LDS Church Tithing Lawsuits

[Raccoon1010]

Mormon church sued again over how it uses tithing contributions from members

From the article:

"In February, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission fined the church and Ensign Peak $5 million for using shell companies to obscure the size of the investment portfolio under church control. The church agreed to pay $1 million and Ensign Peak will pay $4 million."

I remember being a member and hearing the discussion about how they invest your tithe monies wisely to be profitable servants. Is that what the Lord wanted from them? Or charitable uses of their monies? Those lawsuits appeared to have a statement related to that issue:

"A federal lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints investment arm misused hundreds of thousands of dollars donated by three men by investing the money instead of using it for charitable purposes as they claim was promised."

Now I'm not knowledgeable about if and how God directs that church. I am poor class and getting help myself to survive. But when I was LDS I did donate $25,000 and had to serve and not get any money from the church. The lower down serve and pay 10% plus fast offerings and they ask much. I can definitely see members getting angry when things get ugly in that church.

Thoughts?

 

[Raccoon1010]

The Church of Jesus Christ was set up by God over the Apostles in the early church as witnessed to in the New Testament at the end of the book. And then it simply stopped as being mentioned about. So I wondered if the Lord let go of that early Church if his and because of the hardness of their hearts did not require them to give all their possessions to the Apostles Jesus appointed and instead set up a different church that only requires 10%. I know of various churches that operate that way today including all denominations perhaps on earth today. Catholics have paid clergy, LDS are paid high up but not in lower levels. And I believe the Protestant denominations also go with funding.

But I felt that it was moral and ethically sound for churches that operate that way to inform the members with statements on how their tithe was used by the authority of the churches. Here is the LDS website about that:

Conduct Tithing Declaration

 

[Raccoon1010]

In investigating the lawsuit claims I found the following relevant information from the LDS Church website. I noticed the above post #2 LDS church website tithing declaration was regarding Bishops which are low level members and in church of a group of people that meet in a church building regularly and they are not paid clergy. So here is the statement from the LDS church website regarding paid clergy, and it states general authority but does not state who they are or what names are used in that so I will also cover what they say are general authority:

"General Authorities leave their careers when they are called into full time Church service. When they do so, they are given a living allowance which enables them to focus all of their time on serving in the Church. This practice allows for far more church members on a worldwide basis to be considered for a calling to serve as a General Authority, rather than limiting considerations to only those who may be financially independent. The living allowance is uniform for all General Authorities. None of the funds for this living allowance come from the tithing of Church members, but instead from proceeds of the Church's financial investments." https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/church/leaders/general-?lang=eng

It listed "general authorities" and not "general officers" and it appears that the "presiding bishopric" might be misleading. Here is the statement on that:

"The Presiding Bishopric is a council of three men who work under the direction of the First Presidency. They manage such matters as humanitarian aid, welfare programs, tithing and fast offerings, physical facilities, and the organization of membership records, among others." Presiding Bishopric

I wondered if their was a difference between "presiding bishopric" and normal non-paid clergy bishops at the normal church level?

 

[Raccoon1010]

And the problem I saw in the lawsuit was that it was claimed that the money used from the tithes did not go to normal causes and I suspected it might have been used for investment purposes which at least some of that is used for paid clergy, which the church stated was not supplied by tithings. So if it was not tithe money that created the investments than it would have to be a private business that allows for direction of the upper level church authority. Is that a charitable cause or non-profit organization and protected under USA laws?

I couldn't figure that out and was looking into the results of that lawsuit. And therefore what a judge said about that.

 

[Raccoon1010]

The ethic and moral problems with that LDS church authority money that use from investments are the following:

Does it build up or decrease over time and does anyone know about it? They may say it's nobodies business as a member of that church. Is that correct? No I don't beleive it is. Consider the following problem that I cannot confirm is true:

Who gives them the money to invest, is it foreign communist tied moneys, I think as a member you would want to know who is paying them to provide the direction for the church. I do not want to be suspicious. And I think a proper examination of the messages from the authority is important, which I did do in the online General Conference Messages. I saw some false doctrine I did identify in some of the messages and also some good messages I felt were from God. Now how do we know a message is from God, it will be a good message provided from God as he is the only one Good as confessed by Jesus before his mission on earth was finished. God may also testify of messages from people in different ways of God, there is the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, Heavenly Mother as I have been witnessed to from God and Angels of God. And in the Heavenly Mother and Angles area I received it together with the Holy Ghost.

Regarding false doctrine from the General Conference members, I would not like to be a harsh judge as we are all in a learning process and God blesses some of us in different measures. I have seen plenty of false doctrine in all the denominations on the earth today that I have witnessed to and some worse than others. I did see some pure evil presentation in the LDS Temple area as presented by them that I feel that church should repent of and I believe they call that "Christian Apologetic". Is that a place where churches repent of any false doctrine they were teaching at some point? I certainly know that the LDS church appoints "juvenile" less learned members that have spoken false doctrine in the churches I can certainly testify of. Do we require perfection from people?

James 3:1 My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment.

If people are given teacher positions hopefully it is from God's direction and not mans alone.

I realized I cannot know if another person is saying someone from God without God confirming it. And I know Paul had a good witness from the Holy Ghost here:

Galatians 5:22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

God certainly has confirmed to me that he works in other ways to give me knowledge of what is Good and not Evil from God.