Most people of goodwill agree that there is an obligation to assist those in need. For Christians, the responsibility is intrinsic to our faith. Commands to help the widow, the orphan, and the poor pervade Old and New Testaments. The writings of the Church Fathers are full of admonitions to give to the less fortunate. Basil of Caesarea (d. 370), who founded the world’s first hospital, put the obligation in stark but not uncharacteristic terms: “The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry man; the coat hanging in your closet belongs to the man who needs it; the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the man who has no shoes; the money which you put into the bank belongs to the poor. You do wrong to everyone you could help but fail to help.”
To know that we have an obligation to help the needy, however, is not to know how that obligation should be discharged. Many people assume that the move from principle to practice is a seamless one. Helping the poor is easy, and lots of opportunities present themselves. Pay taxes. Throw some change in the kettle. Put a dollar in the collection basket. Give the panhandler a few bucks. If we do these things, we’ve done what’s necessary.
Doing these things may (or may not) be actually helpful to those in need, but what is certain is that they are not adequate to meet our duty to others. If we are genuinely committed to acting in charity—if we truly desire the good of our neighbor—we must go far beyond what is simple and easy. Proper motivation—genuine love—is the primary element, but even that is not enough. We must also apply our intelligence.
The importance of reflection, consideration, and evidence in the practice of charity can be illustrated by a story that appeared in a local newspaper a few months ago. The report relates the development and eventual abandonment of a project to address homelessness in a small Midwestern city.
In 2015, in response to the demands of community leaders, the mayor formed a task force on homelessness. A local church volunteered to operate a warming shelter on winter’s coldest nights. Despite extensive publicity and widespread invitations, few people availed themselves of the shelter. Critics suggested that the location was wrong; the shelter needed to be downtown.
A downtown church agreed to host the shelter. Volunteers staffed the rooms and prepared meals. Hot showers were offered to induce visitors. The result: “Many nights, the volunteers ate the dinner they had prepared so that the food would not go to waste, and then went home when no one came to the shelter.” One potential client showed up but left when he discovered there was no television to watch.
Critics now proposed that the homeless stayed away because they weren’t comfortable at a church. The shelter was moved to a non-sectarian community center, a place already well known as a resource for those in need. The numbers did not increase.
The task force made one last try, this time enlisting the charitable expertise of the Salvation Army. During the winter of 2019-2020, the shelter was open seventeen nights, and not a single person spent a single night. The mayor concluded, “Perhaps it’s time to simply realize that we can spend our time in ways that produce better results.”
Just so. This was a project conceived by good, well-intentioned people to tackle what appeared to be a serious problem in the community. The effort was locally initiated and brought together churches, non-profits, and government in a collaborative endeavor. So far, so good.
But none of these positive qualities guaranteed its success. Perhaps the exact nature of the problem had been misunderstood. Perhaps the solution to the problem was more complicated than initially recognized. Whatever the case, it’s clear that the elements of good intentions, resources, and effort were not enough to ensure effective charity. Better analysis of how to address the problem was needed. Laudably, the task force in this case had the humility to admit that their experiment had failed. They can now learn from the experience and move on. This failure can be the catalyst for more effective charitable activity in the future.
The travesty is when a government or non-profit welfare programs gain a momentum of their own, regardless of the consequences. Big charities and state and federal programs are the most likely to fall into this problem. The more separation there is between donors, administrators, and beneficiaries, the more room there is for ignoring the effectiveness of aid efforts. When the metric of success is money spent rather than results achieved, the original goal of the program has been subsumed by other interests. That is not smart charity.
