Should Church Members’ Tithe Amounts Be Published?
Q: Is it proper or ethical for a church to publicly post members’ names along with their tithe amounts? If someone is offended by this, does that indicate immaturity?
A: No, I don’t think that’s proper. The Bible indicates that when it comes to our generosity, we shouldn’t let our left hand know what our right hand is doing. Jesus used this figure of speech to communicate the idea that you should almost try to forget about how much you give, instead of praising yourself for it. When the amount that people give is made public to other people, it inescapably changes things. It makes people feel better or worse because of their giving. So no, I don’t think that it’s proper or ethical to publish the names of tithers or the amount they give to the church.
If someone is offended at that practice, look, I think it’s worthy of some offense. People often mess up in the world today because they take something that’s worthy of some offense and they take gigantic offense from it. We want to avoid that. You don’t want to take excessive offense at it. But I think it’s wrong for a church to do so, and therefore it should be avoided.