I've been the financial clerk for around 10 years, off and on.

At the beginning of each year, the clerk enters the tithing declarations into the computer and he definitely sees the amounts as he enters the data.

This may a bit judgmental, but I was amazed at the number of TR holders who declare a full-tithe but it's obvious they weren't. I'm talking about the lawyer that lives in a big house, drives a 60K car, and paid 3K in tithing that year...full tithe payer. This guy in particular, is a fanatic TBM. I remember one year, an engineer in the ward gave a talk about tithing and how he's always paid a full-tithe, but this guy didn't pay a single penny that year, no joke.

I get that people are allowed to have their own definition of what a full-tithe is but that never fit into my TBM mind.

I find it funny that there are so many dishonest people among the supposedly best and most honest people on the planet.

I'm not going this year.

When I think about "tithing settlement" it really irritates me. This is supposed to be a VOLUNTARY charitable donation but it turns out to be an act of extortion so that people can get their magic kingdom club card (TR), They need this TR so they can always keep up the appearance of the faithful temple goer.

LDS INC sure created a cash cow with the profit centers...er temples.

I remember cringing when I would see the sign up sheet taped to the bishops door. Then everyone in the ward could see who the perfect tbms were.

I remember a lot of the more affluent people paying tithing directly to SLC so local ward members wouldn't find out how much they paid. Many paid tithing from their stock options.

I did this for my last few years as a TBM, as did a number of people in the stake. I'm definitely not rich--I paid to SLC because there was so much gossip about tithing amounts at ward council and because they took WEEKS to cash my checks.

If the COB was smart, they would automate tithing payments, let people do it online if they want, keep track of it and then email the results to bishops. Good thing for the members that the COB isn't smart.

They won't do that because that would take away from the show and tell aspect of mormonism - the bragging, the one-upmanship, the "look at me" attitude. It's crazy.

The COB is smart in the area they care about -- keeping the cashflow coming in.

Social pressure, also known as "publication" is a well-known incentive which far outweighs the efficacy of threats or rewards.

One example which has grown hoary with retelling is the story of Western Electric trying to get warehouse managers to send back their unused cable to corporate headquarters, where it was to be reprocessed.

Nobody would do it and they tried EVERYTHING! Then they hired a consultant who said he would solve the problem for a flat $10,000 (at a time when a house was $13,000). And he did!

He told them to publish in the company newsletter a box with the name of the warehouse manager with the oldest cable.

BAAAM! Within just a couple of months, all the old cable had been returned to headquarters.


They know exactly what they are doing. Members are lucky they don't have to wear armbands with "I've Been to Tithing Settlement" on it.

Anagrammy

Or a sticker like they give you when you donate blood.

Maybe the church could set up a PayPal account.

In 2012 I received a call from one of the EQ presidency members to alert me to my appointed time to meet the bishop for tithing settlement. This was a follow up call to the mass email that was sent to the entire quorum showing which time each Elder was assigned. I had not been at church for 6 months. The caller identified himself, but I did not know him. He was new to the ward and had never met me. He asked me, a TBM BIC member, and RM of 50+ years, if I knew what tithing settlement was?

For 2013 I've decided that if someone calls me again about my appointed time slot or sends me an email with my name in an assigned time slot, I'm going to respond in writing or on the phone . . .

. . . "I'll be happy to come to tithing settlement as soon as you have read everything on MormonThink.com. And once you have read everything, then call me and ask me if you still think I should attend tithing settlement."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/14/2013 11:38PM by jiminycricket.

Doesn't bother me that someone doesn't dish out their hard earned money to the mormon church.

"Yes Bishop, I'll attend settlement....providing you can show me the financial records of how the previous tithing I've donated has been spent. Deal?"

Love it!!

Despite being a full tithe payer my entire life, I haven't been invited for a single tithing settlement since returning from my mission....13 years ago.....I've paid my last cent

AnonToday Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
I'm talking about the
> lawyer that lives in a big house, drives a 60K
> car, and paid 3K in tithing that year...full tithe
> payer. This guy in particular, is a fanatic TBM.

Betting your lawyer friend has an LLC and draws out very little in salary (tithable), and pays a lot of expenses from his corporation ($60K car).

DH received an email from the HPG leader who wanted to schedule tithing settlement offering a few day/time options. We hadn't been to church in two years. We didn't reply.

bishop called me at home and asked me if I Had time to come in for tithing settlement.

I said not gonna happen..no thank you.. I dont need an audit for a charitable contribution,

Mormon 8:32

In the last days churchs shall rise up and for your money they will offer you salvation

That's priceless.

Forced appointments for tithing settlement are an insult, implying you actually owe the church money.

Even most devout TBMs should understand that such contributions are between themselves and their god, and should not be forced.

Most wards and stakes no longer do the forced appointments nor the sign up on the clip board in the clerk's office.

