Charitable Giving

"donuts" was a typo. Lol. I didn't donate donuts.

I know that I have blasted my former RomanCatholic faith but I must admit that I have helped out people through Catholic Charities. It's a double-edged sword.

Motor, it's good of you to give. With the bad economy a lot of people are hurting.

Another joke:

A minister visits a prominent attorney to ask him to give to charity.

Minister: "You're wealthy lawyer, but you haven't given anything to charity."

Lawyer: "That's true. But there may be some things you don't know about me. Did you know that my mother has been hospitalized for a year with a serious illness and is not expected to recover?"

Minister: "No, I did not know that."

Lawyer: "And did you know that my brother is severely retarded and has to be institutionalized?"

Minister: "No, I did not know that."

Lawyer: "And did you know that my sister's husband recently died, leaving her and her 5 children without any means of support?"

Minister: "No, I did not know that."

Lawyer: "So, if I didn't give them any money, why do you think I would give it to you?"

St. Jude Childrens Hospital and ASPCA. If you check their sheets you'll find they put more dollars to the cause.Even though I am a true prick in life,love and biz I hold a soft spot for the innocent. Make those donations closer to tax time so you don't have to carry that weight to long.

Not all Catholics are bad .

Slick

I'm a "fallen away" Catholic. I know the nuns do some good work. That's a good idea.

And Slick, I don't mean to hijack my own thread, but I became disenchaned with the Church by the way they handled the molestation issue. But that's far from the only reason. One of my last Confessions ever made - I asked for forgiveness for masturbating. ( no joke, I was taught it's a mortal sin so I always did). He told me he did not consider that to be a serious sin and it shouldn't keep me away from Holy Communion.

I appreciate he leniency but he can't go against the Pope and Catholic Doctrine and make up the rules. That's when I left.

Oh, and to clarify. I'm all for spending money on hookers. Just use your own money, not mine.

Motorhead... You should use Charity Navigator to get info on the charities you plan to donate to. You can get the info you need on spending for the cause vs overhead.

I confessed to a priest I had sex with a girl from a club. I didn't add that I knew very little about her. I was hoping she wasn't married but I forgot to ask. Anyway the priest said that wasn't that bad. Must be a standard unless you confess to murder or something really illegal.

These priests must hear it all and are expected to keep things confidential. Compared to murder, adultery, stealing, etc, all the other stuff is not that bad. I imagine if a hit man went to confession, the priest might have all gray hair afterwards, lol.

I wonder what a priest would say if you confessed to running a knife up a oouple of people, ripping their guts out, then shooting a few other people, then covering it all up, stealing millions of dollars by running a ponzi scheme, stealing retired people's lifetime savings and skipping out leaving them nothing. Maybe, "oh my, that's bad!"

@Motorhead; Same with me. Stopped going cause of confession. It went from confessing to teasing my brother, not brushing my teeth, swiping a marble, to touching myself in an impure manner,and thinking about girls. I guess thinking about girls was a sin, and I got tired of saying a zillion Our Fathers and Hail Marys.

Then the next guy goes in the confession booth and says he masturbated and thinks the priest is full of crap because he says that's not that bad,lol.

Sorry if you took anything personal, I'm just surprised. I guess I didn't know about all the so called sins in church. Maybe I wasn't paying attention. I've been accused of that a few times. Usually I think it's not very important.

What would be a good confession? I stuck my fingers up a girls vagina and I didn't even know her. Then I massaged her tits. In college I remember a suitemate said everything you enjoy must be illegal, immoral, or something else I forgot.

I recently saw a list of major charities CEO' s salaries, and while most were well into 6 figures, the Salvation Army was minuscule. And they get lots of free labor from court ordered " community service". With criminals ringing their bells, I'm sure some of the take finds its way into their pockets, but I always send a check.

I give to the VA. Never forget about our vets in need.

Charity Navigator is a good tool.

For personal reasons I always give to the American Cancer Society. I've been giving to Wounded Warrior for the last couple of years.

Really can't go wrong with the foodbanks.

I have to say that I agree with those who mentioned all of the good works done by the Catholic Church. I have a number of issues with how they run things, but what we do not hear so much about is the fact that it is the largest single charitable organization in the world.

In some of the most blighted cities in the northeast the Catholic church is a significant source of support and help for the needy. One such example is Bridgeport CT, where the Catholic church runs shelters, soup kitchens and even several money losing schools.

For this reason, I do give to my Diocese during its annual appeal. However, I do also donate directly to very local causes, including Christmas gift drives and food pantries.

Someone should start a charity that provides free or subsidized hookers to destitute men.

I too prefer to give physical donations instead of just checks. Toys for Tots and the Food Bank get most of my attention around this time of the year. Its not hard to buy an extra few cans when you go food shopping just to donate.

I used to donate to Big Sisters in my Aunt's name, she loved that place, but they just got their federal grant money pulled for non-compliance. Not sure what they did but no more from me to them.

As others have said; there are good organizations doing good work and doing it efficiently – this can be verified online.

I currently give to Food for the Poor – they are based out of So. FL and help out folks in the Caribbean and Latin America.

In the past I’ve also given to World Vision and St. Judes.

During my retirement I combined my gardening hobby with support for the local food bank. I grew scads of root vegetables expressly for the food bank - carrots, parsnips, turnips, rutabagas, potatoes. One year I showed up with 100s of pounds of my funky tomatoes. That donation was appreciated more by the food bank volunteers than by the food bank clients. Apparently, purple or black or striped tomatoes were a bit too exotic for the clients of the small town food bank near Rancho farmerart.

I also support the local women's shelter. My involvement with the shelter started with a fundraiser based on men walking in heels during the intermission of a hockey game. That event was a hoot and since then I have become a major underwriter of the local shelter. The shelter's residents have free access to Rancho farmerart's raspberries, strawberries, and saskatoons in summertime whenever I am away. If I am available I always host a BBQ or indoor party for the shelter's residents once a year.

Other organizations that I support - Alzheimer's Society, Museum of the Regiments in Calgary, Salvation Army, Planned Parenthood.

I refuse to support any church-run charity. I am an atheist and organized religion mostly just disgusts me.

The company I work for matches charitable donations, so I do it through them.

Art,

I like the fact you donated fresh vegetables. But this year the food bank I donate to had specific needs. They were short on canned corn and canned green beans. and made an appeal for those items. I complied, but I worry about waste. I find canned vegetables disgusting.

My brothers...if we're going to bump threads maybe this is a good one to bump. Thx to Mo-head-dude for starting it.

I don't the middleman. i give directly to bums and homes. No middleman organization for me. Like for example, there was a news report on Channel 7 about an anonymous benifactop who gave a poorgrade elementary school a whole charity's worth of brand new, well made jackets. spending well over $10K. That's my sort of thing. Help them directly, because unless you're in the charity biz or you're just really learned, you don't know where the other half of that money goes.