Taking a Leap

It's pretty clear to me what I am being called to do. This post, and this one, and this one, and the first comment on this one all point to the same conclusion: Stop trying to do it all yourself and just give it to God.

And these are all posts within the last week or so.

When I began this blog, I wanted to highlight the ways we, as blessed inhabitants of a wealthy and prosperous nation, can live our lives in solidarity with the poor. My path was waylaid immediately by what I thought at the time was an obstacle: my husband's opposition to giving to charity. So I changed my focus and dedicated myself to budgeting and saving, non-monetary giving, and prayer.

It's not at all that I think I made the wrong choice or anything, but I think I had the wrong attitude about it. I thought at the time, "I'll just do all these things in obedience to what God is calling me to do, and He will change my husband's heart so we'll be able to give to charity." I also thought, "God will help me save money so we will be in a good financial position and have extra to give to the poor."

Um. So. That totally hasn't happened. At all. The irony is, we are in excellent financial position. We have paid off all our debt and saved three to four months worth of salary for emergency spending. My husband has gotten a raise. We've made improvements on our house that actually saved us money in the long run (winterizing, etc.)

But we don't seem to have any money for the poor. My husband had suggested that any money left over in the monthly budget could be split 50/50 between savings and charity. Not only have we not had any money left over for the last year, but we have been overspending our monthly budget by hundreds and hundreds of dollars. In fact, just from overspending, we've gone back into debt.

My husband is dumbfounded. "How is this happening?" he asked me the other night. "We used to be able to get by with less! We have more money than we ever have and we're spending more!"

I didn't have an answer for him, but in praying about it (and reading blogs that coincidentally all say the same things) it seems pretty obvious to me what the problem is. We're not giving God His money. The whole idea of budgeting and scrimping so we can save some "extra" for the poor has the entire thing backwards. We should be giving freely to the poor, and trusting in God to provide for us, as He did when we gave $100 to the IRC instead of buying groceries.

I am petrified. And completely at a loss. This whole trusting God thing is exceedingly difficult for me, and I am very, very worried about how it might affect my marriage. Can I be completely honest? It's not even that I worry about our financial situation, or making my husband mad. My real fear, the deepest, most central fear that's stopping me from taking a leap of faith, is that it won't work, and it will be just one more reason for my husband not to believe in God.

What if we do this, if we give to God and then He doesn't provide? I've seen friends who attempted great things for God fail utterly and completely (in the eyes of the world.) It didn't rock their faith, they were never in a situation where they had no food or no home, and I think it led them to a better place, but as far as my husband is concerned, they listened to a voice that wasn't there and completely ruined their finances. I don't want to fall into a prosperity gospel trap here and move forward recklessly, expecting that strangers are going to drop checks on our porch to pay my kids' tuition. But if my husband and I are not on the same page when it comes to tithing, we might not hear the same message, and what to me is a sacrifice for the greater good might to my husband be a failure or an untenable compromise.

And of course, I care more about what God wants me to do than what my husband may or may not think, but it doesn't seem right to me that I am forced to choose. It doesn't seem to me that God would ask something of me that would harm my marriage.

Which leads me to think that He is in control of this, and that good will come of it.

But I'm still petrified. And I don't know how to start.

Picture credit: Movie still from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, brain child of the illustrious Mr. George Lucas (George Lucas & Jeffrey Boam, Paramount Pictures, Lucasfilm, May 24, 1989.)

Perspective

I'm late on 7 Quick Takes because I'm only online on Sundays. Hopefully I can jump in without penalty!

1. It's very unlikely we will homeschool next year. While I see successes in some areas, the overall atmosphere is very unpleasant. My son hates learning and complains no matter what task I set him to. He procrastinates and sulks and sabotages his assignments, which makes me so frustrated that I lose my temper and create exactly the kind of environment that experts say prevents a child's ability to learn. I've prayed for strength, for patience, for guidance, and it comes down to this: it's not working. I want to be open minded and accept that homeschool might not be right for us.

2. So we are in the process of finding a school for him. I'd like to make the financial sacrifice and send him to our parish school, if only because at least that way he'd still get to Mass once during the week and would receive catechism instruction on a daily basis. I'm not yet convinced, though, that the benefits of a Catholic education outweigh the financial burden. But I found the public school overcrowded when we visited last week, so if I had to choose, I'd prefer the private school.

