Re: TEC financial difficulties

[Louie Crew <lcrew@ANDROMEDA.RUTGERS.EDU>]

This will be my 6th (and last) GC as a deputy.  I don't recall any 
resolution that would force dioceses to pay into TEC's budget; if 
resolutions were considered, they were rejected.

Some dioceses require parishes to pay their diocesan assessments (some 
instead specify minimums).  The penalty for not doing so is to lose 
vote(s) at the diocesan conventions.  Some of the dioceses that require 
payments of parishes object most loudly to any suggestion that GC remove 
votes from dioceses that don't pay.  (Maybe it would be more appropriate 
to remove their voices than their votes?)

I am not sure how I would vote on any such proposals.  The debates would 
go on for a very long time, leave people even more divided, and further 
distract us from doing mission together.

Would assessing you at a rate higher than you currently choose to pledge 
likely make you more generous or less generous?

I always give because I want to, not because someone shames me into it.  
As a kid in the Baptist Sunday School I strongly resented the offering 
envelopes that had us rate ourselves as Christians for the current week.  
Of 100 points maximum, you 'earned' points for things like

   15% did daily bible readings all week
   10% attended Sunday School
   15% read my lessons
   25% tithed ten percent of my income/allowance to this church
   20%  .......

If you earned 100 points, you could call yourself 100 percent Christian 
for the week.

Blasphemy!

Louie

Louie

Louie Crew, 377 S. Harrison St., 12D, East Orange, NJ 07018 973-395-1068
http://queereye4lectionary.blogspot.com/  Queer Eye for the Lectionary