on how to pay tithing without disclosing it to their home bishop.

It is simple. The church is funded by the 80/20 rule. 80% of all tithes and offerings come from 20% of the membership, with the top 1% contributing close to 25%. Those are the ONLY ones they do not want browbeaten by bishops.

The rest of the 19%, and the 80% that pay the widows mites have to be guilted and squeezed.

How do we know that the church was pissed off for being outed? What is that about (more details)? Who outed them? Can you send us a link?

I cannot remember if it was on this or another board, but someone outlined how to make donations not visible to the local ward. It is a program reserved for the wealthy to be able to hide their wealth from local bishops/stake presidents.

You had to word an email in a specific way when setting up direct donation to headquarters.


Several people tried to set it up so they could finish their schooling/lie to their bishop and keep temple recommends etc.

The mormon lurkers found the post and changed the policy so the poor folk could not hide, and could still be harassed a shamed by their bishops to pay a full tithe.

"It is a program reserved for the wealthy to be able to hide their wealth from local bishops/stake presidents."

I can remember seeing instructions here on RfM on how to do exactly this...tithe directly to church headquarters and bypass the local ward clerks/accounts/bishops...and there was some sort of document that you showed your bishop proving that you tithed directly to church headquarters.

This option or route around the bishop/ward level was not in effect, but I can clearly see why some would not want the bishop to know. As the ward clerk, I often assisted the financial clerk when it came to "prepping" for yearly tithing settlements. I often had the duty of printing and stuffing those printed reports into security envelopes and then passing them out. Naturally, I saw the figures of what had been paid up.

And that experience added another doubt to my cracking shelf of the church.

How was it possible for my parents to be paying the church $500 more tithing than the dentist whom my Mom worked part time as an assistant?

Yep, that bugged me a lot. But the dentist who served on the high council had no problem paying less than his part time assistant.

I worked for an investment firm in Utah. Many people who have money do this because there is a tax savings in donating appreciated stock. The disclosure thing seemed to be secondary to the tax savings.

I pay my (Baptist) tithe directly out of my traditional IRA, and gain a tax advantage, a "Qualified Charitable Distribution " (QCD). The requirements, according to Fidelity Investments, are:

"You must be 70½ or older to be eligible to make a QCD.

QCDs are limited to the amount that would otherwise be taxed as ordinary income.

The maximum annual amount that can qualify for a QCD is $100,000. This applies to the sum of QCDs made to one or more charities in a calendar year.

For a QCD to count towards your current year's RMD, the funds must come out of your IRA by your RMD deadline, generally December 31, and--VERY IMPORTANT--be paid directly to the charity(ies).

Any amount donated above your RMD does not count toward satisfying a future year's RMD.

Funds distributed directly to you, the IRA owner, and which you then give to charity do not qualify as a QCD."

Source: Fidelity.com

Also, you can't take a personal distribution, then make your charitable one. The CDR must be the first withdrawal in the tax year.

This way, my "Adjusted Gross Income" never sees this as income, and neither does the (un)Commonwealth of Taxachusetts.

I can find no documentation saying you must make a QCD before a personal distribution for yourself in a given tax year. All I can find is that the RMD deadline applies applies to both your RMD and the QCD. If you have documentation on that, please post. I did mine in the reverse order, so I have more than academic interest!

You also used a CDR acronym when I'm pretty sure you meant QCD.

Yes, talking about the IRS results in a deluge of acronyms.