My friend, Demy, having read Thomas Paine's "The Age of Reason", has often sought to debate with Iglesia ni Cristo followers on biblical/religious issues, most of which really could be resolved if the literal or layman's meanings of the texts are avoided. To maintain, for instance, that Joshua actually made the sun stand still simply because God is all-powerful and can do anything is to argue like a child in pre-school. Like most poems on exploits of Roland or Ulysses, these tales were not meant to be taken as factual accounts but as epics of the imagination, romances, songs by poets or bards writing or performing for ordinary folk or shepherds sitting around their camp fire.
There is one other topic, however, on which Demy becomes even more agitated. When an Iglesia follower cannot give his contribution (tithe) in a given week, he is recorded as 'owing' for that week. For how long or for how many weeks he will be recorded as 'owing', I am not sure. Then he says, "I am willing to contribute a tenth, even a third, of what I have. But 1/10 of zero is zero. If God will make me win the Megamillion jackpot, I will give 1/3 of my winnings to charity, especially to the homeless street children in our country. But not to your church, because everybody knows your church is already very rich with so many 'sambahans' (temples or places of worship) all over the world. What I can't understand is why churches' monies are tax-free while that new-hire at Macdonald's is subject to all kinds of taxes by the IRS and the State..."
It does seem unusual that not only the Iglesia ni Cristo sect but most (if not all) organized religions have rich coffers, the Vatican's material wealth/treasures, for example)... When Christ advised that we give unto Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's, I believe He was referring to us all.
Speaking for myself then, my sou is for Caesar, my battle-scarred soul - for God.
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