3. I am starting to get really super-excited about the idea of having some time to myself every day. I could work on my book. Possibly (gulp) finish it! I could do fun stuff with my son instead of having all our interactions be adversarial! I could schedule doctors appointments that don't involve my kids shouting and screaming and barging in while I'm being examined! I could sit at Mass and actually pray in silence! Wow!

4. I am also really, fundamentally, depressed about this. It's hard not to feel like a failure. If I were a better teacher, perhaps my son wouldn't fight learning so much. It saddens me that he'll have so much less time now for role play and adventuring. I hate that he'll be gone 7 hours every day and that he'll probably be spending most of that sitting down at a desk. I am deeply worried about his social interactions, both the influences he'll be exposed to as well as the potential for bullying. This just isn't what I wanted for him.

5. My dad has invited us to visit Malta with him this summer. I haven't been since I was three, and this time I really want to explore the churches and the monuments and take a boat tour and all sorts of amazing things that you can do on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean that was settled by ancient Romans! I am supremely blessed with family members who buy me vacations to wonderful places. Unfortunately, I am afraid to fly and will probably spend the entire time over the ocean going through decade after decade of the Rosary. Eh. Prayers are never a bad thing.

6. Last year, I declined requests to be a catechist at my Parish as well as a co-leader for my moms group and planning member of the Colorado Catholic Homeschoolers conference because we were planning to be open to life in January and I didn't think it was a good idea to commit to a volunteer position and then disappear off the face of the Earth halfway through. I'm facing the same choice again for the fall, which is when we are next planning to be open to life again after the unforeseen ectopic pregnancy I experienced a few months ago. Part of me thinks it's ridiculous to plan for something that may not happen, the rest of me thinks that ALL plans may not happen so that's stupid logic. I have been feeling a pull to take more risks and trust God more lately. So perhaps I'll go ahead and volunteer, and then trust that people will figure things out if we are blessed as we hope to be in the fall.

7. And in news that illuminates posts 1 - 6 as the frivolous prattle of a person with no real problems, I found out yesterday that a friend is pregnant. She's really not in a very good place right now and can't afford another baby. I don't want to say any more out of respect for her privacy, but I do ask that you pray for R--. She is not considering an abortion at all, but she is very worried about how they can manage, and she needs a great deal of help.

More Quick Takes at Conversion Diary!

Wonder of wonders...

...miracle of miracles!

I wanted to take a brief moment and post here about an outstanding, completely unexpected breakthrough that occurred in my marriage recently.

My husband came up with a plan that allows us to give to charity every month.

For the last five years (ever since I gave up working outside the home) my husband has insisted that we have no money to give to charity. Though I felt comfortable tithing 10% of my own paycheck, once that disappeared I had nothing I could count as my own. So I gave away whatever cash came into my hands from family members, as gifts for my birthday or Christmas, change from buying lunch or coffee, etc.

About the time I began this blog, I decided to commit myself entirely to my husband's vision for our finances. I ceased asking him about charity and instead devoted my energies to spending as little of our money as I could. I turned over to my husband every penny I received as a gift, even though it offended my family members who intended it as "play money." My intention was to remove myself from the argument and really, wholeheartedly work for unity in my marriage. I wasn't going to change his mind, so it seemed the best idea was to embrace his plans and make them my own. I had some idea that he would be pleased to see me making an active investment in our financial future, and proud of my ability to spend wisely. I even thought God might reward my efforts with some sort of major change of heart, perhaps even a windfall of money that would allow us to start adoption proceedings.

As of November, this was looking to be a dismal failure. I was frustrated by my inability to keep to our monthly budget and exhausted by the mental effort it required to plan each grocery trip down to the last penny and deny myself practically everything I wanted to buy (goat cheese, home decor, clothes, replacement sneakers, snacks at the mall, visits to the chiropractor, etc.) Each time I put the pine nuts back on the shelf at the store, or adjusted the books in my daughter's broken cubby, I mentally fumed that these sacrifices were totally for naught. We weren't saving any money at all. To make matters worse, my husband hadn't even noticed. He was growing more and more concerned about our finances, to the point where he was having trouble sleeping from the stress. I felt I had no incentive to keep up my careful regimen even though I knew it was right and good to do so. I felt like our situation would never change, and I wondered why God didn't seem to be doing anything to change it.

