason I share this with you is because, as I’m confident that you’ll continue to be the good husband and father that you are, it’s my hope that you’ll one day be able to reconcile yourself with the theology of the temple and continue forward in eternity as a blessed parent. Nothing else can bring greater joy.
Thank you for a wonderful article Elisa. I stopped paying “tithing” as the church defines it last year. I still “tithe”, but to other organizations or individuals I can help. It was a decision I felt I had to make to feel right with myself. I also wanted to feel what it was like to give to places other than the church. Tithing to the church is not fulfilling, in part, because you never have any idea of how your funds are used. I want to feel like I can make a difference and there is no positive feedback when you pay tithing, Here I am defining “positive feedback” as knowing what my donation is specifically supporting. Being able to direct my funds is more fulfilling. Any direction we give the church by checking a specific box on a tithing slip is meaningless because the small print stipulates the church may use donations anyway it wants. I’m not excited about helping the church make interest on a pot of money. The church’s lack of financial transparency fed my decision. To whom much is given much is required. I expect much more of the church in these matters.
My daughter got sealed in the temple last weekend and my husband and I could not attend. This is after donating thousands of tithing money over the years. It didn’t matter how many countless hours I served in callings over the years. It was all annulled as soon as we started questioning things and made a choice to spend tithing elsewhere. The struggle is real, what bothers me is I never thought of it as a problem before.
@heidi I think about this too. Because of the timing of my faith transition, if I have a kid who wants to go to the temple I won’t be able to go. The substantial amounts of money and time I’ve given to the church – 40 years of tithe paying, a mission, tons of callings – will count for nothing.
I’m so sorry you were excluded from the sealing. That’s so wrong.
We stopped when the Church started spending our tithing money to persecute our gay friends by funding Prop 22 in California. But I agree that the Church no longer needs anyone’s tithing, it is so, so rich. In accordance with what President Joseph F. Smith said, tithing should now stop.
“Charities don’t use their money well, they pay a lot of overhead, and I’ve read research that says they do more harm than good.”
This is my mom’s go-to argument in favor of paying tithing on her modest social security/retirement income. What she seems to miss is that all non-profits have necessary operating expenses, and that if they want to be effective in their charitable goals, they have to attract and hire talented people and pay them competitively. Not every organization has the luxury of entire armies of young adults and senior citizens they can exploit for free labor.
Meanwhile, the Church spends a great deal of money to build and operate temples, which provide no tangible benefit to their respective communities (except perhaps inflating property values, which is a topic for another day…).
Several years ago, the late Jon Huntsman Sr. was interviewed by Forbes about his accumulated wealth and well-known philanthropic endeavors. When asked about his tithe to the LDS Church, Huntsman replied that he did not consider tithing to be a form of charity, but rather more like “country club dues”. I didn’t think much of it at the time, since I was a faithful tithe payer then and just dismissed Huntsman’s remark as something a privileged wealthy Church member would say. But I think Huntsman was on to something there. If you look at the COJCOLDS as a county club (after unpacking all the issues with elitism, exclusivity and privilege that accompany that term), members pay a lot of money to belong and should expect generous benefits in return. But it seems like the perks have been significantly cut back in quantity and quality in recent years. They sold off the tennis courts and drained the pool, and stopped maintaining the golf course (members are expected to do that now, regardless of whether or not they enjoy golf). I think more and more Church members are doing some much-needed introspection about tithing, and asking themselves whether they are getting their money’s worth in return, often not liking the answer, then adjusting/redirecting/cancelling their donations according to the dictates of their own conscience.
A few comments (I haven’t read the comments yet):
1) The BCC article was truly terrible. Especially this part: “For people with less financial privilege, that amount might be their ability to visit a parent, provide education for their children, or access basic needs. These are big sacrifices—for many of us, bigger even than the time we routinely give to the Church.” Unfortunately I can’t air my dismay at BCC because the permas routinely mollycoddle the blindly believing in spite of not being full believers themselves, and tend to throw tantrums if you are too blunt with the blind believers or express open doubt in the church’s truth claims. It is a disgrace that the church pressures the poor into these kinds of sacrifices. And it is a disgrace that PhD candidates feel compelled to echo their nonsense rhetoric justifying extreme sacrifice.
2) Rock Waterman wrote an ingenious blogpost about a decade ago entitled, “Are We Paying Too Much Tithing?” He was excommunicated, and I fully believe that that post had something to do with his excommunication. But the reasoning on the article is solid. You pay on your increase beyond your necessities. And what you deem your increase to be is up to you and is likely far, far less than ten percent of your net, let alone your gross, income stated on your W2. The average tithe-paying member is paying way more than what the average tithe-payer used to pay in the past.
