Want to help the victims of Katrina?
 

Here is info on how to do it through LDS Humanitarian Services:

http://hedgehogcentral.blogspot.com/...u-may-not.html

our stake public affairs person reported that when she approached the city of Dallas about service projects, she was basically told that our church was unreliable and had the worst reputation as far as major religions in the Dallas area as to meaningful, reliable contribution to the community. Ouch.

Our ward, other than participating in one multi-stake service project (Habitat for Humanity) for half a day, has not had a single service project. And I don't think we will for the rest of the year.

So whatever it is that LDS humanitarian services does, I feel pretty far removed from it, even if some of it is my financial contribution.

That stings.


I remember a few years ago when that tornado tore up Oklahoma(around Lawson, I think) pretty bad. Our stake went to help with the cleanup. There were lots of people who showed up but with absolutely no organization. Each ward kind of did the best it could, meandering around from field to field & house to house & joining up with other stake members, but it was kind of a mess. I remember at one point we were demolishing a house and a couple of people were yanking at a beam while there was a guy on the roof supported by that beam. The guy was tearing up the roof.

Nobody knew what the heck they were doing.

Ah, good times.

That's too bad . . .
 

but I know the reputation is not the same everywhere. Here in L.A. among the community services network our church is known as the "go to" organization if you really want to get something done. We have very strong relationships with interfaith groups and humanitarian services people. Maybe that's because we have a strong Public Affairs Council whose job it is to make sure we get involved where there's a need and do things right.

I'm wondering if part of that is that religion in general is not as big in California? Meaning you don't have a church on every corner like here in Texas. So, by default, LDS church becomes a bigger deal.

Of course it wouldn't surprise me if other places have their act together, much more than Texas saints.

My former Bishop would say "we don't give money like other churches to local causes, we give our time."

In some ways, the reality is that we give neither. But I wondered why we were not more involved in improving the community.

Well, we do give money, just quietly
 

IN the last 10 years the Church has forked over about $1 billion in aid to various disaster victims. They don't publicize it as much as they could.