Difficulty giving money to the poor and beggars

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notredame_999

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I work in a downtown metro area with a lot of homeless and beggars. They are always asking me for money. Every once in a while I give them a dollar or two but most of the time I do not and I feel extremely guilty about this because I know Christ said give to the least of my bretheren and you have given to me.

However, is it a fair comparisson to make considering the amount of welfare and unemployment benefits our country has compared to biblical jerusalem?

Is it a fair comparisson when some of the homeless are clearly able-bodied healthy individuals who are too lazy to work?

Is it fair comparisson when some of these beggars are sex offenders?

Is it a fair comparisson when some of these beggars will just blow the money you give them on heroin or other drugs?

Finally, is it a sin to refuse money to beggars but give to reputable charities who you know will spend the money on food and shelter and not drugs and alcohol? Thank you.

P.S. I also mention this because I am discerning the priesthood and I also know feeding the poor is essential to that ministry. Thank you.
 
There’s two schools of thought here.

One is to give because it is what your heart desires. Now if they will only use it for drugs later, thats their problem. Unless you have prior knowledge and absolutely 100% sure that they will use it for drugs, then you shouldn’t hold back on giving just because of a suspicion. If your intnetion is pure, then God will reward you for it.

The other line of thought is give directly to charitable institutions which would help them. They may not get help immediately or some of them may not get help at all, but charitable institutions live to help these people and they would know how to deal with them and their addictions and other bad behavior.
 
Personally, I think it is better to give the money to a charity like Saint Vincent De Paul and then refer the poor people and the beggars that you see to their local Saint Vincent De Paul so that they may get help from them. At least then you know that the money will be spent on necessities rather than wants.
 
A partial solution is to buy gift cards for various food providers, etc., if you are concerned they would use it more to harm than to good.

But you shouldn’t use too much reserve in this area. Pray and give.

I’ve seen truly thin and starving people in other countries. . . I have never actually seen any in the USA. No ‘skin and bones’ folks. OTOH there are many other reasons people need money than for food that are good… and the mentally ill, addicts, etc. still need this monetary charity too…

So you shouldn’t use too much reserve in this area. Pray and give.

There’re corporal works of mercy and spiritual, we should do all we can.

“For also when we were with you, this we declared to you: that, if any man will not work, neither let him eat.”

2 Thessalonians 3:10

Applies but, how do you know the actual situation? And what the best medicine is? Well… There’s lots to it. So since you don’t know… you do what you can…

And if you give to charities for them, avoid the ones that misuse the money for population control, politics, etc.
 
Nothing says you have to give money. If the beggar asks for a dollar for a cup of coffee, and you’re downtown and there’s a coffee shop nearby, why not give a cup of coffee?

Once in a food court, a beggar was asking people for money; he hadn’t gotten to me yet. I had just bought myself a burger and fries. Instead of giving money I walked over and gave him my platter. Judging by the way he ravenously ate the burger, I’d have to say I hit upon a real need.

Of course we know if we give money, it will go towards booze or drugs for the most part. But we can instead give for a real need, if they’re hungry (which no doubt they are but they haven’t the sense to buy food instead of booze or drugs). Give food, and you’ll add a day to his life. Give money and you’ll probably take a day away from his life.
 
I was with my family once and gave money to a beggar on a street corner in a smallish town in Georgia. It was hot day and he had a down coat on. I patted his arm and said “God bless you.” His arm seemed to be nothing but bone. They do exist here.
 
I am disabled and already am as generous as possible to my church, my first responsi-
bility. When I am asked for food I offer to go with them to a corner deli and let them
choose what they want. If they turn that down, then I know they were going to use it for
alcohol and/or drugs. If they want coffee, I spend time with them while we both drink
coffee. I love dogs, and some homeless have dogs which are their only companion/family.
So sometimes I buy dog/cat food for them. I spend time talking to them about what their
animal means to them. I always show respect. “There but for God go I”.
 