3) Tithing settlement is superfluous and should be done away with. It is a shakedown. You can’t convince me that pushing every member to answer to their local bishop in front of a printout during the holidays whether or not they are paying a full tithe isn’t a high pressure tactic used to squeeze members and make them feel guilty. The question of whether you are a full tithe-payer or not is already asked during the temple recommend interview. Plus, in the Mormon belt, being able to baptize a child or attend a temple wedding is a significant litmus test. And it is a pay-to-play operation. My oldest just turned 8 and his grandpas did the baptism and confirmation. I participated in the confirmation circle. Perhaps my family and family-in-law might be catching on to the fact that I’m not a believer. But I will never volunteer that information to them. I will leave the burden upon them to inquire. And that’s a pretty big question to ask and I doubt that any of them really wants to ask it.
But on tithing, I pay a little bit. My wife is OK with Rock Waterman’s interpretation. We don’t attend tithing settlement and haven’t for 8+ years.
I’m glad to see the Kingdom spreading throughout the earth. That’s enough of a “return” for me.
Great post and really painful stories to read. Paul’s in particular really hit me. Paul, I’m so sorry that happened to you. To answer one of your questions, Elisa, yes, I think social pressure and the really unfortunate (and wrong) Mormon ideas of worthiness influence a lot of people to pay tithing. One reason I’ve been able to survive in a church that I find, in the main, a brutal combination of soul-crushingly boring and demonstrably harmful is because I’ve never outsourced my feelings of “worthiness” or of self-worth generally. I have a lot of flaws, but one of the few I don’t possess is the need for anyone’s approval. Most of my ward and stake leadership know me pretty well and they know that if they ever confronted me about my non-payment of tithing with accusations that I was “unworthy”, I’d tell them to go f*ck themselves. We have a kind of “don’t push me too hard and I won’t push you too hard by telling actual truths about the Mormon Church in Sunday school” relationship, and that works for us. I imagine that once the leadership changes over in a few years, this may have to be re-negotiated.
There is, more to your point, a definite psychology about a lot of this. I think one of the particularly insidious things about Mormonism is its very upfront teaching that being with your loved ones in the afterlife is directly connected to how well you you’re able to be “worthy” according to the church’s definition. This leads to internalizing both a sense of never being worthy enough and to the idea that if you really love your family, you’ll obey the church and its leaders. That second one is absolutely insidious and is, IMHO, one of the very worst things about the church. To hold a person’s family hostage in the afterlife until they write the church some checks is both unconscionable and unsupportable by any but the most stilted and myopic interpretations of the teachings of Christ. THAT’S where a lot of the social pressure comes from; Mormons are taught from a very early age that community and family are directly tied to giving the church money. And if they don’t give the church money, they are unworthy of the blessings of friendship and familial love and connection. I can’t imagine anything further from the core of Christ’s gospel.
@paul, really appreciate you sharing your experience. I’m glad you recognize that your bishop’s (ridiculous) Cain comparison was rooted in his own insecurity but I am sorry that it happened.
@jack Hughes, the county club analogy is apt.
@john w, the waterman post is quite compelling. The BCC discussion was bizarre. I don’t like to overuse the term gaslighting but it felt gaslighty.
@bro sky, agree. The compulsion aspect of tithing and temples is icky. I didn’t see it for a long time but once you see it you can’t unsee it.
Brother Sky,
That’s a bit cynical for my tastes. Was the Savior wrong to say that those who don’t believe and aren’t baptized will be damned? What if half a family believed and the other half didn’t? Would that mean the Savior was being cruel by implying that only the obedient half of the family would be exalted with him?
I think we tie ourselves in knots over tithing because we’re dealing with money. And that (money) represents blood and sweat–sacrifice, if you will. And so, on the one hand, we have to be careful that we don’t trivialize the sacrifice that has gone into earning that money. But on the other hand, the gospel requires sacrifice–and those who have been to the temple understand the sacred nature of the Law of Sacrifice. And so the reason we may fail to qualify for a temple recommend–by not paying tithing–is because it might be an indication that we’re failing to live the Law of Sacrifice in the way that has been prescribed by the church.
And so, I think we need to be careful in how we contextualize these precepts. Would we say that the church is manipulative because it requires that we obey the Law of Chastity in order to be worthy of the blessings of the temple? I don’t think so–at least we probably wouldn’t be as suspicious about that requirement as we tend to be about tithing. Even so, we could pay our tithing faithfully until doomsday and never receive a temple recommend because of other violations. That says something (to me) about the importance of striving to live up to the commandments in the way that has been prescribed by the Lord. And his way involves a “no respecter of persons” approach. All are required to give of their time, talents, and substance. That offering on the part of the saints is part and parcel of being a member of the Lord’s church–his Kingdom.