By the grace of God and guidance of the Holy Spirit, I refrained from sharing any of my feelings with my husband. I just kept on as I had been, and instead of giving me cash, my family started buying us groceries and home improvements. In December however, directly on the heels of going over-budget in November and with Christmas looming ever closer, I gave in to despair and made an offhand comment along the lines of: "it's never going to be enough for you." He was offended, rightly so, and countered, "you have made it perfectly clear you don't care about our finances."

Somehow, I managed to refrain from defending myself, pointing out all the sacrifices I was making and all the effort I had put into "his" vision, the pain it caused me to turn away from homeless people on the street and the tears I cried every time the collection basket went past me at Church. But I was preparing to scrap the whole experiment and start hiding money from him and giving it away behind his back. The only reason I didn't is that I had none to give, it being December and all.

Yet within two weeks, he wrote me an email to say he'd been spending a lot of time pondering the situation, and suggested that any remaining money at the end of the month could be split, 50/50, into savings and charity. I can't express to you my surprise and delight, or how unexpected his gesture truly was. There was no lead up to his sudden acceptance of my desires and subsequent factoring in of them to the family plan.

Nor was it anything I did, or anything I said, to change his mind. In the past, we had argued about this endlessly without coming to any satisfactory conclusion: I confidently asserted that we would be blessed if we gave from our hearts, he said we had no money to waste. I explained my beliefs about stewardship and responsibility to those less fortunate, he said we could help them when we weren't struggling to pay our own bills. Yet even though nothing in our money situation changed, even though we aren't yet at the point where we have 6 months income in a savings account for emergencies and even with the house in need of immediate repairs, he just decided that we could do this and then came up with a plan to make it work. I can only deduce it was the hand of God working in him. And therein lies the miracle.

It's not the plan I would have chosen, of course. It's actually better because it fulfills BOTH our interests. And because my husband came up with it himself, I feel like it's a gift he's given me, rather than a battle I've won at the expense of his pride.

So we have a charity account now! And I have direct incentive to refrain from spending frivolously; if I am under budget each month, some of that money will go to help the poor. It just makes it so much easier to brave the crowds at Costco knowing that there's a larger purpose to my sacrifices. And for the first time, I feel my husband and are are truly united in our marriage and our finances. We are working together towards each of our goals. This is so much better than a windfall of money (though if God has one planned I won't turn it down!)

I am thrilled and filled with new hope. I truly consider this a miracle, and I am wholly thankful for it.

Picture credit.

Self-Indulgences

I have been MIA these past months from a combination of writer's block, emotional frustration and personal crises. Everyone is mostly healthy now (my son broke his arm in early May and has been sick since mid-June with a nasty stomach bug that just won't.go.away and which everyone else has shared) and we're past all the big events that have taken so much of my time (trips to visit family, planning my son's 5th birthday party, and houseguests.)

My heart has been stilted for a while now. I'm trying to keep busy so I don't think about the constraints that keep me from acting as I wish to, but every now and then something reminds me and I'm upset all over again. On Thursday evening I was making dinner when the phone rang. Our alma mater was calling to thank us for the generous gift we gave them.

I said, "Oh. Sure, no problem." and then asked my husband if we had given them something. Yep. $20. I know it's not much, but according to his arguments, we can't afford ANYTHING for charity right now. I wish I could say I accepted the news with grace, went off and prayed about it, then respectfully discussed the matter with him a few days later. But instead I snapped, "Then you won't mind if I give $20 to our Church building fund, will you?"

I still wonder if I'm doing the right thing by doing nothing. There's always another financial setback (our insurance company just raised our deductible from $300 per person to $4,000 because of all our trips to the ER in the last couple months) and it just doesn't seem to me that my husband has any incentive to change his thinking. We are further from being able to adopt and give to charity than we were when I began this blog a year ago, yet I've been praying daily, offering up my Masses and sacrificing my own principles for the sake of our marriage.

Trust. The theme of every message I've gotten recently comes down to one simple fact: I am not trusting God to perform a miracle for me. I still think there's something I need to be doing, or saying, to convince my husband to my position. It might take years for his heart to be softened, and in the meantime I absolutely cannot be nagging, prodding, complaining or whining.

I just wish that it didn't hurt so much. That I didn't start crying any time someone even so much as says "Africa." That passing the empty basket at Church didn't cause me physical pain. That I didn't have to throw out every envelope from Save the Children, St. Jude's Hospital, Save Darfur, Samaritan's Purse...

