Tithing Settlement is now Tithing Declaration

[Hamba Tuhan]

10 minutes ago, Durangout said:

In the past, it might also have been used to determine if chapels would be built for a given unit.  I may be wrong in that one.  Not 100% sure.

This is still the case.

Quote

On the other hand, there might be better metrics ...

Half of what you proposed as alternatives only pertain to people who have been endowed and/or live near a temple. Measuring temple attendance amongst Indonesian Saints, to take just one example, will tell you nothing about their faithfulness. And everything else you suggested is either more difficult to measure or more open to interpretation or more culturally bound (not being in a cabin on a Sunday???).

[SeekingUnderstanding]

24 minutes ago, SteveO said:

I stand corrected.  Now, based on your experience, would a full tithe payer ever be denied financial help if it was asked?  
 

I refuse to believe a ward and bishop would allow a full tithe paying family to eat nothing but rice.

I served as a clerk in the Bay Area. Help was given for a couple months and then the family was told to move to somewhere cheaper. 

[Chum]

2 hours ago, JAHS said:

I really doubt 10% is going to actually make such a difference financially as you have described.

My post doesn't blame tithing for our conditions. It says when I ran the postmortem analysis, a terrible conclusion followed. I indicated I understood we were an outlier and asked for greater understanding.

2 hours ago, JAHS said:

I suspect other factors were involved.

Over 30 years? Sure, tons. The continual havoc from my wife's growing mental illness was a big one.

2 hours ago, JAHS said:

Perhaps you were paying tithing for the wrong reason. We don't pay it to get blessings; we pay it because we love God and want to be obedient.

Again, this is a long period. I paid tithing for all of the above reasons and more besides. In the end it was mostly obedience. That's kind of a crappy reason on it's own but it was the very best I could manage under the circumstances.

2 hours ago, JAHS said:

I suspect things would have still turned to your favor if you had kept on paying tithing. Bad timing perhaps?

There's a reasonable argument to be made that it was all coincidence, one end to the other. The challenge with that - I find it invites a conclusion that tithing is meaningless. That's not where I want to go. Wandering into that feeling is reasonable but I'm not looking to make a home there.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Chum

[Chum]

2 minutes ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

I served as a clerk in the Bay Area. Help was given for a couple months and then the family was told to move to somewhere cheaper. 

That's the thing. Assistance is temporary. We were in the worst of it for a decade. Food assistance can help for a while but such a long period is simply beyond the scope.

[Chum]

1 hour ago, SteveO said:

I do think that a guy writing an open letter to God claiming that tithing was the reason his family was eating rice (and *gasp* maybe not even that!) deserves at least an eye roll and is wholly undeserving of serious consideration.  

It is reasonable to consider your responses as hostile. I do not deserve your hostility. Neither does anyone else in this thread.

I also don't deserve you reading things into my post that I did not say. Even if you suspected I was untruthful, you could have read my post history to see if I had a history of disingenuousness. I'm fairly confident you did not.

[Chum]

Sidebar: We're all here thru survivorship bias. People in the worst conditions aren't going to be here posting.

On this day we are fortunate - we are not representative of the population that is facing persistent hunger or is experiencing homelessness.

[Calm]

1 hour ago, bluebell said:

Clearly some members learned nothing from studying the book of Job last week. 🤦‍♀️

Truth

[Calm]

55 minutes ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

Based on actual experience as a bishopric member, my first bit of counsel to a member who wants to be a faithful tithe payer but is struggling financially is to keep paying tithing and let the ward take care of the rest by means of fast offerings.

In almost every situation, I would be agreeing that would be the way to go.  From what Chum has mentioned of his ward and the area though, I am not sure help would be forthcoming.  

Edited August 12, 2022 by Calm

[Chum]

1 hour ago, JAHS said:

Not calling him a liar. In my opinion I just don't think we are getting all the details.

Of course.  However I think the core of my post stands pretty well alone. 

I was saying that my long experience ran consistently counter to even the minimal promise of tithing (that we will know it was worth it).  I expressed my weakness of needing some amount of positive reinforcement to reliably comply. I asked HF's help in parsing so it would make sense.

[SteveO]

34 minutes ago, Chum said:

My post doesn't blame tithing for our conditions. It says when I ran the postmortem analysis, a terrible conclusion followed. I indicated I understood we were an outlier and asked for greater understanding.

Over 30 years? Sure, tons. The continual havoc from my wife's growing mental illness was a big one.

Again, this is a long period. I paid tithing for all of the above reasons and more besides. In the end it was mostly obedience. That's kind of a crappy reason on it's own but it was the very best I could manage under the circumstances.

