(June 24, 2025 at 8:32 pm)Sandman Wrote: @Mister Agenda
You said "I think purely religious giving should be subtracted from that. If I pay dues to belong to a social club, that's not charity and that's what a lot of going to church is, IMHO."
ah definitions - gotta make em agree. So by your definition, when secular social clubs use their members money & time for charitable causes, it's not really charity either. Because its a social club.
No, the portion that goes to charitable causes counts as charity, the portion that goes to the organization itself should not.
(June 24, 2025 at 8:32 pm)Sandman Wrote: Well, I hear the churches in America gave, say, 3% of this year's $135.78 billion dollar member 'dues' to charity. Would you please, as best as you can, off the top of your head, provide me the total dues collected by all social clubs in America this year, and the percentage of their 'dues' which went to 'charity'. I understnad there are no good numbers for volunteer time given to churches alone, so we can throw out volunteer time numbers on churches and secular social clubs.
This way we can reasonably include or exclude social clubs along with churches in our religious vs. non religious charity calculations.
No.
(June 24, 2025 at 8:32 pm)Sandman Wrote: You said: "Approximately 81% of Americans believe in God, so 63% of food banks being religious doesn't seem like a high proportion to me, given that."
Ugh. I hear from one Atheist that religion dominates America, and from another, that religion has declined, and nobody goes to church any more.
The percentage of people who believe in God and the percentage who go to church are not the same. The percentage of Americans who regularly attend church is about 30%.
(June 24, 2025 at 8:32 pm)Sandman Wrote: Religious and Non religious charity donations apppear to come out even. A wash, as far as I can tell.
That's my impression as well.
I'm not anti-Christian. I'm anti-stupid.