Jack,
I take it that you’re not a troll, so I’ll respond briefly to your comments. I won’t engage about the law of chastity equivalency issue because I see the law of chastity as a tool of the patriarchy and I believe it negatively impacts women disproportionately. I’m also pretty progressive about sex in general (prostitution should be legalized, sex workers should be allowed to unionize, etc.), so that discussion would go nowhere.
Regarding the notion of sacrifice, it’s important, I think, to realize that the “law” of tithing (as well as some other laws) is entirely arbitrary, as other posters have pointed out. So if the whole notion of tithing, including its definition, the reasons why it became a “law” in a Mormon context, etc., are merely historically, socially and financially contingent, then, while the general notion of sacrifice may be something resembling a principle of the gospel of Christ, the law of tithing so-called is hardly eternal and unchanging, at least in the Mormon context.
One other aspect of this is the words of Christ himself. IMHO, when he says in Matthew 9 that he “will have mercy and not sacrifice”, he’s talking to the very people who have made the mistake of equating the making of sacrifices with living a truly moral life. In doing so, Christ quotes the prophet Hosea, who made the exact same point to another group of people centuries earlier. The concept of sacrifice, in other words, is less important than the concept of mercy, precisely because when we make “sacrifices”, it’s incredibly easy to fall into a self-righteous pattern of thought about how we’re making the sacrifices we should be making, so we’re “earning” our way into God’s kingdom (in other words, we’re “worthy”). Wrong, wrong, wrong. Christ clearly places the quality of mercy above acts of sacrifice because the Pharisees to whom he was speaking had just questioned why he, Christ, would deign to associate with sinners, publicans, harlots, etc.. Christ calls for mercy because mercy is much more likely to allow us to connect to those whom we might otherwise avoid than making sacrifices that cause us to think we’ve earned something we really haven’t. THAT’s why mercy is more important than sacrifice; it is more likely to lead to connection, fellowship, and love; you know, the most important aspects of the gospel. And that’s why paying one’s tithing is more likely to lead to feelings of self-righteousness at our supposed sacrifice than it is to truly connect us with others. Therefore, the law of tithing and other kinds of sacrifice are not as important in a Christian context as mercy and love. Sic probo.
So let me begin with with the guilt part of my tithing–as a 19 year old girl at BYU with a vague idea of what she wanted to be in life, a professor/mentor and the a whole department spotted me and shepherded me into a doctoral program at the University of Chicago. Same thing happened to my husband there, and we met at Chicago, almost 40 years ago. Looking back, I wonder why some poor woman in wherever in the Third World sold vegetables on the side of the road, gave her 10%, and helped subsidize 70% of our undergraduate education. From that point of view, I feel awful. God forgive me, but I find it disgraceful to ask for the widow’s mite. So I felt compelled to give back. But now that giving back goes to Ensign Peak, I’d rather give more to Catholic Relief. This is just mental gymnastics but when I’m asked “Do you pay a full and honest tithe?” as well as “Do you keep the Word of Wisdom” (having consumed my third iced tea of the day) I feel quite honest in saying “yes I do.”
So now the big one. My husband was diagnosed with late stage Sarcoma, 99.9% certain because of exposure to toxins at Ground Zero. From 9/13, for a year and a half, he had to show a pass to get through Ground Zero to get to his office 2 blocks away. So our relatively comfortable life may soon take a big hit–and so what for us. We can live on much less. But I am laser focused on making sure that my emotionally disabled, perhaps always dependent son has the things he needs, and to be able to take care of myself. Health insurance, housing, and the necessities of life–and I don’t want/need any help thank you. From the church or the government. No one (IMHO) should pay tithing, give to charity, or buy food storage, etc., to the detriment of those who God has entrusted us with, when the best thing we can do for our church and our society, is take care of ourselves. I will love and serve however I can, but it will necessarily be different. And I think I will still be able to say “I pay a full and honest tithe.” Hope I keep hitting the bishop/SP lottery.
@englecameron, I feel the same about my BYU education (and I didn’t pay a dime of tuition for law school) but I’ve more than paid back my tuition.
I’m so, so sorry about your husband and the prospect of a forever-dependent child is something that it seems many of us face. So we may not be third world but that is an extreme financial (and emotional and physical) commitment and stressor.
“Was the Savior wrong to say that those who don’t believe and aren’t baptized will be damned?”