There's a reasonable argument to be made that it was all coincidence, one end to the other. The challenge with that - I find it invites a conclusion that tithing is meaningless. That's not where I want to go. Wandering into that feeling is reasonable but I'm not looking to make a home there.

…I feel this post, is kind of the “missing part” from your open letter.

[Chum]

27 minutes ago, Calm said:

In almost every situation, I would be agreeing that would be the way to go.  From what Chum has mentioned of his ward and the area though, I am not sure help would be forthcoming.  

His point of paying tithing while asking for help is valid. That is the usual counsel and it's good counsel.

The Bishop did authorize food assistance on and off over the years. Maybe 6 mos of food in all, not an inconsequential amount. Once, my wife spent the rent money and the Bishop wrote the check. For whatever faults my ward may have had, I do not feel the least bit neglected in this. Our situation was simply beyond what the Church could address.

edit: Calm also mentioned area. I live in a southern state so state hostility toward helping people in need is a given. We applied anyway but were predictably denied. What food banks are here are fully overwhelmed and can only fulfill a tiny percent of the need.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Chum

[Chum]

5 minutes ago, SteveO said:

…I feel this post, is kind of the “missing part” from your open letter.

The point and purpose of my letter was the last paragraph and the sentence that followed. The rest was just background so those wouldn't be confusing.

[Hamba Tuhan]

34 minutes ago, Calm said:

From what Chum has mentioned of his ward and the area though, I am not sure help would be forthcoming.  

There is certainly no way of knowing.

One of my mates was my former bishop here but a few years ago took a contract doing research in California. He has been serving as the bishop in his urban ('inner city', in American terms, IIRC) ward there for almost the entire time, and he has told me that serving as a bishop here in no way prepared him for the difficulties he would face there. He says that close to 90 per cent of all his time is taken up with welfare matters. On a couple of occasions, after all the entire ward could do to help (and not just applying fast offering funds), he has had to suggest to a member who has never lived anywhere else that the only possible long-term solution was to seek refuge in a better managed state where employment is more likely and rent is not only for the very wealthy. He's hated doing that.

ETA: I think Chum expressed above what I just tried to describe: 'Our situation was simply beyond what the Church could address.'

And it's at this point that one would like to see some evidence that the promises of tithing are real.

It has repeatedly been my experience that they are; consequently, I have no idea how to address someone whose experiences have been different.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Hamba Tuhan

[Chum]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

Clearly some members learned nothing from studying the book of Job last week. 🤦‍♀️

You aren't wrong but to be fair even Job's ordeals didn't go for a generation.

[SteveO]

14 minutes ago, Chum said:

Once, my wife spent the rent money 

 

…yeah

Wish you the best.

Edit:  There’s clearly more to the story.   It sounds like a lot of factors that made the ordeal difficult.  But there was no basis for the way that letter was presented.

Edited August 12, 2022 by SteveO

[JAHS]

52 minutes ago, Chum said:

My post doesn't blame tithing for our conditions. It says when I ran the postmortem analysis, a terrible conclusion followed. I indicated I understood we were an outlier and asked for greater understanding.

Over 30 years? Sure, tons. The continual havoc from my wife's growing mental illness was a big one.

Again, this is a long period. I paid tithing for all of the above reasons and more besides. In the end it was mostly obedience. That's kind of a crappy reason on it's own but it was the very best I could manage under the circumstances.

There's a reasonable argument to be made that it was all coincidence, one end to the other. The challenge with that - I find it invites a conclusion that tithing is meaningless. That's not where I want to go. Wandering into that feeling is reasonable but I'm not looking to make a home there.

Crappy or not, in the end it really should be the only reason. I am Impressed that you were able to keep it up for 30 years under the added stress.

[filovirus]

5 hours ago, Chum said:

Okay so I know no one on the forum can actually help me with this. Instead, here's an open letter to Heavenly Father.

Dear Heavenly Father:

I paid my tithing faithfully for over a generation. Throughout that time, our lives became increasingly difficult and miserable - until the last decade where we were cutting vital services, until food was exclusively plain white rice or not even that. I finally stopped paying tithing and about that same minute our lives finally turned around. Dramatically. Today, we're about 3 years into our first small measure of security.

HF, you must fully understand the concept of positive reinforcement so I am baffled why the blessings we enjoyed from tithing were so indistinguishable from Hell. I am not angry and I am not being confrontational here. I do not believe our experience is at all representative of tithe-paying in general. However, I genuinely don't know how to math our particular 30 years into something other than tithing destroys lives.

Any insight or clarity you could give would be tremendously appreciated.

As always, your Chum.

Sorry to hear of your struggles. Must have been tough.

