Anyone else here that LD$ Inc., would not help in your time of need, like food, heat electric bill? What did you do?

My dh is a painting contractor and he severly broke his ankle. Pins and screws etc. Obviously he couldn't work and I was a dutiful stay at home mom. We asked the church for help and all they would do was let us go to the food place (can't remember what it's called) 2 times. I figured out that by that date we had paid over $100,000 in tithing. I am still mad about that and I'd sure like a refund. So dh had to go back to work much sooner that he was supposed to and his healing took longer.

I asked how we could pay tithing when we had no income. My ex refused to give us money, and I had to borrow money from my parents for an attorney to sue for (the bare minimum) temporary child support.

Of course, the bishop said that it is policy for church members to "rely on their families" for help first, before going to the bishop.

The bishop commented that we had just moved into the ward, in a new house, and we could sell it. Putting it on the market, finding a buyer, going through escrow, finding us another place to live, all took time, and in the meantime we needed food and heat. It was winter.

The bishop said the Lord would provide a way for me to pay tithing, and when I did, they would "see what they could do." Heck! If the Lord provided us with money, we were going to spend it on food!

I sold a painting, for enough money to get us through several months. Even though we were new to Utah, I qualified for the first job I applied for, and within two weeks, got a paycheck. My boys got two paper routes, and when they were old enough, all my children had after-school jobs. We worked our heads off. I felt that the money we made was for our survival, and NOT for tithing to a church that refused to help out. Back then, I didn't know where the tithing money went, but I did know of plenty of other single mothers who were turned down, also.

I had to turn to the church for help when I was unemployed on 2 occasions back in the late 80's and early 90's.
On one occasion the bishop (an independent building contractor) took me on as casual labour and I am very grateful to him for that. I think I also got a ward christmas hamper that year.

On the latter occasion (different bishop), No help at all. I borrowed money from DW's dad (a nevermo) and got some food and furniture help from the Roman Catholic church. Nothing, zilch, nada from TSCC.

and the dumb thing was, as soon as I had a job again, I started paying tithing again.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/24/2010 08:38AM by onceanelder.

When I was a kid, we were the lord's church, his peculiar people, and we took care of our own, temporally and spiritually. The welfare farms, deseret brand, bishop's storehouses, macaroni factory, cattle ranches, etc. It was all part of the infrastructure to support the realities of making such a program work financially an example of revelation and inspiration to the world.

Now I am starting to hear reports that BPs are now telling folks to apply for government aid (food stamps, etc). That was almost a cardinal sin when I was a kid, equivalent to turning your back on god, his kingdom, and his people.

It all made so much sense. God's one true church, would take care of it's "talents" and magnify them, to allow it to fully meet the needs of it's members first, and ultimately the world's needy, just as Jesus would do if he still walked the Earth in his cruisers.

It looks like the joke is on us. The church is fake. Their mission is fake (growth of members, recruit the ignorant, save the dead). Their prophets, seers, and revelators are fake. Their world view is fake. And to no surprise, their representation of the modern Jesus ideals is fake.

And I have to hit myself in the forehead for missing the obvious. What else would I expect as the fruits of a con-man. Thanks Joe. Color me dumb-ass. HeeHaw.

Go file for help from the Government - AFDC, food stamps, etc - if THEY turned you down, THEN you came to the church. I remember a lot of people were shocked by this. I was a newbie so I didn't know what to think. The prevailing sentiment used to be "The Church takes care of its own." I thought that was cool. But evidently, the times, they are a-changin' - and have been for a while.

Now the Little People support the Lord High Muckety-Mucks, and get by however they can.

It's too bad. I thought that "The Church takes care of its own" made me feel like I was part of something special.

So, I guess I need to set this up first. About 25 years ago my wife's(wife at that time) mother(divorced because daddy was cheating with women in the ward) decided to get married. She owned the home they had lived in because daddy-in-law was a contractor and he built it and it was paid off when they divorced. So she asked us to live in the home and take care of it just in case the marriage didn't work out. Since she owned it free and clear she said we didn't have to pay rent just take care of it and if the marriage worked out we could buy the home down the road and all we had put into it as improvements would be applied to the purchase. Mommy-in-law's new hubby knew a lot of the people in the ward because he was a prominent business person in Utah Count and he had a brother-in-law in the ward too. After they were married he came to us and told us we had to pay rent equal to fair market value and I threw him out of the house. So mommy's new hubby did not like me at all, in fact I think you could probably use despise as a description of how we felt about each other.

We were a young couple with young children and we moved in to the ward she had grown up in. I was laid off and we had been struggling to make ends meet because I was a full time student at the time. One day I woke up with the feeling that there was a knife sticking in my side and someone was constantly twisting it. Lo and behold I had my first kidney stone.

