Category Archives: Life

What Poverty Today?

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If we strip out the UK government definition of poverty as being those households with an income of lower than 60% of the average UK income, then we are left with the question of what poverty is there in the UK today?

In theory UK welfare and bankruptcy laws should provide for the needs of daily life, such as food and shelter. However, I do recognise that the application of this theory is fraught – I have personally had to spend time helping a friend claim what was due her (after she had suffered injuries that had made her unable to work). It’s as if our society wants to make it as hard as possible to keep one’s head above water in difficult circumstances.

So apart from money troubles due to the lack of help available to get the benefits of bankruptcy or welfare (and these are far from insignificant matters) what poverty do we have today?

My post the other day about the well-being of our children made me think that perhaps a large problem was the amount of time that family members spend with each other.

This is essentially what is behind the ‘Keep Sunday Special’ campaign – the idea that families need to spend more time together. However, because I don’t see any theological reason for Sunday actually being a special day, then I would rather tackle the issue directly rather than attempt to tell people that they shouldn’t work on Sunday. The church needs to wake up to the needs of those that work on a Sunday and change from having what is generally regarded as a key time within the church on a Sunday morning.

So I guess it comes down to providing for people’s poverty. If the poverty is a lack of quality time together then do things that enable people, from diverse backgrounds, to be able to have that time together.

Whilst I’m not sure that I would back a ‘keep dinner special’ campaign or a ‘play boardgames instead of watching TV’ campaign there are surely things we can do.

What are the things that are eating into people’s family time?

  • Sports
  • Watching sports
  • TV viewing
  • Ready meals and easy snacking
  • I’m sure that there are many others…

… but that last one gives me an idea:
Meals for Families

I think that that will need to be my next post!

We are the Prisoners of Our Debts

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The title “We are the prisoners of our debts” is an interesting quote from an article in The Telegraph.

Other quotes include:
“most sensible thing might be to borrow no money, to rent a place to live”
“how, short of living for 20 years in a tent, we could ever save enough money to buy a house outright”
“we screw up our courage to the sticking point and embark on a reckless gamble”
“if our income falls, and house prices fall, what then? We lose everything”
“one has taken out an excessively large mortgage, one finds oneself condemned to earn an income to match”
“Excessive debt is the mighty engine which has kept the British economy going”
“no choice because most of them were up to their eyeballs in debt. To go on strike was not an option”

We have friends (a couple with their second child on the way). They have never had a mortgage, he just worked hard and long and they now own (outright) two houses. It may not seem possible now, with house prices so high at the moment, but it is possible.

If you do take on debt it is always very sensible to remember that it is a speculative gamble. Nobody knows the future. Nobody knows whether they will be able to continue earning, nobody knows whether what they borrowed for will hold its value. Be prudent give yourself room for a fairly bad case scenario.

If your house is respossessed the lender can still come after you for the outstanding debt.

I don’t think that it is outright and always wrong to take on debt. I don’t think that we can put God in a box like that – but we must be sensitive to His will and do what we believe He is asking of us. Remember that debt can force you to carry on earning when maybe God is calling us to something else that might mean giving up our well paid jobs.

Great opportunity for young people to get their voice heard

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Dave Wiles from FYT and Roger Sainsbury have a meeting on 13th October with (Stephen Timms MP and Chief Secretary to the HM Treasury) to talk about issues relating to YOUTHWORK and GOVERNMENT FUNDING.

FYT are collecting young peoples views on the Young Peoples as Prophets website here and so we have a great opportunity to get young peoples views heard.

The extract from the Young people as Prophets site says
If you are a young person and want someone in POWER who has a say in how this country spends it’s money Dave will take any comments you post directly to him. If you are a youthworker, start exploring this issue with the young people you work with. Post your views under the category Politics/Funding Youth work.

What’s the Matter with our Children

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I’ve just written this news item for Ekklesia.

It highlights the fact a number of problems related to the well-being of our children in the UK.

For more information read the author’s version of the report here.

What is particularly interesting to me is are the results showing that young people in their upper teens have the second lowest measure of combined career aspirations (amongst those studying) and employment (amongst those not studying). Also, whilst UK children live in homes with by far the largest number of rooms per person, this material wealth isn’t translated into general well-being or a responsible attitude to the future. The study shows that the country ranks at the bottom for family structures that are beneficial for the development of children. The UK’s children do not tend to eat, or even talk very much with their parents. Not only that, but their friends are relatively unkind and unsupportive. Children from the UK also have the riskiest patterns of behaviour including sexual behaviour and drug use.

