re: #149 Jeff In Ohio

the liberal perspective

From the article:
“Utah is among the most Republican states in the nation, largely because of its heavily conservative Mormon population. Mormons tithe 10 percent a week to their church. But is that charitable giving? Or is it a membership fee? How much of it goes to anti-poverty programming? How much to church administration?”

He lost me there… A little research on the authors part would show that the tithe is voluntary as are additional fast offerings that go directly to the poor. Anyone tithed or not can attend an LDS meeting, be baptised and take the sacrament.

The LDS Church pours tons of money into disaster relief and international aid, self-reliance based welfare programs and other social causes. Our missionaries do millions of hours of community service in addition to preaching the gospel. Tithes go to pay for chapels and Temples in North America as well as the rest of the world and we don’t discriminate who gets good facilities based on the amount they are able to contribute.

One could as easily say an environmentalist giving to greenpeace isn’t considered charity because they want to attend their meetings. Stupid argument.