The dubious link between Christian literalism and Christian values is also belied by other indices of charity. Consider the ratio in salaries between top-tier CEOs and their average employee: in Britain it is 24 to 1; France 15 to 1; Sweden 13 to 1; in the United States, where 83% of the population believes that Jesus literally rose from the dead, it is 475 to 1. Many a camel, it would seem, expects to squeeze easily through the eye of a needle.
scott_alexsk said:Who said other people besides Christians cannot donate money? Your post does not refute the fact that my church and my parents are charitable and give money and other things to the poor.
scott_alexsk said:Call me fundamentalist, but by my definition of life, and the view that abortion is taking the world in a very unfavorable direction (i.e. eugenics ), I would have no problem with my church funding something that would encourage the pro-life movement. Why should Christains not be active in politics? Certainly according to our system of government, Christians make up a portion of people, therefore shouldn't their collective will have some influence (within the confines of the constitution of course).
-scott
scott_alexsk said:My point is that abortion will lead to eugenics and has already.
scott_alexsk said:My point is that abortion will lead to eugenics and has already. Someone posted on this forum that parents now can discriminate between embryos depending on what they want. That seems like a textbook definition of eugenics to me. You may not have a problem with that sort of thing, but I do.
scott_alexsk said:(and go ahead and speed it up by doing a really late term abortion on everyone else)
Chi Meson said:(NB: I generally do not like these labels, but I like these "who's better" studies even less)
"Conservatives" tend to be more wealthy and tend to stick close to the traditional 10% tithe. wealthier conservatives are also looking for tax deductions. "Liberals" are more likely to forego a more lucrative career in order to devote their time to a cause. I tended to meet fewer conservative volunteers during my HFH stints. I'm not judging either "side" here, but there are more ways than cash by which to measure generosity.
Moonbear said:I also wonder how they define conservative and liberal? Are they basing it on party affiliation, assuming all Republicans are conservative and all Democrats are liberal? How is this connection made? There are a lot of moderates in both parties.
arunma said:I'm not sure which side they'd put me on.
Danger said:Start buying Preparation-H by the truckload, because you're firmly impaled on a picket.
Chi Meson said:I rely on a good pair of tweezers due to chronic splinters from incessant fence-jumping.
Danger said:And a rear-view mirror, I assume?
Moridin said:TDid they donate, because they were conservatives or because they were nice people to begin with?
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2007/08/religious_doctors.htmlAlthough most religious traditions call on the faithful to serve the poor, a large cross-sectional survey of U.S. physicians found that those who are more religious are slightly less likely to practice medicine among the underserved than doctors with no religious affiliation.
In the July/August issue of the Annals of Family Medicine, researchers from the University of Chicago and Yale New Haven Hospital report that 31 percent of physicians who were more religious -- as measured by "intrinsic religiosity" as well as frequency of attendance at religious services -- practiced among the underserved, compared with 35 percent of physicians who described their religion as atheist, agnostic or none.
...Curlin and colleagues also noted that those who identified themselves as very spiritual, whether or not they were religious, were roughly twice as likely to care for the underserved as those who described their spirituality as low. [continued]
Chi Meson said:"Conservatives" tend to be more wealthy and tend to stick close to the traditional 10% tithe. wealthier conservatives are also looking for tax deductions. "Liberals" are more likely to forego a more lucrative career in order to devote their time to a cause. I tended to meet fewer conservative volunteers during my HFH stints. I'm not judging either "side" here, but there are more ways than cash by which to measure generosity.
Arthur Brooks, the author of "Who Really Cares," says that "when you look at the data, it turns out the conservatives give about 30 percent more." He adds, "And incidentally, conservative-headed families make slightly less money."
"You find that people who believe it's the government's job to make incomes more equal, are far less likely to give their money away," Brooks says. In fact, people who disagree with the statement, "The government has a basic responsibility to take care of the people who can't take care of themselves," are 27 percent more likely to give to charity.
And what about the middle class? Well, while middle-income Americans are generous compared to people in other countries, compared to the rich and the working poor, they give less. "The two most generous groups in America are the rich and the working poor," says Brooks. "The middle class give the least."
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=2682730&page=1Religious people are more likely to give to charity, and when they give, they give more money: four times as much. And Arthur Brooks told me that giving goes beyond their own religious organization:
"Actually, the truth is that they're giving to more than their churches," he says. "The religious Americans are more likely to give to every kind of cause and charity, including explicitly non-religious charities."
It is far easier to track money that is given to churches or is funneled through them to charities than it is to assess the impact of people who give money anonymously and/or volunteer their labor or provide professional services at a discount or free to people in need. This issue of "trackability" may be the source of the entire disparity if indeed there is a disparity at all.chemisttree said:I have no idea what Mr. Brooks uses to measure liberal or conservative in his book and I don't think it is important enough to buy it and research it. But if he is accurate, and I'm not saying he is, the real question here is, "Why would a humanist (athiest/nonreligious) ignore humanity more so than one who believes that our fate is in the hands of a 'mythical' creator?"
Having spent some time working in the deep south, I can tell you that one of the "benefits" conferred upon church members is the ability to send their children to all-white "Christian academies". When Bush or other Republicans blather on about the crying need for a school voucher program in which the vouchers can be used for any school, this is the demographic they are targeting. They like to mumble on about inner-city poor kids, but the biggest beneficiaries would be the "Christians" sending their kids to church-affiliated segregated schools.Moridin said:Another interesting question is, given that a portion of the money goes to the maintenance of churches, whether the donations is for that purpose or to help the poor etc.
chemisttree said:"Why would a humanist (athiest/nonreligious) ignore humanity more so than one who believes that our fate is in the hands of a 'mythical' creator?"
chemisttree said:The ABC program quotes Arthur Brooks as the source of the 30% disparity in their story.
I have no idea what Mr. Brooks uses to measure liberal or conservative in his book and I don't think it is important enough to buy it and research it. But if he is accurate, and I'm not saying he is, the real question here is, "Why would a humanist (athiest/nonreligious) ignore humanity more so than one who believes that our fate is in the hands of a 'mythical' creator?"