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I remember years ago I was reading a lesson manual or a family home evening manual — can’t remember which. It mentioned that we may sin in this life and yet experience no immediate consequences. That God holds back from unleashing consequences immediately as this would limit our free agency and cause us to act righteously for reasons other than virtue’s own sake. Immediate consequences, the argued, does not show God our true character. Our true character shows when there are no immediate consequences. This made a lot of sense to me, and then I thought “but what about tithing??”. If I don’t pay my tithing, no temple, no ability to hold certain callings — these are immediate consequences, in addition to the long-term ones. It seemed very inconsistent to me. Further, such giving is not anonymous. You see the people who are doing it in the temple. Your local clerks and Bprics know, you are on lists of endowed with current TR lists, and of course, if you are in a particular calling that requires a TR, anyone who understands church policy knows you are a full-tithe payer.
And of course that has me thinking about levels of charitable giving. We can give to be seen of others, to receive the honors of men, or to receive some form of earthly blessings — such as the immediate consequences I shared in the second paragraph.
Could you argue that giving to a non-church organization, anonymously with no immediate benefit at all, signifies a higher motive/form of giving than donating to a church in order to maintain immediate privileges?
First, I think I need to separate God and the church. I think what you learned long ago from a forgotten manual is true – I don’t believe God punishes any of us for anything we do (or don’t do) in this life. I do believe he respects our agency to the fullest. My opinion, of course, is taken from my deist viewpoint and it makes total sense to me. I get what you’re saying about tithing, temple recommends, etc., and I think you’re right there as well – but that’s not God it’s the church. Call me an apostate if you like, but I don’t think God has anything to do with tithing and I’m not sure He really cares about tithing. The church certainly does care and has a literal vested interest in tithing. I see the perceived domino effect here (but the prophet is the Lord’s servant, the bishop is the judge in Israel, etc.) but those dominoes don’t necessarily fall if your point of view about earthly priesthood authority doesn’t make that authority the same as God’s authority (and in my view they are different). That said, yes I do believe there is a difference in charitable giving (and service in general) with the thought of some kind of reward as opposed to giving with no expectation of anything in return. The latter is true charity (as in pure love of Christ) IMO. I don’t pay tithing for a TR, and while I enjoy having a nice building to meet in and the ward picnics, I’m not sure I actually expect that (and I don’t go to most ward activities anyway). However, I do see many people who do pay tithing as “fire insurance” (something I cringe at honestly) or because there’s an expectation that being a full tithe payer on gross will buy their stairway to heaven.*
In the interest of full disclosure, tithing, fast offerings and welfare were a part of my faith crisis. Part of the rebuilding of my faith necessitated my decision that whatever I give tot he church in anyway includes no expectation of any return. Likewise, because I don’t give all I can I am able to set boundaries. I don’t home teach and I don’t expect to be home taught. I don’t pay fast offerings (I do give to local food banks and similar charities) so I expect nothing from church welfare. It’s quite liberating actually.
*Sort of related story: This past Sunday in HPG we were talking about home teaching (ugh). Our stake does have a home teaching guideline in place regarding frequency of visits and other contact (basically do new members and part member families first, others can be visited less frequently if resources are scarce as they are in our ward). The guideline talks about things like service counting as home teaching and our HPGL brought that up with a question about what we view individually as home teaching (there was no full agreement, some thought nothing short of a scheduled monthly visit with the Ensign lesson counted while others thought any contact outside church counted and everything in between). One member brought up an instance where his children were invited to their home teacher’s home to help him on a project from which they benefited. He thought that was great and counted as home teaching for the month. After the meeting I happened to be in the hall behind this guy and his home teacher, who I don’t particularly care for and who I think has no concept of grace and quite fully believes he is buying his way to heaven. As I overheard the conversation, the home teacher was chastising the guy for bringing this up because he didn’t see it as home teaching and didn’t report it for that month, followed by a statement to the effect that he had always been a 100% home teacher until that month. I’m not saying that’s a bad thing in and of itself, and I’m not saying he doesn’t serve his families – but I don’t think he’s doing it with the expectation of nothing in return.
Interesting thoughts. I agree it can be liberating to set those boundaries, and to truly NOT expect anything from the church. Whether its right or wrong, I guess at some point, my service had strings attached. Expectations of a minimum level of kindness from the organization/members/leaders in some fashion. Expectations they would live up to their claims as a divine organization, putting values ahead of temporal concerns, etcetera when the chips ere down. Expectations that when as as volunteer, I had personal needs (such as a release from a heft calling) they would show their appreciation for my service (not my tithing, my service and freely given time) by granting my request in a timely manner. I don’t think I consciously viewed tithing as tit for tat, or quid pro quo, but AFTER I saw there was no reciprocity or appreciation, it made it very hard to pay tithing. They say you pay tithing with faith — well, the experience I had, hurt my faith.
I find it hard to accept the payment of tithing when people are treating you nastily, and leaders are repeatedly indifferent to your needs. Also, hard to pay when you have non-financial needs at the very heart of our three or four-fold mission, they let temporal concerns eclipse the fulfillment of those needs.
Anyway, I have learned NOT to expect anything from the church. And it seems so much easier when you are not giving large sums of money to it after what happened to us. You can indicate to yourself “I am not contributing anything to it any longer, so I don’t have a right to complain”. And that brings peace.
Anyway, back to tithing and charitable giving. I find it hard to think that a person who gives 10% of their income to a good, non-church cause, is NOT WORTHY in the eyes of God. They say you pay tithing for you own good. And that good is found in being a charitable person. Not in giving to an organization that likely does not even need it to meet their basic needs, in order to maintain basic privileges.
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