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  • EADD Moderators: Pissed_and_messed | Shinji Ikari

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:( Now I feel bad. Ctrl + F and "birds" didn't yield any results, I shouldn't have been so impatient, haha. Your explanation was better than mine anyway, so maybe you can take comfort in that.
 
MrM said:
Is 'no faith' the same as 'atheist' ? I'm not sure it is. Also your source is the Bana Group; 'The Barna Group is an evangelical Christian polling firm based in Ventura, California.' Possibly biased?
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No faith and atheist are put in the same bracket as those who do not regularly attend church. It is the attendence of church, not the simply stating you are a Christian that is a predictor of charitable giving. I have very little doubt the Bana group is biased, but there is only so far you can bend facts. If it was that easy atheist and humanitarian organisations would have done it a long time ago. There are dozens of papers on the topic, and they all say religious attendence is a strong predictor of just how much you will give. I don't honestly think Richard Dawkins is going to do a study when he knows what they outcome will be.
 
Mr Smokes Blunts. said:
Here are a few links to Christian/religious charitible giving
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Which charities are they giving to tho? Charities that furthur the spread of their religion and support the church? That's not quite the same thing.

I think the question should be more about whether christians contribute more to secular charities like the RSPCA than non-christians. That would give you a better idea of whether they are giving for givings sake or giving because it's supporting their church.
 
Ismene said:
Which charities are they giving to tho? Charities that furthur the spread of their religion and support the church? That's not quite the same thing.

I think the question should be more about whether christians contribute more to secular charities like the RSPCA than non-christians. That would give you a better idea of whether they are giving for givings sake or giving because it's supporting their church.
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Aha, that old chesnut. The links also state that it's giving across the board. They even give more to secular charities ;)
 
It would be interesting to know which charities were being given to, because a LOT of churches, especially in the US, are registered charities and strongly encourage their members to tithe a certain amount of their income to the church itself, which then goes on church expenses, which in some cases include enormous advertising budgets and in very extreme cases allows the pastors to live a life of opulent luxury.

I'm not disputing any of the above but as I say it would be interesting to know where the money was going.
 
jancrow said:
It would be interesting to know which charities were being given to, because a LOT of churches, especially in the US, are registered charities and strongly encourage their members to tithe a certain amount of their income to the church itself, which then goes on church expenses, which in some cases include enormous advertising budgets and in very extreme cases allows the pastors to live a life of opulent luxury.

I'm not disputing any of the above but as I say it would be interesting to know where the money was going.
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I have read most of Arthur C Brookes book, and even when you take away charitable giving to churches (who do the bulk of outreach programs, especially in America, like soup kitchens), they are still giving more. They even give more blood!
 
23-25% sounds reasonable as a margin by which coercion would influence charitable behaviour. 60 odd % of people are decent enough as is, a quarter of folk are only nice when coerced into it. The remainder are life's arseholes. I can believe that.

The question being dodged is very simple.

How do you reconcile belief in an omnipotent, omniscient, God who cares, with the stark reality that confronts you every second of every day?

How can you reconcile a world filled with appalling suffering and injustice, with the notion that there is someone watching, who is a good guy, who can help, yet never, ever does? He could fix everything with a snap of his fingers, but doesn't.

If you believe he exists, how do you reach a conclusion where he is anything other than a massive sadistic wanker?
 
Mr Smokes Blunts. said:
Aha, that old chesnut. The links also state that it's giving across the board
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Presumably not to charities that don't coincide with their religious beliefs tho? They won't be contributing much to "condom use in africa".

I guess the question is if there was a charity operating and everywhere they operated, instead of having a massive cross on the building, they had a massive sign saying "LEGALISE MUSHROOMS NOW" then I'd probably contribute. But would I be contributing because I'm "charitable" or because I want people to have a sign saying "LEGALISE MUSHROOMS" forced down their throat?

I have read most of Arthur C Brookes book

Can this guy be trusted? I thought many commentators found that when you took away religious giving there wasn't any difference in athiest and christian?

I know the motive of a lot of right-wingers is to bring the welfare state to an end and make everyone dependent on the charity of their local church, charity which only comes if you will accept their preaching of course.
 
