Don't Give Up Hope

Hope is essential to change and it is essential to what is required to keep doing good works. As scripture says, "Don't grow weary in doing good works." But let's be honest, we who follow and hold God in awe are rarely going to get any affirmation from the press. That is especially true for the Leftist press such as the New Your Times.

Not long ago, the Times offered a scathing attack on Prison Fellowship the great program started by Chuck Colson after his stint in the Federal Prison. You can read about it here.
http://www.breakpoint.org/listingarticle.asp?ID=5902

However, a recent editorial in the equally Leftist Washington Post was able to say some very positive things about Conservatives and their generous giving. Here is part of their editorial

Conservatives who chafe at the twinning of conservatism and selfishness implied or stated outright by liberals should hear charity expert Arthur C. Brooks. The opposite of the convenient "altruistic liberals, selfish conservatives" stereotype appears to be true -- mostly because the average religious person is very charitable and, more often than not, is also a political conservative.

In total, conservative households donate about 30 percent more money to charity each year than liberal households, Mr. Brooks has found. Churchgoing America is ... much likelier to give to charity than non-observant, disproportionately liberal America.

Among Mr. Brooks' most interesting findings, contained in "Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism," is the red state/blue state divide. Measured as a percentage of income, Maryland is the only blue state to break the top 25.

One wonders what has happened to charity in wealthy coastal states like California, New York and Connecticut... Residents of these states simply do not donate as large a share of their income as the nice and modest folk in flyover-land cities like Topeka, Kansas, or Sioux Falls, S.D.

Residents in the latter were found by ABC's "20/20" this week to donate twice as much money as San Franciscans to Salvation Army buckets in a test the show arranged.

(I)f liberals were to give blood at the rates that conservatives do, America's blood supply would rise by 45 percent, Mr. Brooks found. There is a culture of giving and altruism in America that is highly associated with religious faith and practice, which in turn is highly associated with conservatism. Or maybe we could put it simply: Good things go together.

Now that can give us hope. Even if the motivation for giving is God's word and a charitable heart, it is nice for the world to acknowledge one more reason that faith in God produces good fruit.