Jesus of the NT Gospels never said that those who aren’t baptized will be damned.
Brother Sky,
Or is it Mister Masterson? 😀
Thanks for the response. I agree that mercy far outweighs sacrifice. Even so, mercy offers sacrifice willingly on behalf of others. So we need not create a stark dichotomy between the two precepts. The former is subsumed by the latter as we learn to love after the manner of the Savior. Even so, many “sacrifices” are required by those who would live a good life–as every good parent, employee, citizen, or neighbor, knows.
That said, I agree that the Law of Tithing may seem arbitrary if we try to prove it by the scriptures–that is, the precise way we are counselled by our leaders to live it nowadays. Even so, I believe the counsel that we receive from living prophets–and it’s in the principle of continuing revelation that I rest my case. Now that may seem like an argument from authority–but so would an appeal to the “book” as it too claims to be the words of (albeit, ancient) prophets.
And so (for me) it doesn’t matter whether we’re talking about tithing or chastity or what-have-you–I go with the Law of the Church as presently constituted because I believe the words of living prophets trump former counsel.
John W,
Not sure if you’re alluding to the debate over the last part of the Book of Mark–but here’s an interesting article on the subject:
https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/the-book-of-mormon-versus-the-consensus-of-scholars-surprises-from-the-disputed-longer-ending-of-mark-part-1/
That said, I take the whole modern canon as a guide–baptism is essential. And fortunately we also learn from the canon that everyone will have ample opportunity to receive baptism–if not in this life then in the next.
Jesus reportedly said in Mark 16: 16: “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.” If you take the Gospel’s words at face value, which is what the majority of Mormon believers do, that verse says nothing about those who aren’t baptized being damned. It’s all belief.
On the Interpreter article, this part of the abstract made me laugh: “According to the consensus of modern Bible scholars, Christ did not speak those words; they are a later addition. If so, this is a problem for the Book of Mormon.” As if the myriad verbatim passages from the KJV aren’t already a massive problem for the Book of Mormon: http://www.mormonthink.com/mormonstudiesbible.htm. As if the modern scholarly consensus even comes remotely close to validating the historicity of the Book of Mormon and it is all hinging on the integrity of the Book of Mark.
John W,
To me it reads as if baptism would be a natural consequence of belief. And so, those who don’t believe aren’t likely to be baptized. But even if they were baptized–the ordinance in and of itself won’t be enough to save them. There must be belief. Even so–coming full circle–belief (speaking in the abstract) isn’t enough either. There must be baptism.
Bro Sky: “To hold a person’s family hostage in the afterlife until they write the church some checks is both unconscionable and unsupportable by any but the most stilted and myopic interpretations of the teachings of Christ.”
Damn.
Jack: Thanks for helping to keep these conversations going. I don’t see eye to eye with you but I’m grateful that your seemingly good faith perspective helps draw out nuggets like the one above.
Jesse,
Happy to oblige. And just so you know — and I’ve already responded to Brother Sky — the bit you quote is at the very heart of what I thought was a bit cynical in Brother Sky’s comment.
If we reduce the practice of giving tithes and offerings to writing checks to the church in order to secure exaltation then we’ve lost the purpose and meaning of the practice. Abraham payed tithes to Melchizedek. Did he do it just to get in the good graces of the reigning high priest? No–there must be a better reason as to why the father of the faithful would humble himself and participate in such a practice.
And I believe the “better reason” that motivated Abraham is found in the story of Cain and Able. Why was Able’s offering received and Cain’s rejected? The simple answer regarding the dichotomy between the two is that — as per the Book of Moses — Cain was told by the adversary to make an offering. And so what we have is someone going through the motions and rigors of sacrifice for his own purposes and not for the glory of God.
And so it is today — as it has been in every age — when we put the Kingdom first we are seeking the Glory of God and not our own. We may not understand all of the whys and wherefores involved with the operations of the church. But it is incumbent upon the saints to follow inspired counsel relative to our duties as members of the Kingdom–especially when those duties are an expression of sacred covenants.
I think most faithful members are happy to do their part — however small or great — in building the Kingdom And establishing Zion.
The church has installed a giving machine in our area. Has anyone investigated whether all the money put into these get to the charity nominated? Does the money go through the church’s books and so can be claimed as charitable donations by the church?
Merry Christmas, Jack. Obviously we won’t agree, but thanks for the pushback. You’re a good sport coming on a blog among people who will strongly disagree with you and presenting the traditional LDS believer counterarguments, even if I generally don’t find them persuasive.
Thanks, John W. Merry Christmas to you, too!