The doctor told me to drink lots of water and it would pass. Well, 5 days later after excruciating agony 24 hours a day with no reprieve doctor finally admitted me to the hospital. It was stuck in my urethra and I needed surgery to remove it. So surgery done I am laying in the hospital recovering. Now I will grant it was not major surgery but I was still in there for 4 days(had a bad reaction to morphine). So I am laying there wondering how we would pay for all this and stressed to the max about paying bills and such. Wife went to the bishop and asked for financial help and this was his wonderful reply.

"I advise you to leave your husband. He is a loser and will never amount to anything and you should leave him and we will help you find a worthy husband." I guess mommy's new hubby had been talking shit about me to the ward members and bishop thought it would be best if she just left me. Great advice for a young couple married in the temple with me in the hospital huh?

The kicker is that now I think he may have been inspired since we recently divorced after 31 years of marriage and I would have been much happier these past 25 years if she had left me. Oh well at the time I was just pissed as hell. We went to the stake pres and complained and all he told us was to be patient with bishop because he has a lot of serious things he is dealing with right now. That was when I left the church in my heart but I didn't leave it completely until about 10 years ago.

Your interfering, avaricious father-in-law, your completely incompetent doctor and your asshole bishop.

Some people do really give all they have to the church and the church should look after them in their times of need but what happens on a regular basis is that people give some to the church and a lot to themselves.

My question to loveskids would be, since you've paid $100k in tithing, at 10%, that's a million dollars in earnings. Does your family not have anything put back for savings? Now of course it depends on how long it took to get that 1 mil. Ten years at 100k is obviously different than 30yrs at 33k.

This is the day and age of the benefit raffle. They seems to be one going on every weekend for someone who truly had an unfortunate incident. BUT, BUT, BUT what compounds these issues is the fact of the 2 four wheelers in the barn, the bass boat, the new 4x4 in the garage but they forgot was INSURANCE for the family.

Sorry, didn't mean to go off on a tangent there. There are people that do get down on their luck even through responisble, hard working livings and I will and do step up to help those people; but, the ones that sponge off society (and there are many) get no sympathy.

This happened when we had been married 33 years. We have 9 kids. Helping them with college,weddings (7 are girls) all the normal stuff you do for your kids. We did pay way to much of our kids bills(At one time we were paying for 5 cell phones) It's stupid but we did it. I think I was more disappointed that they didn't even make an effort to help. Just a no-do it yourself. And very arrogant about it.

Oh-I forgot. No,we never had a boat or anything other than cars. I have only had 1 new car in 37 years and that was in 1999. We do have a big house,but you kind of need one with 9 kids.

The first rule of personal finance -- DO NOT EVER PAY ANY TITHING. The CoJCoLDS has a net worth estimated at $30 billion. Any person needs his/her own money a lot more than the church needs it. If you ever fall on hard times, the church will give you next to nothing, maybe nothing. If you can't take care of yourself, don't make the mistake of thinking that the church will take of you.

Instead of paying tithing, put the money into a traditional IRA. Let it accumulate interest that is tax free until you withdraw the money. If you do this diligently over your working years you will have enough money to provide you with a reasonable retirement. If you don't put YOUR own money away for retirement then you will almost certainly spend your retirement years in poverty. Social Security benefits are barely enough to survive, but not enough to be above the poverty level. 85% of Americans reach age 65 without any money saved for retirement.

If you ever have a major financial problem, you can tap your IRA money to get by. But if you paid your tithing and do not have a sizable IRA account, you will be in deep financial trouble. This is the hard truth. It just doesn't make sense to pay out YOUR money in tithing to a church that is already super wealthy.

When I was going through my divorce, and before a maintenance order was in place, my hubby was trying to smoke me out--thinking I'd change my mind if I couldn't survive without him. My car insurance had been dropped and I had 2 kids driving who didn't even know that. I was just trying to be able to buy food and buy gas to get to work. I should have let my house go then, but I put all my money into paying a house payment that I couldn't afford on my own, thinking I could sell it, which never happened.

I'd get stories all the time about everything my dad would do for people in his ward-giving them jobs, setting them up so they could start a business, etc. But he never once offered me so much as a dime and it was like my parents talked all around what was happening so they didn't have to ask if I needed any help. When I'd try to ask for it all I'd get is "pay your tithing."

So at one point when I was destitute, I went to the bishop and told him I was trying real hard to find a better job, but in the mean time I really needed some help. Of course, the first thing he said was, "I see that you haven't paid tithing for months." I just wanted to scream, "what part of I can't provide for my kids do you not understand?" He chastised me for an hour or so and then told me that he wanted me to pay tithing and he promised me that if I did, the Lord would help me find a new job. He said that if I still did not have a new job in 2 months to come back to him and if I were paying tithing, he would help me."

