When people homeless beg for money on the street corner, how often do you give them money?

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I follow the guidance we were given in Scripture. I direct them to the organizations who can assist them with food, medicine, a place to live, and I donate to those orgs. BE like the Good Samaritan!
 
That’s only happened to me once when I was on vacation in DC. The guy asked me for gas money as we passed by each other, and this is probably more than a usual amount, but I gave him 6 bucks. I saw tons of street performers in DC, and there were two I didn’t give anything to. So, I can’t give you a percentage, but I can say that I’ve donated a couple times in situations like this.
 
I give money and sometimes food. It doesn’t fix the situation they are in but I’m happy to help anyway I can
 
Once in LA, a guy with a full 16 oz malt liquor in his hand asked me for money. When I pointed at his drink and laughed, he laughed too and walked away.

I’ve muted all response notifications. Still see likes though. Have a blessed day!
 
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I feel the same , I commute in LA and see a lot of homeless. If I have water or food that I havent opened from lunch I will give it to them and will pay for their fare when the driver doesn’t let them in . I do give Money if I have extra cash on me . I don’t know and cant judge that all homeless are on drugs so I give it when I can so why wouldn’t I help?
 
I rarely give anyone money. My city has a great amount of resources available to homeless people and others with few resources - free food, free clothes, free bus transportation, even free cellphones. So, unless I see some unusual situation, no. We have plenty of regular beggars manning certain corners or freeway ramps. I’m happy to give funds to organizations, but not to street people.
 
I donate sustainable food products, shampoo and the likes several times a year to a neighbouring parish. I don’t give money as most of those begging on our streets now have made it a “business” more or less.
 
If a homeless person seems legit and is in need, I do give them money whenever I can. It might be God testing my faith with an Angel. Faith without works is dead.

Hebrews 13:2 New American Bible (Revised Edition) (NABRE)
2 Do not neglect hospitality, for through it some have unknowingly entertained angels.

James 2:24-26 New American Bible (Revised Edition) (NABRE)
24 See how a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. 25 And in the same way, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she welcomed the messengers and sent them out by a different route? 26 For just as a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
 
EvangelistVictor said:
If a homeless person seems legit and is in need, I do give them money whenever I can. It might be God testing my faith with an Angel. Faith without works is dead.
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Unfortunately, whenever I have found out what happened to the money I gave, I found I had been lied to.
If you or I were an addict who had a future self who was clean and sober, the last thing our clean and sober self would want from strangers is to be able to tell a story and get money, right? That just extends the most dangerous and hopeless stretch of our lives out for a longer time, possibly to the point that we actually succeed in killing ourselves.

Why? Because we weren’t in need of money. Food: yes. A place to live: yes. Medical care: yes. Someone who would see us as a human being who needed friendship: yes. A way to feed our self-destructive addiction? No. That, we needed to have denied to us, because that was a near occasion of sin and a path to our self-destruction. It isn’t as if that self-destruction always leads to a “rock bottom” in which the addict turns from the addiction and gets clean and sober. Too often, it leads to an isolated life of despair that ends in a lonely death.

More to the point, money and time given to organizations that do outreach to the homeless and other destitute persons can both make the money go farther and make certain it is used responsibly. It can require people to get the human contact they need in order to get the food and shelter they also need. A life where you can get money from strangers to choose a life of enslavement to an addiction is no life. That isn’t what we’d want for ourselves, if we were in that state. It isn’t what we’d want for family members. No, giving the necessities of life in a context that includes human contact and concern is a far better use of charitable giving.

If you’re going to give to someone in need, take the time to give what is needed, rather than cash. Cash is far too often used for self-destruction. Giving cash to someone you don’t know to do who-knows-what isn’t a charitable “work.” Charitable work for the destitute requires more time and effort and personal contact than just giving money.

After all, the Lord didn’t say, “I was hungry, thirsty, a stranger…and you gave me money…” did He? No, He said, “you gave me food, you gave me something to drink, you clothed me, you visited me, you welcomed me…”
 
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I will buy them food if possible. I will never give them money.
 
When I was in LA guys would run up to your car when stopped and try to spray some suspicious yellow liquid on your window so then you’d have to let them wipe it off with a filthy rag and then give them a couple of bucks. Ingenious, in a fiendish sort of way.

I’ve muted all response notifications. Less temptation to respond in anger to flamers that way. Still see likes tho. Nice PMs always welcome. Have a nice day!
 
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I usually give them a few dollars if I have cash with me. Sometimes, if I am at work and going to grab something for lunch, I might buy someone a sandwich or something.