The whole thing sounds like an IRS audit. Last year I was told that the bishop had a special message for my family. I told them that it was so special, then he could drop by the house. I was then told that it was the same for everyone. To which I responded that he could just give it over the pulpit.

Some years ago, in my TBM days, while clerk, we went the rounds about doing Friends of Scouting at the same time. Fought tooth and nail to not allow it. Got kind of loud in the bishop's office. Finally, I got up and found a tithing slip. I asked under what classification one placed FOS and was told it was different. Yup, that's right, and you should not conflate a judgment of worthiness with an external organization, that, by the way, pays huge salaries to professional scouters, while our kids need to do fund raisers to buy a damn tent.

Oh, and they say you need to come to TS to get your IRS statement. The last one who claimed that got an earful about IRS regs.

Nope, never again.

Crathes Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Most wards and stakes no longer do the forced
> appointments nor the sign up on the clip board in
> the clerk's office.


I'd be interested to know if this is really the case. Every ward I've ever lived in has forced an appointment.

This year my ward isn't having sign-up sheets at all. The Bishop is having the E.S call each family and assign them a time...as if the poor guy has nothing better to do.

At least half of the wards I attended as an adult had forced appointments, and all the wards I attended as a child/teenager had forced appointments (I remember my dad getting pissed about it).

My last tithing settlement was in 2011. The brand new bishopric was ordered by the stake presidency to set appointments for people and then follow up with them if they didn't show up. The announcement was made from the pulpit by a high council member. The new bishop was cringing and openly apologetic about it later, but still enforced the decree.

This will be my first year of non-tithe payer status. I usually wait until the end of the year to pay, my goal was to come out to my wife before the end of the year so I wouldn't have to pay my yearly fees.

Mission accomplished!

Oh, and DW, while still remaining a stalwart TBM, keeps coming up with new ideas for the money. Ha!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/15/2013 02:15PM by Hold Your Tapirs.

Our first with out paying tithing, either. DH is still tbm, I think, though we don't talk about it much, but he didn't push the tithing issue and has seemed happy enough to use it to pay down debt instead. Last year, we only paid a partial tithe, which was very clear from the statement, but we still got a phone call from the bishop asking if we were full tithe payers or not. I imagine this year that there will be no phone call because, clearly, no, we are not.

Sheep get fleeced.

Since he's a lawyer, he may interpret tithing on your "increase" as being only the amount of money you were able to save that year. That's how it always should have been anyway. This way if people who have little or no money and live paycheque to paycheque to buy food and pay rent wouldn't have to pay tithing. Of course the church would never let people think they can get away with this and still go to the CK, so they just let people continue on thinking they have to pay on their gross income.

I'm still interested to see how people who live in countries with a 90% tax rate are able to pay 10% on their gross.

It was the Lorenzo snow manual lesson in tithing where they removed his comment about tithing "who has means" that pushed my wife and I over the edge.

We found the original general conference talk, saw that they deliberately removed those words, were SO angry, then decided to stop kidding ourselves that they LIE to us.
Also, Malachi 3 was speaking to the church leaders, not members.

I then put this thread together on a very pro LDS web site, which ended up with hundreds of posts and discussions.

You can refer this site and page to any Tbm its a safe site as far as they would be concerned.

Page 1 covers it all.

I broke it into 5 posts.

Tithing was on surplus. Period. After Reed Smoot the church was almost broke cos people didn't pay cos why would you if the USA govt would just confiscate it. Plus too many hands in the till.

So Lorenzo rattled the can and it morphed into on income.

http://www.ldsfreedomforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=28207

1st page covers absolutely everything about tithing. Abraham, jacob, Malachi, LDS, 1890s, 1970 statement.

"Who has means"

Little did they know.

I always found interesting that they invite members to do this interview, where you disclose your earnings and compare how "honest" you have been with your tithes. BUT... TSCC wont come clean regarding its finances!!! how fair is that!!.

I have done the settlement only like 5 times and will never do again...

Non-Mormon here...at this Tithing Settlement, do they expect people to bring in their pay stubs and then calculate how much the church should have gotten? What makes them think your private financial information is any of their business? We give to our church but it is an amount we chose, not an amount someone demands from us. Tithing Settlement sounds pretty awful.

They don't need that. We line our children up to be asked creepy questions in rooms with licked doors by middle aged strangers.
We let them tell us how to have s ex.
They control the underwear we wear.
Most people bring their cheque book, not their at Stubbs.
Plenty of times told we will burn as stubble if we don't pay.
Fear is enough.

It's always been my firm belief that most of the stuff they monitor in the church is nobody's dat-gum business. Paying tithhing is like belonging to a country club--gotta pay your dues to get in to the club. I'm anti exclusive clubs of any type. Not my cup of tea.