Respect of Persons

The Lord has commanded us to be one.¹ Until we are one, we cannot be Zion. One way we can be one is by treating all our brothers and sisters in the developing world the same way we treat those in the first world. Throughout the scriptures, the Lord commands us to do exactly that. He indicates that it would not be right to treat one group of members better than another group:

And again I say unto you, let every man esteem his brother as himself. For what man among you having twelve sons, and is no respecter of them, and they serve him obediently, and he saith unto the one: Be thou clothed in robes and sit thou here; and to the other: Be thou clothed in rags and sit thou there—and looketh upon his sons and saith I am just? Behold, this I have given unto you as a parable, and it is even as I am. I say unto you, be one; and if ye are not one ye are not mine. (D&C 38:25-27.)

Elder Glenn L. Pace once said, “There is a state of human misery below which no Latter-day Saint should descend as long as others are living in abundance.” This is a laudatory thought. We ought to be just as concerned about those Saints in the developing world as we are the Saints in our own ward.

Jacob strongly chastened his brethren because they thought they were better than the poor among them due to their riches:

And the hand of providence hath smiled upon you most pleasingly, that you have obtained many riches; and because some of you have obtained more abundantly than that of your brethren ye are lifted up in the pride of your hearts, and wear stiff necks and high heads because of the costliness of your apparel, and persecute your brethren because ye suppose that ye are better than they. And now, my brethren, do ye suppose that God justifieth you in this thing? Behold, I say unto you, Nay. But he condemneth you, and if ye persist in these things his judgments must speedily come unto you....Think of your brethren like unto yourselves, and be familiar with all and free with your substance, that they may be rich like unto you. (Jacob 2:13-14,17.)

Although it is doubtful that anyone will ever self-identify as thinking they are better than others, or as treating one group differently than another, Jacob gives us a clue of how to tell: Are you familiar with all and free with your substance? Or, do you partition more of your substance to some than others? Are their qualifiers placed on your giving?

Alma taught that we suppose we “are better one than another” when we turn our “backs upon the poor, and the needy” and withhold our substance from them. He said those who do so have set their hearts upon riches.²

The Lord has indicated that if we are not equal, and we do not treat others equally, that he will withhold his Spirit. “Nevertheless, in your temporal things you shall be equal, and this not grudgingly, otherwise the abundance of the manifestations of the Spirit shall be withheld.” (D&C 70:14.) We ought to pay strict heed, therefore, to whether or not we treat the poor among us as well as we do the rich.

One way modern Mormons treat the poor differently than the rich is in how we spend fast offerings. Estimated at $400 million per annum, only 2% of that goes to the developing world, where almost half of members live. About 25% of members in the developing world live on less than $1.25 per day in areas where the cost of food is not very different from the United States.³ The issue with the manner of distributing fast offerings is that the poorest nations house both the members with the greatest financial need and the members with the least ability to donate fast offerings. Without a globally equal standard of need, Bishops instead define need based on local norms.⁴ Thus, families in Zimbabwe are turned away from the few dollars in fast offerings the Bishops there have to spend per month because hunger is not a sufficiently emergent need in Zimbabwe, while a member in the United States can easily receive $1500 per month in aid to pay his mortgage when he is laid off of work. In places like Zimbabwe, the needs far exceed the welfare budget. Because of the nearly ubiquitous unemployment, nearly the entire ward is in need. In my interviews with leaders there, Bishops told me that they rotate their assistance allotment among perhaps 3 families each month.⁵ A month’s assistance consists of perhaps a 2 lb. bag of corn flour and a bar of soap. There are no bishop’s storehouses in the developing world. There is no budget available for medical needs, as even the most minor medical need, such as a course of inexpensive antibiotic treatment for chronic diarrhea, exceeds the ward and stake welfare budgets. Although there is a codified mechanism to gain access to welfare funds beyond the ward/stake fast offerings collected, the need must be clearly recognizable as beyond the norm for the local area in order to gain the required approval of Stake President, Area President, and Presiding Bishop.⁶ Thus, there is no direct mechanism to distribute fast offerings from affluent areas such as the United States to areas of great poverty. In short, fast offerings are not designed to alleviate poverty in the church, but rather to provide short term assistance in local congregations.

Would it really be so difficult to make the welfare budget like the ward budget, where all funds go to headquarters to be redistributed globally by ward size, instead of anchoring the offerings to the unit that donated them? This would not be as advantageous as allocating welfare budgets according to global weighted need, but it would be a change that could occur overnight and would be many times more efficacious (and equitable) than the current system.

Another way modern Mormons treat the poor differently is in the excuses they use not to donate to them. The biggest excuse is self-reliance. The counsel to be self-reliant is present in every manual discussing caring for the poor. In fact, it is listed first in order of duty before actually caring for the poor in every case. Self-reliance is a mantra of church welfare. For instance:

the Lord only helps those who are willing to help themselves. He expects His children to be self-reliant to the degree they can be. (L. Tom Perry, “Becoming Self-Reliant”, Oct 1991.)

Many programs have been set up by well-meaning individuals to aid those who are in need. However, many of these programs are designed with the shortsighted objective of “helping people,” as opposed to “helping people help themselves.” Our efforts must always be directed toward making able-bodied people self-reliant. (Marion G. Romney October 1982 General Conference.)

...the Church is not satisfied with any system which leaves able people permanently dependent, and insists, on the contrary, that the true function and office of giving, is to help people [get] into a position where they can help themselves and thus be free. (The Church Welfare Plan, Gospel Doctrine manual, 1946, p. 77.)

