How does tithing work?

[Asmor]

Planet Money, a podcast kind of like This American Life which focuses on financial stories, did a podcast a couple months ago about tithing in the Mormon church that might be of interest.

What The IRS Could Learn From Mormons : Planet Money : NPR

To summarize, the church leaves it to each congregant to decide what should and should not be tithed, and it's a matter of their own conscience. It's been a while since I listened to it, but I believe they talked with a Mormon couple who, for example, disagreed about tithing in that the husband believed the 10% should be based on pre-tax income while the wife thought it should be based on net income after taxes.

Quite interesting.

 

[Jon_Dahl]

After having some perspective here (thank you) I've spoken with some of my players. We've tentatively decided to go with this rather unorthodox system:

Each month you have to pay 10% of the looted/earned gold, silver and such. You have to actively sell unnecessary items in order to have the money to pay for tithe.

Now it gets more complicated:
Every time you have ten magical items (not potions or scrolls) you have to give one item away as tithe. This item should represent the average value of all ten items.

Same is done separately with potions and scrolls.

In case of valuable items that weren't shared (e.g. they were donated or kept collectively for the adventuring group), the tithee should estimate what would have been his share. This calculation is counted towards his tithe.

Why is this a good system?
It's easy to calculate 10% of you cash.
You keep record on how many magical items you get (three different categories: scrolls, potions and others). Every time you get full ten, you have to pay up and start all over again.

What do you think?

 

[MichaelSomething]

Wouldn't an easier solution simply be to give the Paladin/religious adventurer some type of quest in lieu of paying tithe?

 

[GSHamster]

Wouldn't an easier solution simply be to give the Paladin/religious adventurer some type of quest in lieu of paying tithe?

I don't think so. Tithing represents a sacrifice of wealth. It is supposed to sting a little.

Whereas a quest or adventure is what the paladin was going to do anyways. It's not really a sacrifice for the paladin to go on an quest.

I think tithing to be restricted to more liquid forms of wealth. For example, if the paladin was given a title and a grant of land, I really don't think that the paladin is expected to give 10% of the land to the church. The paladin would be expected to give 10% of the rents and the harvest to the church, but not the underlying land.

 

[Loonook]

I don't think so. Tithing represents a sacrifice of wealth. It is supposed to sting a little.

Whereas a quest or adventure is what the paladin was going to do anyways. It's not really a sacrifice for the paladin to go on an quest.

I think tithing to be restricted to more liquid forms of wealth. For example, if the paladin was given a title and a grant of land, I really don't think that the paladin is expected to give 10% of the land to the church. The paladin would be expected to give 10% of the rents and the harvest to the church, but not the underlying land.

Yes, but the Paladin gives the tithe alongside taxes, and fees to maintain the land.

So please please please go this route so we can introduce adventurer taxation in your game .

Slainte,

-Loonook.

 

[jefgorbach]

Easy ... tithing is a MORAL agreement/responsibility between the individual and their deity, so I suggest using the Detect Evil spell to determine the base chance of their deity noticing the individual's failure to support their religious brethren via either monetary or equivalent goods/services are denies them access to ALL their divine abilities until Absolved. Thus while most individuals can safely ignore their Church's routine financial requests, clerics and paladins had best offer their support or face the consequences. [Faint=25%, Moderate=50%, Strong=75%, Overwhelm= definite notice]

 

[Janx]

I don't think so. Tithing represents a sacrifice of wealth. It is supposed to sting a little.

That's a matter of opinion.

Tithing is just a formulaic donation scheme. The point may be to give money to support the organization, not to give money until it hurts.

Furthermore, there's a social class issue. 10% to a peasant really does hurt. 10% to a wealthy noble, not so much. Furthermore, the wealthy noble probably donates in a large chunk and has huge wings of the church named after him.

While SOME religions might view the donation as a form of self-suffering or modesty enforcement, that's not the view all religions take or even all variants of the same religion.