Most of my charity $$ goes into the poor box at my Church, because they twice a week distribute money to the poor to help them pay bills.
 
If I could give PetraG’s post a thousand likes, I would. It is beautifully written and clearly set out. PetraG has evidently given this issue much thought, and successfully explains exactly why giving cash to beggars, while no doubt well-meant, is often merely keeping them trapped in the cycle of addiction and homelessness. As a young man living in San Francisco, where homelessness is almost a lifestyle, I used to give money to just about everyone who asked me. After twenty-eight years now working for the department of Social Services, I have a more profound insight into the whole issue of addiction and homelessness. The problem with giving cash is that, more often than not, it is a way for us to salve our consciences, rather than contributing in any meaningful way to giving a leg up to the less fortunate. If we truly want to help them, we have to ensure that we are not just doing it to feel good about ourselves. We must think clearly and dispassionately about the best way to do it, and then implement it.
 
TheNoseKnows said:
Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?
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Name a saint whose main outreach to the needy was to hand them money.

In the following story, after all, do you think Peter and John were literally penniless? Or was it that money was not what they had to give, but direct experience of the life of Christ?

Now Peter and John were going up to the temple area for the three o’clock hour of prayer. And a man crippled from birth was carried and placed at the gate of the temple called “the Beautiful Gate” every day to beg for alms from the people who entered the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked for alms. But Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, “Look at us.” He paid attention to them, expecting to receive something from them. Peter said, “I have neither silver nor gold, but what I do have I give you: in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean, rise and walk." Then Peter took him by the right hand and raised him up, and immediately his feet and ankles grew strong. He leaped up, stood, and walked around, and went into the temple with them, walking and jumping and praising God. Acts 3:1-8

Does St. James say to give the needy money? No, he says to provide them with the necessities they need:

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him If a brother or sister has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,” but you do not give them the necessities of the body, what good is it? So also faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead. James 2:14-17 (boldface mine, of course)

No one here is saying that the poor should not be given anything. What is being said is that just giving money can easily be doing more harm than good. I would go so far as to say more often than not. If the person says they need money for a bus ticket…take the time to put them on the bus and pay their fare. If they say they need food, buy them food and give them the food. (My husband, by the way, did this and found the man back in the store not five minutes later trying to exchange the food for cash so he could buy what he really wanted, which was cigarettes. Is it an act of charity to reward lying?)

Oh, and by the way, a kitchen outreach to the poor can give both fellowship and food to five or ten people for what it would cost one person to buy something to eat alone.
 
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I’ll usually hand them a dollar, or perhaps a couple cigarettes if that’s all they’re after. I’m not going to try to dictate how they spend their dollar.
 
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I live in the Philippines so would possibly have a different perspective.

About 3 months ago I was in Guam of the United States. On the first night I decided to go into a Hungry Jacks. There was an indigenous family of 4 adults sitting outside and one of them approached me asking for money because apparently as he said they didn’t have enough money for dinner.

This was a surprise because my impression for the half day I was there was that it looked quite developed and well off. Certainly all of the 4 looked well dressed and well groomed. In the Philippines I see what poor looks like and this seemed out of place. Of course when your mind is somewhere else and you get approached you are not sure what to think.

I explained that I was a tourist (which he probably knew) and that I didn’t have so many American dollars with me to give to him.

I went inside the Hungry Jacks and ordered a meal and of course my conscience was going through the routine of thinking about whether I should have given him something or perhaps now give part of my meal. There were four of them anyway so part of a meal was not really appropriate. I asked the girl behind the counter if she knew the family outside and we talked a little and I explained what just happened. The girl said that she hadn’t seen them before that day but they were in the store a little earlier buying ice creams.

When I went outside there were another 2 adults who had joined them and they were casually joking as anyone else would playing with their phones.

I think it is important to know who you give your money to. The Didache (1st century apostles creed) mentions the typical Christian charge of ::
Give to everyone that asks thee, and do not refuse, for the Father’s will is that we give to all from the gifts we have received.
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but in discussing the above it does also balance this with

> But concerning this it was also said, "Let thine alms sweat into thine hands until thou knowest to whom thou art giving."

http://www.thedidache.com/
 
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DignumEtJustum said:
I’ll usually hand them a dollar, or perhaps a couple cigarettes if that’s all they’re after. I’m not going to try to dictate how they spend their dollar.
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I would caution you that the last thing an addict needs is cash. They use it to kill themselves. They are often so enslaved to the thing they are addicted to that they cannot help it.

Having said that, it is your money, and when you make a gift of it, whether out of the blue or to someone who asks, it is theirs. Letting go of what you give freely is not a bad habit.
 
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