CONSERVATIVE
CHRISTIANS GIVE MORE

Topics: Benevolence; Church Attendance; Community Impact; Compassion; Generosity; Giving; Godliness; Poverty; Sacrifice; Secularism; Self-denial; Self-discipline; Social Action; Stewardship; Tithing

References: Deuteronomy 15:7; Proverbs 19:17; Malachi 3; Matthew 19:21; Luke 6:38; 2 Corinthians 9:7

Conservative Christians put their money where their mouth is when it comes to giving. That’s according to a study from Syracuse University published in 2006 by Arthur Brooks in Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth about Compassionate Conservatism. “If you asked me, I would have expected to find that religious conservatives are stingy,” said Brooks, a committed Catholic and political independent. “That’s what we are told all the time.” What he found instead was that conservative Christians give more in “every measurable way,” from writing checks to volunteering time to donating blood.

Brooks attributes the difference to four factors: church attendance, two-parent families, a Protestant work ethic, and distaste for government social services. Of those, church attendance is the most telling. Ninety-one percent of regular church attendees give to charity each year, compared with 66 percent of those who said they do not have a religion. The gap adds up—the faithful give four times more money per year than their secular counterparts. While most of that money is given to churches, religious people also give more to a secular charity such as the Red Cross or to their alma mater.

Religious people also donate twice as much blood and are more likely to “behave in compassionate ways toward strangers,” Brooks said. For example, they are much more likely to return extra change to a cashier when they are accidentally given too much.

Generous giving is part of the religious conservative identity, according to sociologist Tony Campolo. “The Religious Right, by conviction, is convinced that helping the poor is something that should be done individually or by the church,” said Campolo. “[They say that] asking the state to do it is wrong.”

—Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra, “Compassionate Conservatives,” Christianity Today (February 2007)