In conversation with a friend the other day, it became clear that God is asking me for concrete sacrifices dedicated to my husband's conversion. I'm incredibly self-indulgent. When my alarm goes off in the morning, I press snooze for half an hour. I snack constantly. I'm on the computer a hundred times a day. I sometimes skip prayer to watch TV. I wallow in self-pity and bad moods, show all my emotions as soon as they appear, rant and complain more than I care to admit, and generally indulge every whim.

I'm willing to make sacrifices for the poor. Why not for God and my husband?

I've decided to start small. Getting up when my alarm goes off. (I call it "Sit up for Jesus!" and that's what I say silently to myself every morning. "Sit up for Jesus, Tienne. Sit up!") Fasting from one meal a week. Limiting myself to one serving size of desert after a meal.

I'm hopeful these little sacrifices will strengthen my will and fit me for the trials to come. Conventional wisdom says things will get worse before they get better. Mary, my model, be with me and guide me. Shower me, God, with strength. Amen.

Back in the Saddle

We've had a major financial setback, in the form of raw sewage inundating our basement. Apparently, there are two points in our main sewer line that aren't moving water as they ought. Our pipes backed up last week and we didn't notice it until a ten foot area of our finished basement was soaked.

Needless to say, we don't have the money lying around that it's going to take to fix this. I figure this should increase our debt by about 50%, perhaps more.

But I'm surprisingly untroubled about it. After the initial shock and horror of finding such a thing in our basement, my first thought was how much time this was going to add before we were able to give to charity, tithe, and adopt (my three main goals for our family.) I fretted about it for a day and God spoke very clearly into my heart.

We're never going to eliminate our debt. But that doesn't matter, because God's going to change my husband's heart so he's open to tithing, giving to charity, and adoption even WITH debt.

So I don't really care. The house could burn down around us and it'd be a HUGE pain, but we'll figure it out somehow. My poor husband, on the other hand, is having trouble eating and sleeping because he's so worried about how we're going to find the money. I figure we'll just take out a loan if we have to. It's not like we have no assets. It's not like we're living paycheck to paycheck without any cushion or credit.

We'll be okay.

I would be very, very, happy, though, if I never saw raw sewage again. YUCK.

Stewardship Sunday

Today was Stewardship of Treasure Commitment Sunday at my parish. That's a long and fancy way of saying that they pass out the envelopes and ask everyone to write down a weekly or yearly pledge. Fr. Andrew gave an excellent homily addressed to the "5 groups of people in this congregation." The first group was those who have never given and have no intention of giving to the parish. And I had to sit there and listen to the message, knowing that I was part of that group. I wanted to stand up and yell, "I'd give, but my husband won't let me!"

It's so frustrating. I know God is aware of our family situation right now and I know that He wants me NOT to give. Truly, it's not that I care that the office clerk is going to tally up my envelopes for the year and shake her head and think, "Another family who gave nothing." What makes me so annoyed is that the church NEEDS my gift and I'm unable to do anything about it. Our parish is redoing the sanctuary starting tomorrow (there's a special Mass tonight and procession to move the Eucharist into its new spot in the school gym) and I can't be a part of it. They still need 7 million dollars to finish the reconstruction, but I can't give. Our community has hungry and needy that the parish cares for, but I can't participate. (Yes, I can donate spare goods -- which I have -- but the primary need is monetary. I worked for a nonprofit and frankly, unless you're Goodwill those material donations are more of a hindrance than a help. People like new things, many children's toys and equipment get recalled or are no longer usable, and the donations don't always exactly match the needs of the community. Money is really the best way to help.)

I don't want to be in the first group! I want to be in the last group, the group that tithes 10% every year and has only to readjust their pledge to accurately reflect any new income.

I had a strange conversation with my husband the other day. I'd found this site from one of the adoption blogs I'm following and had mentioned it with some excitement. "We wouldn't have to wait as long to find the money; we could start the adoption process next year!" My husband looked pained. "Isn't it need based? Because there's no way we'd qualify. We have too many assets."

"What do you mean, wouldn't qualify? Aren't we like, thousands of dollars in debt?"

"In my head we are." I must have looked poleaxed because he explained, "I sold stock to cover the debt. You know that."

