I need to know when the Mormon church first gave a significant monetary donation to any non-mormon charity - Salvation Army, Armenian Relief, some hurricane relief, some famine in Africa, search for a cure to AIDS, or anything. The first significant monetary donation to a non-mormon related -- either nonmormon charity, or just generally distributed among a people or given to a government for emergency aid.

I was told that someone (nonmember) "knows" the mormon church has been giving canned food to nonmormons for a long time. Does anyone know when the Mormon church first started giving food to nonmormons without the nonmormon having to apply for it in some way?

Thank you

The only thing that even remotely comes to mind here, is with the children that survived the Mtn.Meadows Massacre...word is that Breed 'em young, gave/passed them to adoptive families within the church..after public awareness of these survivors became known, relatives petitioned for their return, which was given.

HOWEVER, Breed 'em petitioned the Federal Gov't at the time of the exchange, to be financially reimbursed for their total care: room, board, clothes, medical, etc., which of course, was provided by those adoptive parties involved....he got the loot in the end...what a profit! Juanita Brooks documented this in her book.

_________________
"When authority masquerades as a power, a simple question will unmask it."

"Just because you think, feel, or believe something is true, doesn't make it true!"

"The doubt of your faith, is not God testing you, but truth trying to emerge and free you."

Thanks, Teoma. BY is almost counter-evidence! Because he also ordered everything to be burned and ruined as U.S. troops approached the Salt Lake Valley to enforce federal laws. He was willing to cause starvation of men and animals, put families into the street by burning their own homes, and leave many of his own members hungry and impoverished after destroying their livestock, homes, and storehouses. I would imagine David O. MacKay had the heart to give to nonmormons, but I was a mormon while he was president, and do not remember any such giving. It was "We take care of our own." Not "we take care of whoever needs our help the most."

My next best guess would be at some point when political heat was being applied to the Church or to BYU. The accusations against BYU expanded into a number of different criticisms of the Church itself. BYU was criticized for the Church's view of racial differences, and soon enough those differences no longer affected one's ability to get the Melch. Priesthood.

I can speculate. I don't want to. I need some hard data for a non-mormon-oriiented forum where some people are saying they are glad the Mormon church helped them or a friend, and so they believe the Mormon spiel that Mormons help everybody and always have!

The information will turn up eventually. Meanwhile, I am able to knock the propaganda pillars out on other issues being raised.

Abinadi, seems that there are lot of marvelous and grand claims made, that are never supported by hard facts or evidence to give them credibility..

A while back, I got into a discussion of sorts with my mail carrier. He claimed that TSCC was the greatest humanitarian organization in the world. When I Googled humanitarian sources, there was no mention of it. What came up was the Red Cross, American Cancer Society, Alzheimers Fund, etc. Not one mention of TSCC..it appeared that I was looking for a ghost...

_________________
"When authority masquerades as a power, a simple question will unmask it."

"Just because you think, feel, or believe something is true, doesn't make it true!"

"The doubt of your faith, is not God testing you, but truth trying to emerge and free you."

Abinadi,

I live in the NC area and when hurricanes hit Lousiana and caused all that damage years back, the church (regional?) requested got stuff organized and local wards sent out people to help with the cleanup effort. This was a big humanitarian effort (and a lovely PR move). I saw a similar effort WRT the earthquake in Haiti but with less response. As a teen, I helped a bunch of people scrape and paint a woman's house ... reroofed it too. My family has received countless disaster-rolls over the years. In many small ways the Elders Quorum or Bishipric was good at organizing charity for members and sometimes non-members. And sometimes members are spontaneously giving and generous. In general, the members have been kind and giving to me.

What I have not seen is the church leadership open up the Lord's purse and give from the Lord's storehouse in any way that comes close to what they have spent on the mall. It's rarely the Church who provides money but a special fund for such a need, or fast offerings for a poor widow.

Headquarters spends their money on more great and spaceous buildings and leaves the business of caring for the poor and widows and orphans to the members.

I know that's not exactly what you were looking.