The report states

“there is substantial evidence that children in single parent as well as in step families tend to have worse outcomes than peers living with both biological parents (Kamerman ‘et al’ 2003; Rodgers and Pryor 1998).”

and

“The family constitutes the most important mediating factor for children’s well-being. An analysis of BHPS youth data found a significant association between the quality of parent-child relationships and young people’s subjective well-being (Quilgars ‘et al’ 2005). Orthner and Jones-Saupei (2003) point to the importance of good family communication for getting children into activities and educational opportunities ‘that will help them succeed’. Qualitative research shows that poor adolescents who have a trusting and supportive relationship to at least one parent are better able to deal with problems (Hoelscher 2003).”

and

“According to an Irish project on child well-being children see friends next to the family as the most important factors for their well-being (Hanafin and Brooks 2005). In fact friendship, the possibility to spend time with friends, to have fun and share problems is of high significance in children’s lives. A ‘best friend’ is often the only person with whom children talk about difficulties they have with their family or friends while being part of a wider group of peers strengthens feelings of belonging. Children are at risk of exclusion from their peer group if they stand out in one way or the other.”

and regarding risky behaviour including sex, drugs and alcohol:

“Adolescence is a time in development in which risk behaviour is very common and young people often engage in it hoping for some positive gains like acceptance in their peer group. In this they tend to underestimate the risks they take.”

This makes pretty bleak reading for UK youthworkers, but it does give us a measure of where we are, what we need to achieve and some issues to tackle

Charity Fundraising Costs

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As we all know, most charities spend a proportion of their income on generating further income. Also, we are aware that charities cannot spend 100% of their income on fundraising, otherwise they would not be spending any money on their charitable purpose. So there must be a level at which fundraising expenses are acceptable.

However, there are hidden fundraising ‘costs’ that are not on the accounts sheet. For example Christian Aid displays the following figures on their site:
Out of every pound we receive, we spend:
* 52p on long-term development projects
* 17p on responding to emergencies
* 12p on campaigning and education
* 18p on fundraising
* 1p on administration

The unseen item is how much resource do external fundraisers contribute. We can see that Christian Aid spend 18p in the pound on fundraising, but in addition to that we have the time and money that external fundraisers (the people who do sponsored bungee jumps, etc) commit to fundraising for Christian Aid. This time and money only adds to the 18p in the pound fundraising figure above – the money raised is already accounted for in the above figures. So even though these people are acting on behalf of Christian Aid, their expenses (and time) are conveniently off the accounting sheet.

To better appreciate the amount of resource that a charity (including it’s supporters) is actually spending on fundraising you need to estimate the time and money that is off the record.

From the figures available for Christian Aid (for example) it is very difficult to assess this cost as their income stream does not differentiate between income from external fundraisers and income from fundraising where the costs are directly to the Charity itself (e.g. the cost of letters asking for money).

For the estimate it is worth including both the time and money of the external fundraisers (this is what is accounted for if the fundraiser is an employee of the charity, after all). If we monetise the time spent by fundraisers then at a guess I would estimate that the final figures must fall into the range of 20p to 35p in the pound compared to the 18p in the pound published figure.

Please don’t assume that I’m questioning the published figure – I’m not. I’m just trying to add to that figure the fundraising costs that are external to the official Christian Aid organisation as incurred by it’s external fundraisers.

So, if we could actually have a reliable estimate of the true costs of fundraising by charities what would our response be? Charities that spend a large proportion of income on fundraising are criticised for that and they usually attempt to reduce that proportion.

There are probably some charities that have no ‘off account’ expenses for fundraising, but probably also other charities that have no ‘accounted for’ fundraising costs because it’s members freely give of their own time and resources to fundraising (i.e. it is all ‘off account’). Just because they can claim zero pence in the pound fundraising costs does not mean that they (in the larger sense than just the accounted for organisation) has zero fundraising costs – it always costs money to receive money even if it is just to check your bank statement and to write it into the accounts. The time and money of voluntary fundraisers should be taken into account by donors, in just the same way donors are interested in the official figures.

So bear in mind that a charity with a zero fundraising cost may, in this slightly different way of looking at things, actually have a 50% or higher fundraising cost.

Here the Charity Commission states that it will take up complaints where people identify that “fund-raising or administration costs that are excessive”.

Christmas at Greenbelt

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Greenbelt did not disappoint. As we had the children with us the festival had a very different spin for me. It was great to see the children get so much out of it, and thanks go out to those who made the festival work so well for families. Stuff like the drumming, statues, artwork, etc around the site was great for us, the shed camera obscurer was fantastic, and Jo as ever loved the sacred space on the top floor of the grandstand. Also the programmed family stuff was great fun, the twist and children’s festival, don’t let the pigeon drive the bus etc.

The one seminar I really wanted to go to I made – Pete Rollins who spoke about faithful betrayal, which was excellent. I recently read his book How not to speak of God which I think is a very important contribution to the current dialogue, I recommend it as the best book I have read for ten years. His talk begins to pilot a theology of redemption as a rupture and gives a great background to some of the issues I raised in the series of post about redefining church, for example see point 4 in this post.

Greenbelt for me is better than a family Christmas, I see so many people I have good relationships with, who I know are on a similar journey. People I now only reconnect with at Greenbelt, but who get me, and as ever the whole festival was a thin place where heaven and earth were a lot closer.

