"The program suggested, again without a source, that the church takes in $7 billion in tithing each year and spends $6 billion on its various religious and charitable causes..."
"If the church did have $150 billion, a figure the church did not confirm during the “60 Minutes” interview..."
Why *isn't* the church releasing its financials? What does it have to hide?
This article is a whole steaming pile of justifications and excuses. First, the general public expects that the Mormon church will follow the law, which the church did not do. The public also expects that any church which receives tax exemptions will do a reasonable amount of charitable work in return, which doesn't seem to be happening here.
The church attempted to hide the money for a reason. They knew that what they were doing would not be viewed favorably.
The worthiness interviews are a constant source of embarrassment for me. Every so often something will trigger my memory of uncomfortably twitching in the bishop's office while spilling my guts. The very private things I felt I had to confess to bishops when I was a teenager filled me with shame. The things I confessed to were normal growing up stuff and nothing that should have caused intense embarrassment and self flagellation. None of it was any of the bishop's business.
If anyone had told me those bishops had no authority over me and that I wasn't obligated to tell them anything, it would have helped so much. I really thought I had to confess everything to remain clean. Oh the humanity!
If I could only do a do-over how much better my life would have been if I could have skipped those worthiness interviews along with the shame, humiliation, embarrassment, etc.