I went home feeling so guilty because both my bishop and my dad the so-called family patriarch, were telling me I'd be blessed if I paid my tithing. I wrote out the check but I just couldn't turn it in. I was going to give it a week, but then I gave up and got what I needed for my family instead and never paid the tithing. I felt so guilty. Well, a couple of weeks later I got called in for a job interview, and got a job that was enough money to scrape by on and had benefits.

If I had paid my tithing, it would have been proof positive that my dad and bishop were right and almightygod blessed me and the church is twoo. I would have been sucked in for life. Instead, it was a real wake-up call that I got that job because I was the best qualified person and because of my own hard work. I got it despite being a non-tithe payer. It really was the beginning of being able to open my eyes and start looking at TSCC from a rational standpoint and seeing it for what it is.

I will never tire of re-telling my story of how I gave, and gave, and gave to the church, putting my ambitions and dreams aside to give "all that I had" to helping the poor, the needy, the sick, and to the building of this goddamned cult kingdom. And then when I became the needy, after faithful tithing since age 12, they wouldn't give me a cent.

Oh, the bishop was a right decent guy, said I had to clean the meetinghouse twice a week for 2 weeks to "pay back" money he "loaned" for basic utilities (I agreed), and then changed his mind and said I didn't need to clean at all.

But then I had a better plan. I went to them (b'prick and Stake dudes) and said, look if you'll loan me "X" amount so that I can go out and find a job, I'll pay it all back when the blessings come pouring in that there be no place to receive it, plus interest. Jesus and Mormon God need their interest, you see. Even if it were my donation in the first place. And the blithering idiots said NO, "it wasn't how it was done" and none of them could personally help because they had a bajillion children to feed, clothe, and educate. None of them referred me to anyone who they knew could help.

A humungous, big THANKS FOR NUTHIN', you pricks!

Oh, yeah this was the straw that broke the camel's back. In spite of question that had been put on the shelf, I kept coming back for more humiliation and fear, week after week, reading scripture so that I don't lose my faith. And the cult turned it's back on me.

after the large downturn in the economy and thousands of engineers were laid off (including hubby).

He got his unemployment benefits (not much in those days), I made arrangements to make smaller payments on our debts, etc.
We had first used up our savings, contacted family to see if they could help in any way. They couldn't, for legitimate reasons. I was unemployable as I was pregnant.

THEN we were eligible, according to the church policy, to ask for help.

That was the policy of the LDS Church at the time.
This was in the late 60's/early 70'.

We were temple married, he was an RM, we were full tithe payers and held at least four callings in the Ward.You were expected, in those days, as LDS to use your money wisely, stay out of debt, and have some savings.

Those were the days when only a mortgage and a washer/dryer was acceptable debt. We had a little more, of course, especially because of the long layoff (over six months).

We were also expected to do some kind of work for the help we received. I did some typing and other odd jobs, while my husband traveled through at least six states looking for work, which he finally found in another location, forcing us to sell our home we just bought a couple years prior.

We received food orders every week, and a check or two to cover utilities, etc. which we paid back with our income tax returns the following year.

My how times have changed!

I think Mormonism helps out certain families more than others, and some not at all.

It is inclined to help out the active, church going ones (I guess that's logical?) but if a person's family has special ties to one of the GA's, they will get help more readily than others.

Yes, and one definitely has to be the type of person who will pay tithing no matter what, even if all they have is money for tithing. My TBM sister did this. She paid tithing on almost no income, and couldn't feed her own kids--but then got the Bishop's Storehouse food--and claimed it was a "blessing"

Plus, I think the church kicked in financially when they were about to lose their home, but only because both she and spouse never miss a single Sunday and do everything they're asked at church.

When I was 15, my mother lay dieing in a hospital in Lancaster, CA, and my alcoholic father had been carted away again somewhere. He was in and out of jail and halfway houses, mostly for drunk driving and disturbing the peace. I lived in a small hamlet in the Mojave Desert, and no longer had electricity or phone due to non-payment of bills. Eventually I didn't even have water, and the county finally put me in a foster home (an LDS foster home, at that). But before that happened, the Relief Society president would come over and deliver me stuff, but refused to come in the house. First she was afraid of my father, and learning he wasn't there, she thought it was "inappropriate" to be alone in the house with me. She left boxes of things like noodles, oil, and oatmeal. What good was any of this stuff? I couldn't cook. I wanted cereal, milk, bread, and peanut butter. Some of the stuff was surprising, like big Number 10 cans of Deseret brand food--applesauce, peaches, and honey. Mostly I needed people around me. I was so lonely and very afraid, and had to spend each evening in a dark and quiet house. No one seemed to catch on to that one, even if it seems so obvious.