In some places, begging is a business with all the orchestrated come-ons that will grab your heart. After a couple of weeks in Paris, I stopped handing out money to everyone – I’d seen a few of the same people in different parts of the city plying their “trade” – although some of them I still couldn’t say no to.

Here in the US, I really don’t hesitate. There are many, many religious and community organizations and programs that work with the homeless and hungry, true, but many can’t take advantage of those services beyond a simple meal or bed for the night. You have to be a part of “the system” to know how it functions and to function in it – you have to be able to follow rules, to obey laws, to “fit in” with the rest of society – and SO many of these people just don’t have the capacity to do that.

Some people you think should be working may be disabled in a way that’s not apparent, or they’ve been looking for work for literally years – or no one will hire them for whatever reason. They may be drunks, druggies or just generic bums – yet, they are our brothers and sisters.

We’re told plainly in the Gospel that what we do for them, we do for Jesus – that’s enough incentive for me.
 
notredame_999 said:
I work in a downtown metro area with a lot of homeless and beggars. They are always asking me for money. Every once in a while I give them a dollar or two but most of the time I do not and I feel extremely guilty about this because I know Christ said give to the least of my bretheren and you have given to me.

However, is it a fair comparisson to make considering the amount of welfare and unemployment benefits our country has compared to biblical jerusalem?

Is it a fair comparisson when some of the homeless are clearly able-bodied healthy individuals who are too lazy to work?

Is it fair comparisson when some of these beggars are sex offenders?

Is it a fair comparisson when some of these beggars will just blow the money you give them on heroin or other drugs?

Finally, is it a sin to refuse money to beggars but give to reputable charities who you know will spend the money on food and shelter and not drugs and alcohol? Thank you.

P.S. I also mention this because I am discerning the priesthood and I also know feeding the poor is essential to that ministry. Thank you.
Click to expand...
The answer to all of your questions is yes, its a fair comparison. You could make most if not all of these statements concerning ancient rome which jeruselem was a part of. This is where St Paul’s discours on judgment comes in to play. Its not fair for you to be denying these people the necesities of life due to your judgments. They had dead beats, addicts, child (and sex) abusers et al in Christ’s day. He never offered any equivocation, neither should you.

God bless,
 
challam2010 said:
Some people you think should be working may be disabled in a way that’s not apparent, or they’ve been looking for work for literally years – or no one will hire them for whatever reason. They may be drunks, druggies or just generic bums – yet, they are our brothers and sisters.

We’re told plainly in the Gospel that what we do for them, we do for Jesus – that’s enough incentive for me.
Click to expand...
Yes, it’s very true, many people just can’t handle ‘the system’ and so since they can’t keep up with the rules and regulations, can’t even receive help from many of these places that require forms and rules and suchlike, whether it’s food stamps or the local charity.

Who gives enough? Everyone has to give more, much more.

'Then he shall say to them also that shall be on his left hand: Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry, and you gave me not to eat: I was thirsty, and** you gave me not to drink**. I was a stranger, and you took me not in: naked, and** you covered me not**: sick and in prison, and you did not visit me. Then they also shall answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to thee? Then he shall answer them, saying: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to me.

And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting.’

