Speaking of "paying 10% for the privilege", one of the things irked me was my dad's insistence that tithes had to be monetary. Per him, volunteer work didn't count.
I was roped into running the computer, or doing the sound, for all 5 services Saturday + Sunday, plus practice before hand. 16 hour commitment twice a month.
My day job was only 20 hours/wk back then, so in terms of time, my volunteer work was ~30% of all my work. Yet my dad still insisted I payed 10% of the taxed cash I received...
That was one of many "cuts" in my "death by 1000" for being religious.
Religion has convinced people that there's an invisible man ... living in the sky. Who watches everything you do every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a list of ten specific things he doesn't want you to do. And if you do any of these things, he will send you to a special place, of burning and fire and smoke and torture and anguish for you to live forever, and suffer, and suffer, and burn, and scream, until the end of time. But he loves you. He loves you. He loves you and he needs money.
- George Carlin
The bible never actually mandates giving 10% of your money to anything, much less the church, which didn't exist. That said, it does say a lot about wealth and how it should be used.
" From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded."
"...The rust of your wealth will be used as evidence against you."
In fact, a very central theme throughout the Bible is along the lines of, "I told you guys to take care of the poor and needy. You didn't do that. I'm pretty pissed about it, FYI. So, I'm going to tell you again. Take care of the poor and needy. --Sincerely, God".
Personally, I think people should be generous with their money. I think Christians, if they believe anything Jesus said, have an obligation to be generous. Our family gives money to our church but our church is highly mission centered and we do what we can to take care of those in our community who have needs. It's good to be able to help people but it's also very sobering because you find out that the needs are enormous.
The fact that a lot of churches have a money furnace in the basement and don't contribute anything meaningful to the world has earned Christianity some well deserved criticism. But not all churches are like that.
You should be charitable to the extent you are able. No more, no less. And money, time, and talent are all valid ways to do that.
Very true but the person you responded to talked about being forced to give, rather than choosing to either give or not of their own free will. Also, doesn't it seem likely (by the mention of death by 1000 cuts) that Matthew 23:4-28 could describe the situation?
They pile heavy burdens on people's shoulders and won't lift a finger to help. Everything they do is just to show off in front of others.
e.g., the dad could have significantly eased the burden by giving the son the money to then hand over to the church, although ofc none of us will ever know what was going on inside the dude's head.
Sources for the OP references:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25%3A34-46&version=ESV
34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers,[a] you did it to me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
On divorce:
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2019&version=NIV
9 I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”
On abortion:
Just a tangential thought:
Tbf, the part about divorce has some substantial context behind it that is missing in modern societies, though I have seen it misused to say that the wife must put up with the husband doing whatever he wants anytime.:-(
Back then women were not allowed to own property, and ignoring atm how fucked up that already was, this commandment to not divorce her unless she was unfaithful was a rather liberal protection against her becoming homeless.
Omnipotent God, Creator of all things, ruler of heaven and earth ..... needs 10% of your wages because he can't make ends meet ...... this universe ain't gonna pay for itself is it?
The ONLY mega-pastor of an Evangelical, Protestant group of churches in America, that I have EVER heard of who acknowledged Trump's moral failings (of being a lying rape-y sack of shit at best, and at worst someone who has attempted literal genocide) is John Piper. The fact that he knew already that he was old and dying of a wasting disease probably helped him care less about the fall-out that doing so would certainly cause, i.e. his career was already (mostly) over. In any case, THAT dude has earned my MAJOR respect. Which is not to say that I agree with or even understand everything he says - e.g. he is heavily anti-abortion, though to his credit he seems to acknowledge that Christian judgement should be reserved for other Christians and not extended to non-Christians, and I wonder if he would consider medical exemptions and such (at a guess... yes?).
But those religious freaks who twist the words of the Bible away from the likes of "workers deserve their wages", and "take care of widows and orphans", and "justice good, bribery/corruption bad" (all summed up in the infamous words of the most holy prophets Bill & Ted: "Be Most Excellent To One Another, Dudes!") to say that basically Christianity = voting Republican, can fuck all the way off! :-(
Especially given Trump's official COVID policy of letting the virus have its (usually non-consensual) way with us, which reminds me of that scene in Braveheart, like 
.
This si how it's been explained to me.
Noah was a drunk, King David killed a husband to get near his wife, Solomon had thousands of concubines, and so on and so on...
The Lord can use a less than perfect man to deliver his message, and aren't we all sinners?
And yes, I think that's complete and utter bull.
Bible says a lot of things, picking and choosing a handful and then acting like thatd all it says is the same thing modern Christians do.
The bible says if you see your dad naked, even if its because hes in a drunken stupor and you didnt expect him to be disrobed, you have to then become a slave for the rest of your days.
The bible says tattoos are bad.
The bible says someone talked to a burning shrub about super important stuff and we shouldnt think that dude was tripping or schizo.
The bible says to kill anyone who practices Wicca.
Heres some more:
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/jaysondbradley/2018/07/terrible-things-the-bible-clearly-says/
That article ends with:
Stop trying to shut people down with “the Bible clearly says,” unless you plan on executing disobedient children.
I would think the things expressly said by Jesus Christ would have priority for Christians.
This Jesus?
“And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell of fire.” Matthew 18:8-9
Seems to me it's pretty straight forward hyperbole.
If something is causing you to be a worse person, distance yourself or get rid of it. It shouldn't really take getting rid of body parts to get there.
It's like if someone said "I can't stop playing WoW and neglecting my family" and you tell them "You can't stop eh? Maybe you should cut off your hands, maybe then you could stop?" It makes them consider what "can't" really means. In the spectrum of simply walking away from the vice that is making you worse person to making it physically impossible to engage in said vice, maybe it really isn't impossible to give it up without resorting to such drastic methods.
That I would say is the least controversial of the things Jesus has said.
So... To be clear, your argument here is that choosing the specific words of the savior which are canonized in the holy book (which may or may not be perfect, whatever) as exemplar behavior is invalid because...
*reads back*
"The Bible says a lot of things" so we shouldn't just focus on those?
So like, there's no reason to judge for not loving your neighbor, because the Bible also says you gotta do gay hating and there just aren't enough hours in the day to get them all done? What the fuck lol.
Or alternatively you're saying that "it says a lot of things" like no reasonable person would assume only good things are part of Christianity because it says all those bad things? Congratulations you've reached the argument for disregarding the Bible and taken steps 2-7 of becoming atheist.
Your argument sort of works if you want to discredit the "bad stuff", but when applied to core tenets of the faith to make Christians not look bad for not doing them it looks pretty stupid yo.
Using a bad faith book full of hypocrisies is not a valid way to judge others.
That was the point.
Using a bad faith book full of hypocrisies is not a valid way to judge others.
It's exactly the right way to judge those who use the same method of judgement. Calling LGBTQ+ people evil because the book says so? You best be following that book to the letter, or we're going to hit you with it.
If they believe it to be absolute truth, yes it is. That's how arguments work. Both sides don't need to believe an argument for it to be wrong, you need only show it isn't self consistent.