In the chapters 3 and 4 that we read this week, one of the main topics that stuck out to me was the immense and positive impact that religious organizations had and have within the nonprofit sector. However, I’ve always been a little reluctant in giving religious organizations credit when credit is due. Although my family wasn’t religious, my mother decided to put me through private Catholic education from grade school through high school because she believed it was a better education for me. That fact is up for argument, but the past few years I’ve really come to appreciate the knowledge I’ve gained about Christianity and Catholicism through my time spent within private education. Catholicism and I never seemed to see eye to eye and for many years I discredited everything positive they did within my communities and others. However, through the natural process of growing up I’ve become a little less self-righteous and have come to see all the positive work that religious organizations have contributed to this nation.
Over Christmas break I went on a road trip on a school bus my friend owns instead of spending time with my family. Although it didn’t fare well with my mother, I learned a lot about myself and the world on that trip. One particular event on Christmas Eve struck a chord in me when we all found ourselves out of money and tired of eating canned beans. That night we ended up at a church dinner feed for the homeless. It was a little surreal because I had always been on the other side of those feeds through volunteering for my parish in high school, but it put a lot of prejudices behind me about my views on the homeless (seeing as I was then one of them) and my views on religious organizations. There was no preaching or mention of religion, but just a simple dinner and funny conversations with San Francisco’s homeless.
Recently, the Catholic Church has been having a particularly rough time in the news, and despite my views on the religion as a whole, I believe it is important to realize all the good that has come out of this organization. A person’s faith is one of the most powerful entities and influential methods for changing a society. The strength of organized believers in an ideology has the potential to solve many of society’s problems or in some cases such as Nazi Germany, take a different route. When problems arise within a society such as overwhelming sadness, fear, or unsatisfactory feelings, people want something to believe in to give them hope. That is often where religion comes in, such as the historical high in membership that Churches saw after World War II (Nonprofit Nation, pg. 65). Although I feel that religious organizations can sometimes use this need for hope to manipulate people, I can’t hide the fact that without religion within our country our nonprofits and social services wouldn’t be anything like they are today. I found it really interesting how benevolence seemed to develop within our nation. The evolution from a few wealthy benefactors to billions upon billions of dollars circulating through religious organizations is a phenomenal progression. I believe this greatly has to do with an individual’s human nature of desiring lend help and at the same time the desire to find a positive community to be a part of. Because the people of the United States put their confidence in religion over “corporations, unions, the media, or federal, state, or local government” (Nonprofit Nation pg. 62), it therefore becomes the most powerful force for impacting society. This is important because ideally one can assume that the services religious organizations provide don’t have the same ulterior motive that a business or government would have. The power churches hold can seem daunting for me sometimes, but it also puts into perspective how privileged Americans are to have religious organizations as option at all.
Over Christmas break I went on a road trip on a school bus my friend owns instead of spending time with my family. Although it didn’t fare well with my mother, I learned a lot about myself and the world on that trip. One particular event on Christmas Eve struck a chord in me when we all found ourselves out of money and tired of eating canned beans. That night we ended up at a church dinner feed for the homeless. It was a little surreal because I had always been on the other side of those feeds through volunteering for my parish in high school, but it put a lot of prejudices behind me about my views on the homeless (seeing as I was then one of them) and my views on religious organizations. There was no preaching or mention of religion, but just a simple dinner and funny conversations with San Francisco’s homeless.
Recently, the Catholic Church has been having a particularly rough time in the news, and despite my views on the religion as a whole, I believe it is important to realize all the good that has come out of this organization. A person’s faith is one of the most powerful entities and influential methods for changing a society. The strength of organized believers in an ideology has the potential to solve many of society’s problems or in some cases such as Nazi Germany, take a different route. When problems arise within a society such as overwhelming sadness, fear, or unsatisfactory feelings, people want something to believe in to give them hope. That is often where religion comes in, such as the historical high in membership that Churches saw after World War II (Nonprofit Nation, pg. 65). Although I feel that religious organizations can sometimes use this need for hope to manipulate people, I can’t hide the fact that without religion within our country our nonprofits and social services wouldn’t be anything like they are today. I found it really interesting how benevolence seemed to develop within our nation. The evolution from a few wealthy benefactors to billions upon billions of dollars circulating through religious organizations is a phenomenal progression. I believe this greatly has to do with an individual’s human nature of desiring lend help and at the same time the desire to find a positive community to be a part of. Because the people of the United States put their confidence in religion over “corporations, unions, the media, or federal, state, or local government” (Nonprofit Nation pg. 62), it therefore becomes the most powerful force for impacting society. This is important because ideally one can assume that the services religious organizations provide don’t have the same ulterior motive that a business or government would have. The power churches hold can seem daunting for me sometimes, but it also puts into perspective how privileged Americans are to have religious organizations as option at all.
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