Is tithing feasible in modern society?

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

Rosalie:

The low wage workers around here either have tons of roommates (not feasible with a family), receive housing assistance, or live 2+ hours away from their jobs.

Don’t forget “work 60-80h weeks”. I’ve seen that one a lot around here. But again, it doesn’t work well if you have kids because you’ll never be able to see them.

Yes. My husband and I could do this. He could move up in his career and double our income. However, he’d be expected to be working 60-80 hours a week and would not see me or the kids very much. We could most certainly tithe…it’d be really easy. More than enough to go around.

But his presence is valuable.

And so is mine. I could take on more hours, put the kids in daycare, and then we could also tithe.

We CHOOSE to live the way we do because of our family life, especially our children, come first. If that means we cannot tithe so be it. I know people in churches that DO require tithe. They DO make the sort of choices to work more/see family less. Some have GREAT families…but more often than not they suffer.

 

[LaughingBoy1503]

That is better then a lot of people are doing. I think tithing in that situation (net, not gross) is doable.

Tithing is not required though. We give from our heart and what we can. When I was making $8 a hour I gave $5 a week. When I made $10 a hour it was more like $20 a week. Then when I bumped up to $17 a hour it was about $40 a week. When I got bumped up to $31 a hour it was $90 a week. Then I moved out on my own and my rent doubled so it dropped back down to $40 a week lol. To qualify, a studio apartment goes for about $1100 a month in my area. Sometimes even more. I live in a studio apartment but it’s a mansion to me because I’m just glad to have a place of my own.

We give what we can. But we certainly must give.

 

[Viki63]

The question for me is whether we can believe God or not. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills, for starters, and he promises not to let us down. If he could take care of people in Jesus’ day, he can take care of us also.
I’ve been tithing for a couple of years, and am living on a fixed income and supporting my son til he starts working again and my husband (disabled). It’s really tight and I’m in debt right now, but know God will provide.
If God is truthful, we will be fine. If he’s not trustworthy, well, then nothing much matters anyway. I have nowhere else to put my trust.

 

[brian_custer]

i just give what i can give. i see every week grown male adults tossing $1 bills into the collection basket to me that is pathetic; that is what i put in the basket xx years ago when i was a newspaper delivery boy

i saw the youth minister (adult) in our parish take a dollar bill from his young daughter & throw into the collection plate as his “offering”

 

[brian_custer]

is everybody so broke & cash starved that A GROWN ADULT male can’t fork up a 5 or 10 or 20 dollar bill to support their parish?

the $ 1 dollar thing is PATHETIC

 

[BayCityRickL]

There’s a lot of resentment about reckless spending in the 2 churches of our parish. There are parishes without debt, if you can believe it. a generous donor paid for the a/c equipment.

 

[AdamP88]

By the time one gets passed housing payments, student loan payments, utility payments, retirement savings, taxes (federal, state, and/or local), real estate taxes (included in rents), etc., is there really 10% left these days?

To do simple math, let’s look at $100,000.00/year (the much aggrandized 6-figure salary). Max deferred comp is ~$18,000.00, so that’s down to $82,000.00. Toss in say ~$20,000.00 per year in mortgage payments and you’re down to $62,000.00. Take federal/state/local taxes out at about $15,000.00, and you’re down to $47,000.00. Toss in student loan payments at about say $10,000.00 per year and combined utilities at about $5,000.00 per year, and you’re down to $32,000.00. Out of that you have food, fuel, medical care, life’s little “Oh expletive” moments, and stuff like that.

Is tithing supposed to include income that is simply reinvested more-or-less in perpetuity? If so, then, people with decent 410K accounts, Roth IRA’s, and regular IRA’s have the nastier position of having more “income” per year that can’t really be touched, but supposedly being expected to tithe a portion of their income.

It’s true that it can be tight, especially for those of us on modest wages. I think if you just give what you can, when you can, that is enough. I try to put some money in the collection on a Sunday for the parish. And I give time when I can to help with the food distribution for the less well-off in the parish.

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

i just give what i can give. i see every week grown male adults tossing $1 bills into the collection basket to me that is pathetic; that is what i put in the basket xx years ago when i was a newspaper delivery boy

i saw the youth minister (adult) in our parish take a dollar bill from his young daughter & throw into the collection plate as his “offering”

Most people give online today. I give my children $1 bills quite frequently. That’s far from all I give. When we travel we might also toss a $1 in because we get funny stares when the collection comes by. People are pathetic when they judge.

At many parishes online giving is 80% of what comes in.

 

[Rosalie]

Why are you watching how much everyone else puts in the basket? That seems rude and inappropriate. And yes, some people don’t have an extra $80 at the end of the month, and as others mentioned, plenty of people give online.