Peace

_________________
I resigned from the Church of THE Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (Feb 2011)

"For nothing is secret, that shall not be made manifest; neither any thing hid, that shall not be known and come abroad." - Luke 8:17

Thats part of the grand illusion...let me illustrate a bit...some time ago there was a disaster in Indonesia...the ruling military junta there didn't allow any intervention by outside sources....except for one, an international charity, can't recall its name..I think it was Hope International..word went out on the street for a collection, and the PUBLIC opened up their own wallets and purses. Some $450,000 was collected in three days....TSCC coughed up $50,000 to bring the total to some $500,000 and ran a PR piece in the SLC Tribune. The way the article was written, one was led to believe that TSCC was responsible for the whole enchelada, all $500,000, when in fact it only tossed in the 50 grand.

And on top of that, TSCC made contact with UPS international at the SLC airport to ship the supplies "purchased" for "relief efforts" gratis...UPS footed the flight costs....some of the pallots of "supplies" were shown on the church owned local Ch. 5 nitely news that evening...I saw three pallots of what was plastic bottles of surplus window washing concentrate waiting to be placed in armoured covered palloting to be loaded onto the UPS delivery planes...Now ask yourself, after a major earthquake, would there be much glass left to need cleaning there? It would seem that items like more immediately needed medical supplies, infant formula, diapers, bandages, water purification kits, etc would be more useful than window washing fluids?

Boy, what an illusion for the public to smile at....incredible deception.

_________________
"When authority masquerades as a power, a simple question will unmask it."

"Just because you think, feel, or believe something is true, doesn't make it true!"

"The doubt of your faith, is not God testing you, but truth trying to emerge and free you."

LDS Philanthropies: "While welfare programs within of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are generally for members, humanitarian donations are used to provide assistance in countries around the world to people without regard to race or religion."
LDS Philanthropies was formerly:

BYU Destiny Fund (1955-1971)
Church Education Development Office (1971-1973)
The Development Office (1973-1982)
LDS Foundation (1982-2005)

I think it's a What cup is the nut under game,
or if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, then it really was a charity all along.

It's present purposes is, apparently, "responsible for facilitating donations to humanitarian and education initiatives including Brigham Young University (Provo, Idaho, and Hawaii campuses), LDS Business College, and the Perpetual Education Fund." As "LDS Foundation," that makes sense. Our local university "Foundation" has as its mission "stewarding donors, data, and dollars in support of the University." So, I imagine, without having researched ityet, the LDS Foundation stewarded donars, data and dollars in support of the LDS education system including BYU and Ricks.

"The Development Office" isn't very significant of a name change.

"Church Education Development Office". Well, that name has a clear meaning that sticks with the mission of education within the church.

Oh, here is a summary provided by LDS Philanthropies itself http://www.ldsphilanthropies.org/ldsp/about/history.html:


1982: 2004:2004:Last entry 2008. Curious, interesting, somewhat revealing. Minor league philanthropy from what I've been able to get so far, in terms of a multi-million or -billion dollar church.

This is incredible. There are clues on LDS budgeting, but I'm not sharp enough to dig them out and track them down and figure out their significance. They may be giving too much information here. Net result, it's more of a fund-raising operation, and oriented more towards in-house education and some help to the needy (if they aren't needy too long a time).

Latter-day Saint Charities is a website for sending money to the Church.
http://www.ldsphilanthropies.org/humanitarian-services/
It is a branch of LDS Philanthropies.
It seems to be oriented almost exclusively to LDS organizations - BYU, Church History, Tabernacle Choir, LDS Business College ( I kid you not), etc.

Hey POC,were those LD$ hurricane aftermath volunteers you saw wearing bright orange or yellow shirts with the 'LDS' logo on them?

_________________
"When authority masquerades as a power, a simple question will unmask it."

"Just because you think, feel, or believe something is true, doesn't make it true!"

"The doubt of your faith, is not God testing you, but truth trying to emerge and free you."

Teoma,

I didn't go but my dad did. I think they just had on vests and pushed hand carts with shovels, saws and embedded church reporters:
http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/c ... na-victims

Again, the members are often giving but the leadership holds the purse close to their hearts.

Peace

_________________
I resigned from the Church of THE Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (Feb 2011)

"For nothing is secret, that shall not be made manifest; neither any thing hid, that shall not be known and come abroad." - Luke 8:17