Poverty, Work, and Dependency

Beautiful October day. I’m walking in the park for some exercise. The leaves on some of the trees have turned yellow, with small flashes of red. There’s a maple tree that has turned maybe a dark burgundy. Blue skies, white clouds, green grass. The park has quite a few people today. There’s an older guy and a younger guy tossing a football, maybe father and son. And there’s a white butterfly floating across the green grass.

My brain doesn’t turn off very easily. I’m exceptionally bad at small talk. Put me at a party with someone I don’t know, and I’m probably not very good at talking about nothing.

Maybe these two things are related. Because here I am, walking through a park on a beautiful October afternoon, and what I’m thinking about is immediate need and permanent dependency.

It’s a question that sounds simple until you start pulling on it: if part of my taxes goes to feed people, house people, provide medical care, or otherwise support people who need help, does any of that count toward our Christian obligation to give?

This is not a question about Christianity as a whole, and it is not an attempt to define what every Christian should believe about government. It is a question about America.

You can argue that America is not a Christian nation and still advocate strongly for public assistance to people in need. Or you could argue that the bedrock and basis of America’s Constitution and law is in Christian theology.

Either way, here’s the question. If we use public money to help people in need, should the design of that help reflect the moral logic Christians see in Scripture?

I do not know the answer. I am not the Almighty, and I’m not going to pretend that I can settle a theological question Christians have argued about for generations.

But I think the question becomes more interesting when we stop asking only whether taxes count as a tithe and ask instead what a tithe, or Christian giving more broadly, is supposed to achieve.

The biblical idea of giving was never simply to, “Take ten percent of your income and put it in an envelope for your local church.” In ancient Israel, tithes supported the religious community, including the Levites, but they also helped support widows, orphans, foreigners, and others who were vulnerable.

That makes the modern situation complicated.

Today, the government performs some of those functions. We pay taxes, and a portion of that money goes toward food assistance, housing assistance, medical care, disability programs,