 

[Mary888]

I don’t know how someone can get detached from material things without giving away even if it is unfeasible. I think that a fixed amount such as tithing was asked by God so people can start learning to give away the wealth of this world. I do not see how through Jesus Christ’s commandment of love we can put a number on charity towards others hence towards our soul.
Remember that he valued the widow’s coins more than other donations. He said those two coins were more valuable to God than all richness of the earth. But for example if a someone rich or average, or a rich widow, convince themselves that he/she are like that poor widow because they suffer too and only give away two coins I don’t think they are as valuable’s as the real widow.
If someone judges me by giving away too much or too less In highschool I was once admonished by certain grownups that I gave money to a beggar in the subway; they said I encourage begging and I am to blame for the degradation of society too. It is true that the beggar looked as if he was going to spend those money on drugs but I thought if he doesn’t get the money easy he may do something worse to get the money because he is under the influence of drugs. Still don’t know exactly if I was wrong or not from the social point of view, but I don’t see how it could’ve been wrong from Christ’s pov even if it may have been irresponsible.

 

[brian_custer]

there is no way a catholic parish can support itself on $1 bills from parishioners

sorry for mentioning it

 

[TheLittleLady]

At an average parish, 70% or more of the parishioners do not give even $1.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

i just give what i can give. i see every week grown male adults tossing $1 bills into the collection basket to me that is pathetic; that is what i put in the basket xx years ago when i was a newspaper delivery boy

i saw the youth minister (adult) in our parish take a dollar bill from his young daughter & throw into the collection plate as his “offering”

You can’t go by what people put in the basket. Many people including myself do online giving and never put anything in the basket. Some folks with children give them a dollar to put in the basket just to teach the lesson to the child that we should give to the Church. They may actually be contributing more online where it is not seen.

I rarely carry cash, and it’s also a lot easier for me to track my giving with the online receipts as I give to a wide variety of churches, religious charities, and non-religious charities.

The three parishes where I count myself as a member are in my monthly e-bills so I pay them once a month by e-check, just like a bill.

 

[PetraG]

Consider
When he looked up he saw some wealthy people putting their offerings into the treasury and he noticed a poor widow putting in two small coins. He said, “I tell you truly, this poor widow put in more than all the rest; for those others have all made offerings from their surplus wealth, but she, from her poverty, has offered her whole livelihood.” (Luke 21:1-4)

Our Lord said nothing about a donation of a set percentage being sufficient or insufficient. God knows whether we are faithful in our use of wealth entrusted to us or not. The question is whether we dare to read ourselves as honestly as God does, with either as much justice or as much mercy. That is a matter for an ongoing conversation with Heaven.

One ought to honor commitments made rather than expecting to satisfy God by betraying the trust someone else had in one to repay what was loaned or contracted. One ought to hold the precept to contribute to the support of the Church. There are some boundaries in place to guide us. Beyond that, the precept is this: “No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.” (Luke 16:13) Follow that, and you’re likely to do OK.

 

[PetraG]

I heard a homily from a pastor who got up, outlined how the parish spent the money given to it, and closed with this: “The average donation in this parish is about $1 a week. I don’t even know what to say to that.” Then he sat down.

Another (later) pastor at the same parish said that parishioners ought to be generous in giving, since all was given to us as stewards rather than owners, but that parishioners ought not give more than 5% to the parish directly. He said other donations ought to go to charitable organizations or efforts that directly do work that the parish does not support at the level that the wealthiest donors ought to be doing. Those tithing 10% ought to give half to the parish and half directly to feed the poor, work for justice, support the seminary and missions, and so on.

 

[AdamP88]

i see every week grown male adults tossing $1 bills into the collection basket to me that is pathetic;

Sometimes you just don’t have the change at that time. I often put nothing in the basket because I use my card for everything and just forget to take cash out.

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

brian_custer:

i see every week grown male adults tossing $1 bills into the collection basket to me that is pathetic;

Sometimes you just don’t have the change at that time. I often put nothing in the basket because I use my card for everything and just forget to take cash out.

Yep. We are fast approaching a cashless society. Hubby and I are frequently at Masses at other parishes. Sometimes the ushers just glare, so we toss whatever we have in–which can be a handful of coins or $1–whatever is handiest.

Not that our donation helps the glares. Oh well. We are giving, they are judging. I’m pretty sure I know who God favors in that equation.

We donate via parish pay. When we give to charities it’s via PayPal or our credit cards.

 

[AdamP88]

Yeah, to be honest, my parish would get a lot more out of me if they had card machines or some form of online payment.

 

[Xanthippe_Voorhees]

Is ParishPay not a thing in Ireland?

Although googling it’s now called “we share”

I suppose you could always pick a random US church and give. http://www.4lpi.com/

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I’m really surprised they don’t have an online payment. Virtually every church I attend in the USA has a button on their page.

I’d suggest if you do your bills via e-pay (like via your bank) then see if you can just add the church as a payee and set a reminder to tell you to pay the church X amount every month. That’s how I take care of my three “home” parishes since I am often going to Mass at some completely different place.