Tithes (and where they go)

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Heard someone comment the other day (and I really ought to be able to attribute this to someone, but can’t remember who it was) that in the Old Testament the tithe was for the poor and that somehow the church today has managed to divert it towards other stuff, like expensive buildings etc. This kinds of relates to my finishing paragraph on this post.

It’s not that I think that the tithe is for today anyway (10% seems a bit odd considering our whole lives ought to be a sacrifice), but it was a great comment!!!

Oh, I know, it was Shane Claibourne speaking at Greenbelt.

Exactly Who is Doing the Giving?

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Bartley brings up the issue of Government funding the church to carry out welfare services. This is a hot topic for many missions of the church including youthwork.

Whilst there are many considerations around the matter, I would like to merely ask: Who is doing the giving?

This is a hard question, but we all need to be careful that we consider it and are aware of it in our own situations.

As Christians, God has asked us to give our lives, as a sacrifice, to put others first. We show love in what we do, because it is our resource that we are giving.

If I give and in my giving I employ someone else to do the work, is it me who is giving or is it my employee? Well, it is me – surely. Sure, there may be the case where my employee is adding his giving on top of mine, perhaps putting in extra hours. That would be the his giving, not mine.

Our love needs to consist of giving of what we have got. Being a ‘professional Christian’ doesn’t mean that you are giving anything – it is only when you go beyond your job that you are giving, or when you receive ‘tiny pay’ (I knew that there was a good reason for such low pay! 🙂 ) – just the same as a shelf-stacking job down at Tesco’s, it is only when you go beyond the requirements of your job that you begin to give.

(note: how fantastically tax efficient it is to be a low paid youthworker and to make your giving your time rather than your money! Alternatively you could give money, but be taxed on the extra income you would need to receive before giving the money away. There isn’t a rule on this though – we just individually have to know God’s calling, and sometimes that can be to make money, possibly…)

When we think about giving let’s start by looking at what we have to give. It doesn’t need to be ‘silver and gold’ of which you may ‘have none’, but it does need to be something that you have.

Don’t seek merely to be an unloving, ungenerous, ungiving conduity of someone else’s love or giving. Don’t seek to merely be an paid arm of the state, or a paid arm of other Christians.

Sure, join with others who want to give, join with those who want to fund (as long as they have the same ultimate aims and wish to use the same methods as you), but don’t forget where your giving ends and someone else’s giving begins.

Ultimately it is giving what God has freely given us that matters.

Youthwork is a fantastically important thing to be doing – do make sure that the youth can see that you are not just giving other’s resources, but that you are giving your own too. It is that that gives you authenticity.

As an aside, I’ve just come across a case where (non-church) parents were given a letter by the youthwork explaining that as so much money went on upkeep of the church building it would be useful for parents to contribute to the youth activities. I was a bit bemused that the church felt it worth saying that the building was a higher priority than the people and that, whilst the church was willing to spend hundreds of pounds a week on the building, it wasn’t willing to spend a much smaller amount on people…

Reasons for Political Radicalisation of Christians

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Reading “Faith and Politics After Christendom” by Jonathan Bartley I’m fascinated by the section where he gives different examples of the action of politically radicalised Christians. It seems common that, as our society ‘descends’ (?) into Post-Christendom and loses many of the laws and cultural norms brought about by Christianity’s involvement in government, Christians decide to take action and do something about it in the political sphere.

Bartley broadly categorises this into positive and negative responses:

  • Where Christians are shocked at moral loosening and wish to reintroduce stricter morals by regulation.
  • Where Christians see injustice and wish to encourage government to ‘do something about it’.

Now, I can see that these two categories do exist (and bear in mind that Barley points out that many people involved in these things will have a broad mix of motive that may include both categories), but I’m not sure that they are as different as they first appear.

Surely they both break down into these aspects:
People are being wronged (maybe they know they are [obvious injustice] or maybe they don’t know that they are [moral damage]) and some Christians, who are politically motivated, want to impose a solution on society (whether it is prohibitive law or ‘positive’ action by the state).

We must surely note that even the more ‘positive’ of these two categories does include the taking or diminishing of resources from some people (perhaps taxation) and applying those resources to people as the radicalised group sees fit. A bit of spin and the opportunity to tell people how wonderful this piece of justice is (justice that we as Christians are called to practice in our lives) can promote the action in a positive light, but we also must remember that it is reliant on the backbone of the law, reliant on the ability to control people with the ultimate resort to violence.

Now, if you don’t believe my last point then note this example: A man chooses not to pay his taxes. By law the people (the state) dictate that people pay their taxes. Does this man get to keep his freedom? No, he is put in prison. What stops him continuing to exercise his freedom? The fact that if he were to try to do so people would stop him. Ultimately society is able to restrain, and if necessary be violent against that person in order to force that person to either cooperate or to accept punishment.

So, in my mind, both these categories of radicalised action fall into the trap of trying to control others, rather than trying to be an example to others and trying to love others (without at the same time trying to control others). I don’t yet know what Bartley’s tack on this is, but I look forward to reading on!!!