Matthew 25:41-46
 
To whom this may concern,
Code: 
 If your discerning the priesthood, I think this is a rocky start. Don't priest and other religious orders for the most part take a vow of poverty? There are some brother monks like the Benedictian Order though that don't as a whole though not. I like the quote "Judge not lest you be judged" and "Blessed are the poor for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven". Using commonsense like a third party will help with some spare money every once in a while with help is also advisable. Talking to these people like humans is also a good thing. Remember giving without recieving is the moto in the Bible. Who do you think the pharacies and the scribes were anyways? The middle class people of the lands of business to political machines to defend the rich among us. 
 I'm just disgusted by recent research that I read like 2% of overall catholics and 3% of overall protestants tythe to their local church. Come on you guys, we can do better than this surely. I want to start tything soon but then again I'm a precatholic not a catholic. One of the five tennants of the precepts of the catholic church is
  1. providing for the material and spiritual needs of the church.
    I look at this precept with respect cause we have in all actuality never lived up to this creed ever. The 10% tythe should bwe considered just a minimum not what we should strive for at all. We should strive for much more for those that have more should give more plain and simple. Also, the equal balancing of criticisms of the business establishment, which benefits from these trades should be herendously slammed. Hardly ever do we criticize business owners who benefit enormously from contraceptives, tobacco, alcohol, drugs, pornography, sexual toys, weapons, and other things. Only when its convenient for us to judge only mainstream media via television cause those are our scapegoats? What a shame that we can’t own up to our own shortcomings in this difficult process. Lord have mercy on us for our selfish desires and open our hearts and pockets to those i need.
God bless,
Peter
 
You know if you’re in discernment, you really should ask some priests how they handle it. From what I understand they get plenty of people at the rectory asking for help.

A Vincentian Father - Vocations Explained

A secular priest has money of course, to decide how to spend.

I’d say one should seriously consider going F.S.S.P. if you’re going for the priesthood.

… In giving to people in need… I think… best advice though is… follow the examples of the saints.
 
Peter5 said:
To whom this may concern,
Code: 
 If your discerning the priesthood, I think this is a rocky start. Don't priest and other religious orders for the most part take a vow of poverty? There are some brother monks like the Benedictian Order though that don't as a whole though not. I like the quote "Judge not lest you be judged" and "Blessed are the poor for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven". Using commonsense like a third party will help with some spare money every once in a while with help is also advisable. Talking to these people like humans is also a good thing. Remember giving without recieving is the moto in the Bible. Who do you think the pharacies and the scribes were anyways? The middle class people of the lands of business to political machines to defend the rich among us. 
 I'm just disgusted by recent research that I read like 2% of overall catholics and 3% of overall protestants tythe to their local church. Come on you guys, we can do better than this surely. I want to start tything soon but then again I'm a precatholic not a catholic. One of the five tennants of the precepts of the catholic church is
  1. providing for the material and spiritual needs of the church.
    I look at this precept with respect cause we have in all actuality never lived up to this creed ever. The 10% tythe should bwe considered just a minimum not what we should strive for at all. We should strive for much more for those that have more should give more plain and simple. Also, the equal balancing of criticisms of the business establishment, which benefits from these trades should be herendously slammed. Hardly ever do we criticize business owners who benefit enormously from contraceptives, tobacco, alcohol, drugs, pornography, sexual toys, weapons, and other things. Only when its convenient for us to judge only mainstream media via television cause those are our scapegoats? What a shame that we can’t own up to our own shortcomings in this difficult process. Lord have mercy on us for our selfish desires and open our hearts and pockets to those i need.
God bless,
Peter
Click to expand...
Yes everyone is right we need to give without judgement, its just hard for me considering I also want to be a cop and I know some of the street hustles.

And for the above post, yes people should tythe more and put more in the collection plate, but it doesnt help when million dollar sexual abuse settlements are being posted in the paper every month. I think a lot of people are not giving to the church because they dont want to see their money go to the settlement.
 
More information about giving issues within and around the church. URL: adherents.com/misc/giving.html and this is supposed to be a time of giving not selfish hording of our money. It’s showing the inate hunger for physical materialism. What I say is to have faith my fellow brothers in christ. Are we not catholics? I thought that we had more of an heart than this. Truly we need to reinforce our faith by our works and charity as virtues are truly to strengthen those in our pews rather than detract from the poor among us. Oh, God give me strength with my own resolution cause of my own financial burdens with credit card and etc but I still want to tythe. Pray for your church to grow a heart during these difficult times.

“hail Mary full of grace the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus. Holy Mary mother of God pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death amen”.

