I had absolutely no money at the time I was a Primary counselor, & it seemed like our budget for the entire 2 years I had that calling was less than $50. It seems like I'm exaggerating, but we really didn't have any money to do anything. The PP, the other 2 counselors, the teachers, & the chorister always seemed to be buying things with their own money, hoping that the general ward budget would pay them back. This was in the mid-90s.
Yes, many times and in every single calling I had.
There was a joke in our stakes that callings were not suppose to cost you money but provide blessings, however we joked it was the other way around.
Basically We paid 10% Paid extra $$ for missionary, temples, humanitarian, PEP and others Run the wards ourselves supported the programs fed the missionaries did the charity thing cleaned the toilets
Why were we sending money to SLC? We could have been much better off if we had our own little church. LOL
in my own experience - in various peinshood callings - I provided petrol <gas> telephone usage stationery subscription to ensign
Only in my genealogy roles, did the church provide the bulk of materials to enable that calling to be carried out without extra financial input (apart from petrol/travelling to the stake centre)
I paid for food and activities when I was YM pres.
I subsidized activities as Activities chairperson.
Never submitted receipts because it took forever, 6-8 weeks, to get paid back.
Oh yeah, I fronted $1500.00 of my rent money for Pioneer Day picnic food and supplies. It took a eleven consecutive nightly phone calls to the SP to get my money back.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 10:31AM by rutabaga.
I spent hundreds and hundreds of my own dollars in my scouting calling. One time for an outing, we were told we had a budget of $5 per kid from the ward. It was going to be more like $15 per kid, so I basically told the cheap bastards to F off and shove their $5 up their asses and went and paid for it myself, something like 13 kids.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 10:24AM by Mormoney.
Yes I had to use my own money for stuff! I was scoutmaster for 8 years and if I wanted to have a good program for the boys I used my own money. Not to mention burning a week of vacation from work every year for scout camp! The bish would tell me sometimes that we were about out of money. I would just say well ya better find some somewhere cuz I was gonna keep spending it. The awards are way expensive! Most of our budget was spent on the awards! That another topic for a different thread!
I'm in this boat at the moment. I have to pick up the awards for the cub scouts. I've had to pay for the majority of the awards twice, and they're quite pricey. When I tell them we're out of money, they act like it's no big deal. I didn't even get a "thank you" when I had to pay for them.
I don't pay tithing :) I volunteered to help the pack out. A few months later they told me it was an official church calling. I called bullshit on that and told them I wasn't set apart.
In every calling I had in my 32 years as a member,especially in Primary,never ever any funds for most things,even the basics,ie;stationary,card,pencils,all supposed to come from thin air,the crunch came for me when I was asked to buy an easter egg for each child and would be reimbursed,when I presented the receipt,simply told there was no money in the pot.
Traveled as a stake primary,many many miles,no support for petrol.
As a counsellor in RS no budget whatsoever,homemaking refreshments had to be purchased by the presidency,RS christmas dinner provided by us too,so mad at how we were used to such an extent,if everyone refused to put their hand in their pocket continually to provide things nothing would run apart from some lessons.
I cooked for the seniors lunch once a month,one sister did soup and I did the main meal,wish i had kept a record of how much I paid,not only in tithing etc but all the added financial burden.
Leadership, youth and Primary callings can cost $200-300 per month or more.
When I was an RSP, my bishop and I had a knock-down-drag-out fight over this issue. He hated to review and sign food orders, so he got into a pattern of telling people who wanted groceries that I would take them shopping and pay for whatever they wanted. (TOTALLY against church policy, btw.) I would find out when these people called to ask how soon I was taking them to the supermarket. Grrrrr...He refused to stop, so I ratted him out to the stake RSP and the bishop's storehouse (they already had a good idea that there was a problem).
Yes, Cub Scouts. Our entire budget for the month was something like $1.25 per boy, not including awards. So if you have 5 boys in your troop, you have about $6.25 to build crafts, do service projects, go to the museum, buy the supplies to build a campfire, paper and pencils to draw maps... you get the picture. You end up doing a lot without supplies and just running stuff off on your home copier, using your own supplies and just getting fed up and buying a couple of bottles of glue out of your own pocket money when you go to the store. Honestly, sometimes I'd get fed up and just take the money out of my tithing.
My mother is den leader and has been for years. She spends a couple hundred dollars of her own money every month, because she has virtually no budget. She's retired and living on a very modest income.
I paid when ever I was a teacher (RS, SS, YW, Primary) especially when it was in Primary and SS (12-14 yo.) and YW (14-16 yo). I always wanted them to leave with something that would remind them of the message. I would make sort of like ATCs or something to play with or something to eat, etc. Technically it did not say in the manual that I should to that but I was always serching for ways to make the 'boring lesson' fun and interesting. I knew it was often a big bore for these kids to come to church so I tried to make it worth it and that needed a bit of my finances...
Oh yeah, I forgot to add the money I paid to be a mish.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 02:55PM by quebec.
I got taken for $200 for a homemaking meeting. It seemed like I was always spending money anytime I had to do something with the kids. I wanted them to have good experiences. The church never gave enough money for that to happen.