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Ismene said:
Presumably not to charities that don't coincide with their religious beliefs tho? They won't be contributing much to "condom use in africa".

I guess the question is if there was a charity operating and everywhere they operated, instead of having a massive cross on the building, they had a massive sign saying "LEGALISE MUSHROOMS NOW" then I'd probably contribute. But would I be contributing because I'm "charitable" or because I want people to have a sign saying "LEGALISE MUSHROOMS" forced down their throat?
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Why should they give to charities that do not coincide with their religious beliefs? Atheists can pick up at least that slack, surely?
 
Furious George said:
23-25% sounds reasonable as a margin by which coercion would influence charitable behaviour. 60 odd % of people are decent enough as is, a quarter of folk are only nice when coerced into it. The remainder are life's arseholes. I can believe that.

The question being dodged is very simple.

How do you reconcile belief in an omnipotent, omniscient, God who cares, with the stark reality that confronts you every second of every day?

How can you reconcile a world filled with appalling suffering and injustice, with the notion that there is someone watching, who is a good guy, who can help, yet never, ever does? He could fix everything with a snap of his fingers, but doesn't.

If you believe he exists, how do you reach a conclusion where he is anything other than a massive sadistic wanker?
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Erm, what about the fact that when they do give they give between 4 and 7x more? That isn't simple coercion.

I am not dodging any questions. My belief is that God is indeed all of these things, but he has given us the ability to solve all of the issues we have raised and we haven't. It's like the story with the people in the storm on a boat who pray to God. A rescue boat arrives, and they send them on saying "no thanks, we're waiting for God". There is enough food to feed the planet, there is enough medicine, there's enough of everything. If God wasn't loving these issues would be unsolvable.
 
No faith and atheist are put in the same bracket as those who do not regularly attend church.
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This is the problem i have with the study. You can't say 'christians give more to charity than atheists' using statistics that lump atheists together with 'those who do not regularly attend church'. To belong to one group you have to have arrived at a distinct philosophical position on the subject of religion whereas to belong to the other you just needn't bother going to church - the psychology is different.
 
MrM said:
This is the problem i have with the study. You can't say 'christians give more to charity than atheists' using statistics that lump atheists together with 'those who do not regularly attend church'. To belong to one group you have to have arrived at a distinct philosophical position on the subject of religion whereas to belong to the other you just needn't bother going to church - the psychology is different.
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I think the Arthur C Brookes studies seperate out the different denominations of non-belief, non-attedence etc. There are plenty of these studies about.
 
Maybe Christians wouldn't need to be so charitable if their churches hadn't stole the wealth off poor people to get rich in the first place.

Rob a Catholic church today.
 
Ismene said:
Because it's not really charity if the key thing is whether or not it benefits your religion is it.
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That isn't the key thing. They give to secular charities as well. They just don't give to charities that don't coincide with their beliefs, as i'm sure you wouldn't. I don't honestly know many atheists who are involved with Christian Aid for instance.
 
Mr Smokes Blunts. said:
I think the Arthur C Brookes studies seperate out the different denominations of non-belief, non-attedence etc. There are plenty of these studies about.
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But Arthur is a little furthur to the right than Attilla the Hun isn't he. He'd like to see all welfare stopped and everyone dependent on christian charity. Is it just coincidence his alleged "study" supports his political beliefs?
 
Mr Smokes Blunts. said:
Erm, what about the fact that when they do give they give between 4 and 7x more? That isn't simple coercion.

I am not dodging any questions. My belief is that God is indeed all of these things, but he has given us the ability to solve all of the issues we have raised and we haven't. It's like the story with the people in the storm on a boat who pray to God. A rescue boat arrives, and they send them on saying "no thanks, we're waiting for God". There is enough food to feed the planet, there is enough medicine, there's enough of everything. If God wasn't loving these issues would be unsolvable.
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But the issue is an omnipotent and omniscient god would know (due to his "ALL" knowing/seeing) that all this suffering would happen when he "designed" the world. Being omniscient he would see that there could be suffering - if he was omnipotent he could stop this and if benevolent he would not allow it.

But he put the world in motion, was everywhere, is all knowing and all powerful; then by designing and starting the world, the definitions given to him clash with each other to the point of not making sense any more, or should we just take them as metaphors?
 
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