Occasionally the branch president would come by and rifle through the house to find things to sell in exchange for the food and the "care" they were giving me--a camera, one of my dad's guns, some dark room equipment, things like that. One time he took a semi-valuable coin my father had. Once he left a big box of envelopes for me to address as some sort of chore that I was supposed to do to help pay for the stuff they were giving me.

What a cheap church. Little did I know that I probably could have knocked on the door of the local Foursquare Church or something for some kind of aid.

How sad and appalling! I've been to Mojave and can imagine the situation. That's terrible.

I can only read these stories when I'm feeling strong enough to handle them.

Glad you and everyone else in this thread survived and are out of that so-called church.

When I had absolutely nothing, was that I hear, and a member in full fellowship, the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints we fuse to help me do anything to immigrate my wife and children into the United States. The main catholic church in Salt Lake City provided me an Atty. For only $400 four years of hard work, work, a demotion all support. When my mormon wife got to the United States and she's we turn missionary, I had to force her to go to the catholic church and thank them.

then where's the food from the canneries going? Is it being stored away for the "end times"? Or are the canneries sitting idle?

I don't know if they do or not, but I wouldn't be surprised.

In the early 80's my family was struggling as were many others. Mother not working and father having a tough time making what he used to.

We all went down to the cannery and canned up some of that wonderful dry turkey meat. We could take some of what we canned. My family was still expected to pay tithing even though they knew only one parent was employed and had seven kids to feed. Nice guys. And this was in a fairly wealthy ward.

Boy doesn't that make me feel valued as a Tithe paying Chinese kid.

(I think she would be my 2nd cousin...not to familiar with the whole extended family deal.) About 14 years ago her husband went in for a fairly routine surgery and the doctors botched everything and he died on the table. He was the sole provider to a family of 5 and they were used to a fairly extravagant lifestyle. It was quite a blow to have "Uncle D" gone and "Auntie D" didn't have any employment experience and now had to support 3 kids, her two sons emptied the bank account from the lawsuit and ran off. (They appeared about 7 years later, in the Nevada state prison) So she was left with her young daughter with no house, no job, no food, nothing. Uncle D had very loose ties to TSCC and once word got out the mishie's were popping up and the RS ladies proceeded their love bombing.
My grandfather found out about her financial plight and offered her some money and that she and her daughter could come live with him and my grandmother until they got on their feet. He and the rest of the family cautioned her on the "nice folks" that were giving her money and food. She declined saying that the mormons were just so nice and she was receiving a lot of help. Then, when she stated she really didn't agree with their teachings, everything stopped.They said that unless she and her daughter were baptized within a week, all assistance would stop. One RS representative called and started leaving nasty voice mails that she had better get her casserole dishes back.

She's moved and worked hard to earn a good life for her and her daughter, and learned a valuable lesson.

She is very very pretty. Has a delightful personality and makes everybody smile.

She got everything she needed. I actually was happy for her because she was so funny, nice, cute, lively. I think everybody liked her and nobody could say no, not even the bishop.

I was so surprised when she told me all the goods and money she got from him.

We ran into a very tight spot in 1990 when our farm just about went under, but asking the church for penny #1 was never considered.

Ron Burr

Like everything else in the church, help is conditional. It depends who you are and who your bishop is. When the church says, 'ask your family for help first', I would love some convert say my family will only help if I resign from the church and have nothing to do with it. I wonder what the response would be?

I've never even thought of this until now.
When my mom left us and moved to Utah, my sister and I (we were 12 and 13 at the time) went to church BY OURSELVES (our dad is a nevermo) and no one in our ward ever said a word to us. We always sat alone and not ONE person ever did a single thing. We stopped going a few months later but looking back I can't believe it!! 2 young girls in the ward were abandoned by their mom and no one said or did a single thing. We really, really could have used some positive female role models in our life at that time...it's too bad my ward was full of total hags.

When I went to the bishop for help, the women in the ward delivered a box of food. They obviously had cleaned out their pantries; among the assorted items was a can of anchovies.

Never any $ help of any kind.

I was married with three kids in diapers. My wife, who was handicapped to start with, had a major bout of post-partum depression. The house quickly became a mess.

My wife asked the RS president if we could have some help cleaning the place up.

The result was that the Bishopric came over and chewed me out for letting it get so far out of hand. Grim faced, they told me how rotten I was for letting it get so bad. Then they made me promise that if they helped me clean it up I'd keep it clean. I hung my head and promised. Then they left.

By the way, nobody EVER came and helped with the house. The entire help they gave was to come over and tell me how rotten I'd been for letting it go like it had.