During my time in El Salvador I met many people who struggled financially their whole life. One family in particular was so poor that many times they were barely able to afford the leftovers of a chicken. This included only the beak and feet to feed a family of 5 for a day. I knew their situation would never change. They knew their situation would never change. They did continue to pay tithing with what little they had. And did so willingly.

There is a mistaken idea floating around that members that pay tithing will always receive financial stability or even financial success. Temporal blessings. I don’t believe this is always the case. I don’t even believe this is generally true.

But we have been promised that the windows of heaven will open. That we will gain spiritual success. That the promised blessings will be spiritual in nature. And that some of these blessings may not even be realized in this life.

[Chum]

31 minutes ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

There is certainly no way of knowing.

Assume the best for the ward and you'll be right. As I've said elsewhere, Church assistance is temporary; it's amazing for what it is but it isn't designed for years of continuous outlay.

Assume the worst for my state (well, all southern states) and you'll be equally right.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Chum

[Chum]

6 minutes ago, SteveO said:

 

…yeah

Again with the couched hostility. And again, I've done nothing to deserve it.

7 minutes ago, SteveO said:

Wish you the best.

That doesn't really make your recurring cynicism unexist. Would you please stop?

9 minutes ago, SteveO said:

Edit:  There’s clearly more to the story.   It sounds like a lot of factors that made the ordeal difficult.  But there was no basis for the way that letter was presented.

Of course. I'm happy to share it but it adds nothing to the point and purpose of my post.

[Hamba Tuhan]

5 minutes ago, filovirus said:

But we have been promised that the windows of heaven will open. That we will gain spiritual success. That the promised blessings will be spiritual in nature. And that some of these blessings may not even be realized in this life.

When I read Malachi 3, the promises don't sound very 'spiritual in nature' to me, though I suspect everything can be spiritualised.

[Hamba Tuhan]

6 minutes ago, Chum said:

As I've said elsewhere, Church assistance is temporary and isn't designed for years of outlay.

I've been in at least two wards that included members who had been supported in one way or another for decades. For example, in my current ward, there is an elderly single sister whom the ward provides with firewood each autumn. We've done this for the 19 years that I've been here and have also helped with utility bills throughout the year as well. But you are right that some situations are beyond what the Church as an institution can pull off.

[JAHS]

2 minutes ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

When I read Malachi 3, the promises don't sound very 'spiritual in nature' to me, though I suspect everything can be spiritualised.

According to the scriptures it's all spiritual.
"Wherefore, verily I say unto you that all things unto me are spiritual, and not at any time have I given unto you a law which was temporal; neither any man, nor the children of men; neither Adam, your father, whom I created."  (D&C 29: 34)
If the laws are spiritual then the promises and blessings that come from obeying them them will most likely also be spiritual.

[mrmarklin]

8 hours ago, JAHS said:

I have a couple of members who don't pay anything most of the year and on the last week of the year pay for the whole year, so there is often a zero on their statement when they see the Bishop.

I pay online last week of the year as well. I see no need to meet with the Bishop. Seems like a waste of both our time. 

Edited August 12, 2022 by mrmarklin

[Chum]

29 minutes ago, filovirus said:

During my time in El Salvador I met many people who struggled financially their whole life. One family in particular was so poor that many times they were barely able to afford the leftovers of a chicken. This included only the beak and feet to feed a family of 5 for a day. I knew their situation would never change. They knew their situation would never change. They did continue to pay tithing with what little they had. And did so willingly.

I think about stuff like this, a lot. Their examples aren't irrelevant to me.

Just to clarify, I didn't decide to stop paying tithing. I wasn't angry or felt I'd been wronged. At this point we'd been in survival mode for a decade. My wife was the opposite of help and support. I couldn't overcome everything and properly support my children. I was overwhelmed and exhausted every day. I gradually withdrew into inactivity because I no longer had the resources to be active in that ward. It wasn't even a decision.

One off the cuff example: It was a four mile walk to seminary. Someone saw that and stepped up to give him rides.  After seminary, my son walked a mile or more to school, in the dark on windy roads with no shoulder. It rains a lot here.  We were well and truly exhausted.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Chum
Checked map. 4 miles from home to church.

[Chum]

1 hour ago, JAHS said:

Crappy or not, in the end it really should be the only reason. I am Impressed that you were able to keep it up for 30 years under the added stress.

It didn't kill me to pay tithing. Much of the time I was genuinely happy to do so.

I admit I feel trepidation at the thought of paying it now. Objectively, I could compare my resistance to superstition. Really, I need time to sort it out. I'm a different person than I used to be.

Edited August 12, 2022 by Chum