God bless,
Peter
 
Near our rural communities there are numerous people that are homeless. These folks seem to have organized themselves into a professional panhandlers organization. I’ve sat in a cafe for an hour or so having a long lunch and watched the street corner where they are setup. About every two hours there is a rotation of panhandlers. A new one approaches, they exchange greetings, have a “smoke”, exchange the sign and the new guy takes over. There is never any competition on any street corner that I have seen. Its a well organized system.

Still, with this in mind, its not my place to judge the panhandlers intention. Perhaps I should be glad that they were smart enough to organize. Whatever the case, I’ll leave it to God. So whenever I can I’ll give a couple of bucks.
 
Okay you guys about your reasoning skills aren’t the most intuned with reality. This is all inductive reasoning by statistics and probability and even still the payback isn’t what we should be looiking at anyways. Let’s say you give it to a local charity that is transparent. will you guys be happy then? I mean seriously this is insaine reasoning here. There are decent individuals that need this money, time or whatever else you can give to listen to respond with new ideas. However, charity has greatly dipped with the rise of per capital income since 1968 or so and less and less church attendance. This is a huge restraint on church charities. The poor pay more by the way look at my link in my previous post than most of you middle to upper income bracket earners anyways. Talking about idiotry in action right?
 
In the nearest metro area to where I live, the police have taken to putting up billboards specifically asking people NOT to give money to panhandlers, along with a phone number for Good Samaritans to call and report any begging activity.

I asked a friend who is an officer with the police dept. about this. He said the number of scammers is far greater than the number of truly needy persons, and they have a unit dispatched (if anyone bothers to call) to assess the situation and provide transport to a shelter if the person is truly in need. He said he’s renaming his patrol car “Lourdes” because most of the time the mere sight of it is enough to make a beggar on crutches suddenly take off running!

My SIL is a Carmelite nun (in a different city) and she says it’s appalling the number of people who approach them at their monastery, asking for money, claiming to be homeless and hungry… and when the sisters respond with a sack of food, they often find it dumped on the street.

It’s a tough call… on the one hand, you’re trying to help the problem, but on the other, you just might be making it worse.
 
Charitable giving does not require foolishess.
To the OP, I face the same challenges, and I have to echo what bluerose said. it’s a tough call, but, for me at least, there are some factors which make my decisions much easier.
I live in Detroit, you see. It’s not pretty. I many neighborhoods, including my own, panhandlers outnumber the employed. By alot.
For me, though, the decision has become easier.
Let’s compare some scearios. Let’s assume I give a panhandler $2. Let’s also assume he plans to use this for food. There is no grocery store in the city. Not one. He will go to the convenience store instead where $2 MIGHT get you chips and a pop, or, let’s say he’s decided to go healthy. He will get trail mix and juice. That is the best he can get with my $2.
For that SAME $2 (less acutally) I know the soup kitchen will provide a healthy, well balanced meal. There will be a meat, a vegetable or fruit, a starch, and a desert. The brothers there have their own gardens in the city, so the produce will be fresh and organic. There will be a drink, usually milk or gatorade. He can come back for seconds. The food is always hot. There are clean bathrooms. There are tables and chairs and tablecloths and music playing. And, depending on the day, the annex is open and he can get free clothes and toiletries. There are many other services, including overnight sleeping accomodations and showers available, too.
There is also another consideration, which is that local business owners and employess do NOT want people panhandling in front of their establishments. It frightens away customers. So, consider that your act of giving money to the panhandler might at the same time be harming the business he is stading in front of, one that, in better times, might be able to reach out and offer employment.
So, in my mind, I don’t even need to make any sort of hypothesis about what I think that person might or might not do with the money. There are churches and a soup kitchen within walking distance. I KNOW that IN EVERY INSTANCE, my money will go farther if spent by one of those institutions than if I gave it to him directly.
I hope this perspective helps, and please remember to pray always.
 
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