This is the sort of thing that always made me nuts about economics and business when I had to take them in high school. I don't care what state the money exists in. I don't care if it's in a savings account, or it's stock, or it's cash under the mattress. There's only two kinds of money: assets and credit. We use our assets to make payments and our credit to purchase things that would take too long to save up for (a car, a house, etc.) Good financial stewardship means maintaining sufficient assets to make all required monthly credit payments and cover the expenses of living, while setting money aside for emergency savings, retirement, and significant future expenses (college, down payments on a house, etc.) Everything else is window dressing as far as I'm concerned.

If our assets were sufficient to cover our debt, it means we have no debt. We DO, of course, have house payments, car payments, insurance payments, school fees and a host of other expenses, but that's not the problem. My husband isn't saying that we can't give to charity or adopt a child until we own our own home. I misunderstood from his email that timing was an issue in this matter. Based on what I know now, I don't think it is. The stock has been sold already. We're not racking up interest payments on the debt anymore. So why can't we do a 1/2 and 1/2 sort of thing? How about we live frugally, pinching money wherever possible, then whatever we save, 1/2 goes into an account to offset the amount of the recent debt, and the rest gets put toward charity or adoption?

I don't know whether to bring this up to him. I'm really doing a VERY POOR job of humbling myself and waiting for God's time on this issue, but I'm just having such trouble justifying the delay. People need our help NOW and we can't even set a firm timetable for when we would be in a position to give. It's all this arbitrary, subjective point where we've put "enough" into a savings account. "They recommend you have an emergency fund equal to three months worth of expenses," says my husband. "How much would that be?" I asked.

The answer? Twice the current amount of our "debt."

I almost fell through the floor. How does the situation keep changing and our debt keep getting bigger and the wait keep getting longer?

"Well what about adoption?" I said. "Is that something we'd sell stock to cover, or would we save up for that?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "I guess we could sell stock."

I didn't ask the follow up question to that, which was, So, if we sell stock for an adoption, does our "debt" then increase by $30K? Is that ANOTHER threshold we have to meet before we can give money to charity?

Pray for me, please. It's all I can do right now to not shake the man. I'm succeeding in having these conversations with him rationally and calmly. I'm truly seeking to understand his point of view and accept his decisions.

But I'm really having a hard time.

Picture credit.

An Embarassment of Riches

It's hard to say where I am...well, where we are in terms of unity in our marriage. I'm struggling to discern God's design for me. On the one hand, I feel so strongly called to take care of the poor, but on the other, I've already made a commitment to take care of my marriage. I can't help one at the expense of the other.

Last week I ran an experiment. My husband and I had both watched the 60 Minutes documentary on Darfur, and we discovered that we fundamentally disagreed as to whether there was money in our budget for a donation. Rather than argue about whether we could afford it, I asked him what we could sacrifice. After some thought, he replied that he didn't want to make any sacrifices right now.

"You're kidding, right?"

"I know my limitations," he replied.

I was at a loss. We've had this discussion so many times and never get anywhere with it. So I simply said, "I'll find the money." And we went to bed. As I lay there praying and thinking, wondering how I could find an extra $100 without having the family sacrifice anything, it occurred to me that I spend $106 every week on groceries. (I don't really know how that number comes about; it just happens to be the total every time the cashier rings me up.)

I wondered...could I go a whole week without grocery shopping? What did we have? There was ground beef in the freezer, a cornish hen from when I bought three and only two would fit in the crock pot at a time, some homemade chicken soup I'd frozen months ago, a head of broccoli, some green beans, 1/2 an eggplant, a red pepper or two, a bag of carrots, a couple onions, 6 eggs and plenty of rice, beans, condiments, pasta and spices. Would it last a week?

I realized right away I'd have to buy something. Every morning my husband has a bowl of cereal with banana, and every afternoon he has an apple with peanut butter. I'd have to buy milk, apples and peanut butter or he would definitely feel that he was sacrificing. And the point was to do something for Darfur without affecting my family. Ideally, I would come to him after a week and say, "I didn't grocery shop this week. We did okay, didn't we? How about we give the money we saved to Darfur?"