While there is nothing wrong with helping people avoid laziness, the mantra of self-reliance is based on the assumption that it is, in fact, possible to obtain self-sufficiency in all countries. The fact is—it isn’t. The United States has been an economically productive land since it’s inception. The modern reasons for this surround the value of our currency. It is not possible for all other nations, or even a majority of nations, to enjoy the economic prosperity we do. This is why their comments about the poor sound regrettably similar to Korihor, who was an antichrist. He preached that:

...every man fared in this life according to the management of the creature; therefore every man prospered according to his genius, and that every man conquered according to his strength.... (Alma 30:17.)

Unfortunately, about half of church members (and most church leaders) are from the United States, and have never experienced real poverty. Because the only poverty they have experienced has been from those who could work but choose not to, you hear church members saying the following about the poor:

• “They are poor because they don't pay tithing.”
• “They are poor because they keep electing corrupt governments.”
• “They are poor because they are lazy and won't work.”

No one who has met these poor members, visited their homes, or even heard their story could say such foolishly arrogant things. The mantra of selfreliance is one possible fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy:

For the godless utter blasphemy; their heart ponders impiety: how to practice hypocrisy and preach perverse things concerning Jehovah, leaving the hungry soul empty, depriving the thirsty soul of drink. And rogues scheme by malevolent means and insidious devices to ruin the poor, and with false slogans and accusations to denounce the needy. But the noble are of noble intent, and stand up for what is virtuous. (Isaiah 32:6-8, Gileadi Translation.)

Here, the false accusations are those above enumerated. The false slogan is “self-reliance.” Hypocrisy includes the fact that the Brethren receive salaries without working from the church, but they say it wouldn’t be righteous to give money to the poor without their working for it. Their programs leave the hungry soul empty. The idea of requiring 10% of a poor person’s income, in contradiction to God’s word on the subject, and withholding temple worship from those who cannot comply, can only be described as malevolent and insidious.

God did not ask us only to care for certain of the poor. He did not make it conditional. In fact, if he specified any group on whom we should have mercy, he said it was those who cannot repay us, those who will never be self-reliant.

But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind: And thou shalt be blessed; for they cannot recompense thee: for thou shalt be recompensed at the resurrection of the just. (Luke 14:13-14.)

There are those who say, “well, giving to the wretchedly poor is not a permanent solution. You are just fighting the symptoms.” Yet, no parent ever looks at a baby who has just soiled their diaper and said, “I will not change them because they will just dirty the new diaper as well.” God knows that the poorest people will never cease to be poor. Yet, he commands us to be liberal even with these:

For the poor shall never cease out of the land: therefore I command thee, saying, Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land. (Deuteronomy 15:11.)

God teaches that we should not give to others based on their capacity to give back. Rather, our generosity to those who cannot repay characterizes our generosity with God. “He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord; and that which he hath given will he pay him again.” (Proverbs 19:17.)

Another way we show preference to the rich in the church today is through how we spend on education. The church's universities and the perpetual education fund provide a staggering juxtaposition. President Hinckley said that “[BYU] is the single most expensive entity funded by the tithes of the Church.” (“Out of Your Experience Here,” October 16, 1990 BYU Speeches.) While we do not know how much tithing is spent on church universities, we can infer an estimate using BYU's comparison of tuition at comparable private universities at $24,000 per year per student more than BYU tuition, or over $1 billion per year for the more than 49,000 full-time students in church universities. That comes out to $96,000 in tithing per student assuming the student graduates in 4 years, a feat only accomplished by 31% of students at BYU according to US News.

The PEF costs roughly $1,000 per completed participant.⁷ Since inception in 2001, the program has only consumed around $60 million dollars. The PEF is not a grant program. Participants are loaned the money. They are required to pay it back at a healthy interest rate.⁸ Since every penny of that money came from interest on the donations from members earmarked for the PEF, no tithing has been spent on the PEF. During that same time, roughly $13 billion dollars in tithing have been spent on church schools.

While PEF entrants are required to complete a class on finance and choose a training program for which employment is available,⁹ there are no such requirements at church universities. In fact in 2014, 46% of graduates from BYU received degrees in fields for which there is little to no employment.¹⁰ PEF tuition is an interest-bearing loan, not a gift, and the terms of repayment are contracted prior to receipt of the money. Meanwhile, church university students are trusted to repay the church's substantially greater investment (around 100 times greater) in them without any interest and no principle. PEF students are held to strict timelines. BYU students are not rushed in any way.¹¹

Education is quite affordable in the United States, Canada, and Europe, where government subsidies and job opportunities in sensible fields mean that tuition can be repaid within a year of graduating, even if the entire degree was financed. In most countries where the PEF is a church member’s only hope at church education assistance, there are limited or no subsidies, and financing is not available. So with the church spending 100 times more per student with no strings attached, why would any member of the church choose to go through the PEF instead of BYU? Because they can’t afford to. Acceptance rates aside, BYU costs prohibitively more for international students than for first world students. International students must not only pay tuition, room, and board at rates that are many times higher than their native countries, but they also must come up with a $4,000 to deposit into a BYU-controlled escrow account in order to be admitted, which cannot be spent for tuition, room, or board.¹¹⁴ Finally, passing the English fluency requirement is usually only possible after years of expensive English classes, something only the relatively wealthy can afford. As President Hinckley once said, the exclusion of members who wish to go to BYU but cannot is an “injustice.”¹² Yet, neither he nor his successor have done anything to make it more fair. Simply subjecting BYU students to the same terms as the PEF would be a marked improvement.

Joseph said, “God had often sealed up the heavens because of covetousness in the Church.” (TPJS, p. 9) Is there any wonder whether the church today is covetous? Do modern Mormons treat the poor members of the church the same as they treat the rich? No wonder Jesus said, “For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” (Luke 18:25) If such is true for a man, what of an institution?