I can concede your pastor getting a $45k salary, but what about LWR needing 5,55,990 in salaries in 2011, including $221,201 in estimated compensation for its president? How does that taste?

*Should read $5,547,331 for LWR salaries. But I just realized that was the 2010 figure. 2011 was $6,122,425. (Doesn't include benefits.)

Nope, I read the wrong line again. LWR salaries and benefits were $6,860,896 in 2010 and $8,146,902 in 2011.

And again, you went to UW Portland. You compare apples and oranges (look at how much of UW Portland goes to the International organization). My chruches non-benevolence fund goes to the local community of which at least and equivalent percentage goes to the local community in one way or another. My Church happens to have a wealthy membership (remember, I drive a MB and make 6 figures and I am no where near the top of the income ladder in thechurch community) yet our actual grounds are modest and our staff (mostly part time except the pastor) are unpaid or paid a nominal fee, so that our internal budget (which includes outreach programs of all sorts) still operates a profit which we then use to provide additional community services that we couldn't guarantee to the community at the start of the year. So every year at Christmas, some program gets a major boost. We keep enough in the bank to cover insurance copays and such should a disaster occur, but the rest goes out to the community.

And our church is not unique. It is very typical of Lutheran churches around the US. Your evangelistic upbringing is *not* typical of church giving in the US. Catholics and Lutherans make up more than 50% of *all* Christian denominations and we both believe in giving freely to the community without the preaching. We are chruches who believe Christ's greatest work in us is what we give back to the world he loved so much.

@hecks

There is a difference between a church that does charity work and a charity that is affiliated with a religion.

@abgemacht,
I was just going with the example Draugnar gave me.

@hecks

I see. But why don't you think they should be counted?

Because a church's primary function is to recruit and serve its own members, not the broader community. Isn't it?

$8 million in salaries versus nearly 10% that to the president of the UW and more than 1 million to American Red Cross president and $2 million to the UNICEF president.

If you want to really see how Lutherans pay their people...

http://www.indeed.com/salary/Lutheran-World-Relief.html

The average salary for job postings at Lutheran World Relief is 48K - 28% lower than all job postings nationwide.

And here is a great site (and this is Lutheran World Relief) for comp-aring charities.

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=4031

Note that Lutheran world relief gave 37 million out of 43 million income to programs. That is way more than your figures show.

Income Statement (FYE 09/2011)




REVENUE





Total Contributions

$42,356,121



Program Service Revenue

$0



Total Primary Revenue

$42,356,121



Other Revenue

$1,276,399



TOTAL REVENUE

$43,632,520









EXPENSES





Program Expenses

$37,301,799



Administrative Expenses

$1,946,052



Fundraising Expenses

$2,301,292



TOTAL FUNCTIONAL EXPENSES

$41,549,143









Payments to Affiliates

$0



Excess (or Deficit) for the year

$2,083,377









Net Assets

$44,383,560

And to clarify, I would and do count LWR donations. I just don't think donations directly to churches should count.

A good Pastor is actually like a social worker - they work with calming family issues, deal with grief counseling, visit the sick in the hospital or comfort families, etc. All the stuff that a variety of government workers do for a higher salary are rolled in to one.

A some teach little boys how to get off....errr...uh...well, that was uncalled for krellin..

I don't know what to tell you, Draug, about the figures they gave you. I'm looking right at a scan of their 990, with Michael Meenan's signature on it.

And no, hecks, a chruch's primary function is *not* to serve it's own prupose. Maybe the one you were raised in was, but the ones I go to and were raised in havea purose to serve their community and the world at large. Sharing Jesus' love by example, not by prostheletizing and growing, but by serving as Christ served the poor and the sick.

"Because a church's primary function is to recruit and serve its own members, not the broader community. Isn't it?"

No, I don't think this is necessarily true.

Charity Navigator is an unbiased evaluator of all charities. It is not affiliated with LWR or the Lutyheran or Roman Catholic Churches or any church for that matter.

Oh, I see what they're doing to get to that number. They're including about 80% of all their salaries and benefits, marketing, fundraising, depreciation, travel expenses, office expenses... they're allocating just about everything to program. I don't know... that seems a little disingenuous.

Yeah. I'm looking at Guidestar, which is owned by Charity Navigator...or the other way around. I forget which. I'm looking at the 990.

But if you compare where Charity Navigator pulls that number from, (Section IX of the 990), then the United Way Worldwide spent $81,342,190 of its $90,342,700 on program. That's 90.04%. Compared to LWR which is...89.78%. So yeah... I guess they're pretty much equal.

Try again. There is a line for marketing and fundraising.

Fundraising Expenses $2,301,292

And a line for slalries and benefits and everything else called administrative expenses.

Administrative Expenses $1,946,052

You are the one being disingenuous by outright ignoring these two lines.

37 million to the program out of 43 million income
4.5 million to admin istrative expenses and marketing and fundraising and stuff.

That's 10% to the non-charitable work. about 3% to reserves. And 87% to the program.

A church most often tries to serve the community at large, thereby seeking to grow it's membership by such outreach in a self-perpetuating, hopefully steam-rolling manner that encompasses the world!

On the flip side, there are non-religious charities that are mostly self-serving, too -- this is why you examine ANY charity before you give money to it. Not all are worth it...religious/church/secular all together.

For example, there are "breast cancer" charities that will take you money given to prevent cancer and turn around and give some of it to abortion clinics....You *may* agree with both, but that is not what you gave your money for...none the less, it is still a charitable donation, no matter how the money got used.

And rich, Conservatives donate more! :P

See my post above. If you compare apples to apples (based on how they allocated expenses on the 990) they're both around 90% to program. (The difference between my 90-ish% and your 87% is that I calculated both UW and LWR as a percentage of total expenses rather than total income.)

And then you consider that my church does at least that much of a percentage to the community. So the $5000 I gave last year over the course of the year meant about $4500 went to those in actual need and only $500 to the administration and church needs. We just did our budget review and upcoming elections and budget. We take in a little over 2 million a year in the congregation and have about 180K in non program related expenses (property taxes, building maintenance, groundskeeping, utilities, salaries and benefits for the pastor and secretary).

@Krellin,
Nope! Middle-class conservatives donate the most.

Yeah, I was typing up my numbers when your second post about 90% each came in.

@hecks

Donate a higher percentage of their income, but not more money.

I dunno. I think we're reached a fundamental difference of philosophy.

In fairness, there are lots of things that I think are "uncharitable charities". Take the museum I work for, for examples. We're registered as a charity, sure. But are we housing the homeless? Clothing the naked? Feeding the hungry? Hell, no.

Are we doing something important? I'd like to think so. But charitable? If pressed, I'd probably have to say no, not really.