This is a silly post with silly implications, even though I appreciate its rhetorical goals
The really c/mildlyinfuriating fact is there are more empty homes in the US than homeless.
Based on currently available numbers, there are about 31 vacant housing units for every homeless person in the U.S. src
You don’t even need to involve churches. You need to hold individuals and businesses who hoard real estate for profit accountable. (There is also the matter of the logistics of getting homeless people into those homes, but I will not dive into that here.)
I appreciate the sentiment of this post, but please be sure to check your predetermined biases before you use the text of this meme to inform your opinion on policy.
I don’t follow what’s silly here. These motherfuckers are not taxed and also not obligated to give back and that should matter. Tax them, would be the obvious solution
Yeah the moral bit is we know people who hold housing for profit are douches. Churches are worse because they think they’re doing the Lord’s work and love talking about caring for people, but very few actually do any good.
Am I reading this right? Are you saying that churches are worse than house-hoarding landlords, just because they think they’re doing good but a lot of them don’t? Even the 18% of churches that rent their buildings from other churches[1] (or the ones that rent non-church properties like theaters or schools,) and thus almost certainly don’t even have a property they could give? Or what about the 48% of churches that run or support a food pantry[2], and are thus doing good?
[1] - https://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/2018/fall-state-of-church-ministry/two-churches-one-roof.html
[2] - https://theconversation.com/nearly-half-of-all-churches-and-other-faith-institutions-help-people-get-enough-to-eat-170074
Mmm I think you’re missing one of the core points of this though: churches have historically and traditionally offered and been used as sanctuaries, often by the poor and downtrodden in a society. In the US these days, you don’t see nearly as much of that. It’s more about evangelism and dogmatism and prosperity gospel. Christians in the US demonstrably doesn’t care that much about poor people these days.
More broadly: as someone who was raised Christian but is now a staunch atheist, I and many others would have far fewer issues with Christians if they would actually fucking practice what their religion preaches instead of whatever some MAGApastor tells you that Supply Side Jesus says.