Girls camp was the worst. We got there and the tents were moldy nasty rotting canvas with big rips. It was raining, and mosquito infested. The area we were supposed to camp in was covered with poison ivy. They were rationing food and it was gross. They also only had one source of running water, 1/4 mile from the camp site.
I called my husband and had him bring tents, tarps, food, mosquito repellant, calamine lotion, firewood, camp stoves, black garbage bags,bath soap, and coolers full of ice.
Hubby came and covered the 1000's of little ivy sprouts with tarps so we could walk around with out getting poison ivy. He set up nice clean tents with no holes in them. We sprayed the girls down with repellant.
In the morning I drove the girls over to the water. We each put a gallon or two of water in our garbage bags, climbed inside with a bar of soap, and gave ourselves a bath that way. Then we went back to camp and made a breakfast of sausage, eggs, toast, and oj.
The stake leaders were mad as hell! I told them i'd pack the girls up and take them home before we camped in the conditions they provided. There was no place to swim. They had bathrooms and showers but they wouldn't let the girls use them. The stake leaders were using them at night after the girls went to bed. When I found that out I was furious! Me and the other counselor snuck over to their campsite and 'borrowed' their key. Us and our girls all got showers that night.
It got worse after that. But the question was did I spend my own money. That event probably cost me about $300.
I once made the mistake of going to girl's camp as the attending RN.
A few days before, the bitch leader called me and informed me that the RN stocks the medicine at her own expense.
Then they insisted that I ride on the bus with them all, but refused, preferring to take my own car and following the busbecause I did not want to be at the mercy at these people in case of an emergency.
The whole time there, the leaders were rude and condescending. I think it had to do with them being SAHMs and me having a well paying profession.
Anyway, NEVER AGAIN. Let the church pay for services - it makes them appreciate the people more.
I'm surprised people don't just tell the bishop that they can no longer serve in their "calling" because there's not enough money for the program. They should at least keep track of their expenditures and subtract it from their tithing. If suddenly no one spent their own money the programs would either be cut or TSCC would start coming up with the money. If the programs were cut, maybe more people would leave the church.
I took the other f***s in the Elder's Quorum flying once so we could have a "planning session" in a Cessna 182 (NOT a cheap plane to rent, like a 150) and come up with all sorts of lame-o quotes about how this message "came from on high." It was the Elder's Quorum President's idea, not mine. Even though I was instructing for the rental place at the time and basically got a steal on the deal, it still cost me $250. Think those donkeys helped out? Nope.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/19/2012 02:34PM by flyboy21.
Ugh. Some nonsense I have about keepin my pax safe being a sacred duty. Ughhhhhh. Especially the first counselor. He was such a douche. Used to call working women "bull dy*es." No exaggeration. Grew up on a ranch and thought some wild things. Called Obama by the N-word (this was during the campaign). I used to secretly hope he'd choke to death on glass.
Whenever I spent my own money, I always deducted it from my tithing. When I spent money on food for the scouts, and didn't take it out of tithing, I was never shy about submitting an expense report, either.
I spent the most $$ in my Primary and Young Women's callings for:
*Crafts *Facials & Pedicures (always a popular YW activity in my wards) *Decorations for various activities *Snacks and other food *Birthday gifts
The budgets we were given seemed to shrink smaller and smaller...
However, I realized then as I do now that it was my choice to spend that money. I did it because I wanted to provide meaningful and fun events for the kids I worked with. I honestly can't remember if I was irritated at spending the money back then, but I see now that it was ridiculous in light of all the money TSCC rakes in.
I was called to be the adult leader who took our teenage girls to Young Women's Camp.
The stake presidency took every penny that was sent down from Salt Lake for the girl's camp, and gave it to the BOYS for boy scout camp.
This meant that there was NO MONEY for the girls camp, except for what wards could generate in the one fundraiser they were allowed to have.
Well, some of the wards could generate enough money to pay for their kids to eat.
But our ward is pretty poor, and we couldn't generate even enough money to pay for the food that the kids would need to eat.
Because there was so little money at the stake level, the kids had to camp in a FREE part of a pretty cruddy state park with bathrooms too small for the number of kids we brought in there. By the second night, the septic system was overflowing - pouring raw sewage into the shower area!
And because there was so little money at the stake level, there were only two meals shared by all of the girls (and paid for by the stake).
Every other meal had to be provided by the individual wards. My ward was not able to raise much money in their fundraiser because it was so poor -- the exact same reason that alot of the kids could not pay a fee to camp.
To this day, I believe the reason I was called to bring those kids to camp is because they figured I would open up my own purse to feed this group of kids.
Well, yeah I did. What else could I do? Let them go without food? Let them watch the other wards cook food while they had nothing to eat?
But I was so angry, that I kept every receipt and I reimbursed myself by taking it out of the money I'd normally pay in tithing.
Actually, nowadays I figure the money was better used feeding the kids at camp than it would have been to send that money -- in the form of tithing -- to pay for the Great and Spacious Mall.
But still -- what church funds the boys with the money that was supposed to go to the girls, leaving the girls to starve and shower in floors covered in raw sewage?
I had almost the same exact experience. That camp out was so bad I loaded the girls from my ward up and took them to my house. We finished girls camp in my back yard.
The stake leader in charge tried to get the stake president to excommunicate me for taking the girls home. She was furious that I didn't obey her. Problem was I had permission from my bishop.