I don't know whether to characterize it as hard or not. It was different. Almost immediately, I started to run out of things. Chili powder. Butter. Flour. Onions. Sugar. Eggs. Tomatoes. We'd invited guests for dinner on Friday night, so I had to entertain in the middle of this whole experiment. Overall, it was a success -- we ate a balanced, healthy, satisfying meal every night and I provided my husband with lunch to take to work every day. We were never hungry. It wasn't until Monday when he ran out of cereal that I brought him in on the whole idea, and he agreed to eat oatmeal for three days until I next went to the store.

I did things I'd never done before, like grate up a broccoli stalk and add it to chicken broth for our lunch. Normally I just throw the stalks out. Instead of cheese and crackers for a midafternoon snack, I popped some corn kernels. I substituted for lots of things I didn't have and tried new recipes when my usual ones wouldn't work. The thing that struck me the most was how much of my time I spent worrying about food, and how diligent I was at conserving it. I sat down at the start of the week and took stock of everything we had to plan out the menu. It didn't allow for any deviation. Monday's meal was crock pot beef bourguignon with a handful of green beans and the remaining 1/2 bag of egg noodles. So I couldn't touch any of that until Monday, even though Sunday's dinner could have used it.

And in so many ways, God provided. I'd planned to attend a prayer rally at my church on Saturday night. They advertised a "light supper" in between the 5:30 Mass and the speaker, so I planned it into our week. No cooking Saturday night. We'd just make do with whatever they served. Hot dogs? Pasta salad? Cheese and fruit? I hoped it'd be enough to satisfy our family and count as a meal. To my astonished delight, the Indonesian community at our parish prepared a feast for us. We had skewered chicken with peanut satay sauce, beef and vegetable crepes, rice with sweet soy sauce, salad, meatball soup, and cupcakes for desert. Not just enough food...bountiful, delicious, remarkable food. I was so grateful to God I nearly cried.

We only made it through the week, of course, because we had so much food already in the house. I think more than anything, it turned out to be a statement about how blessed we are. Even when my fridge is empty, my cupboards are still full. If we had to, we could have gone on longer, but at that point we would definitely have been compromising the nutritional content of our dinners.

Yet the success of the week wasn't the whole point of the experiment. Overarching the entire thing was my hope that it would set up another dialogue with my husband about giving to charity and where that fits into our lives. On that front, the week was less than successful.

When we talked about it, my husband agreed we could give $100 to Darfur. I'm grateful for that, and encouraged by it. But I don't know where we go from here. It's not like any time I want to give to charity I can just stop grocery shopping for a week. Besides the fact that it requires considerable reserves (and the intervention of my parish's Indonesian community) my husband doesn't consider it "saved money." To him, there is no difference between spending $50 on a skirt and spending $40 on a skirt then giving $10 to charity. We're out $50. I can't argue with his math, obviously, because that's fact. But to me, if our budget allows $50 for clothing, then buying something on sale should allow us to spend the extra on something else. Charity, for instance.

Without taking paragraphs and paragraphs to detail our fruitless, circular discussions, I'll just say that my husband feels the only things we should be spending money on right now are necessary items. However, he and I disagree on what constitutes a necessary item. In the interest of unity, and for the sake of my marriage, I want to resolve this in a way that makes both of us happy. I know we are a partnership, and therefore I can't force him to do something he doesn't want to do, but is it right for him to prevent me from the exercise of my faith?

Because that's what this is. God calls all of us to care for the poor. Stewardship is as much a requirement of my faith as Mass attendance and adherence to the doctrines of the Church. I don't know what the middle ground may be, but I know in my heart that it's not right for me to simply give up. I'm praying about this, asking God to help me discern what is pride and what is truth, for Mary and St. Elizabeth of Hungary to intercede for me, for Christ (who showed unflagging love and consideration for the poor while he was on Earth) to show me His way, and for the Holy Spirit to guide my words. I trust that God will find a way and give me the strength to follow it.

Unity in the midst of Strife

A conversation I had with a friend of mine the other day has me thinking about unity; specifically: the unity of a married couple where one partner disagrees with the other on a matter of moral responsibility.

Specifically: my marriage, in which my husband and I disagree on the manner in which we should spend our money.

I started this blog to track my efforts to do more for the poor in my everyday life, but I haven't been posting so much about the main struggle that I'm encountering. My husband is a good man, highly ethical, supportive and a good provider. We make a perfect match, actually, because he is pragmatic while I am idealistic. As I told him the other day "Together you and I make a good person." Without him, we would be in fantastical debt. Our bills might not be paid. Our children's future would be entirely unsecured. We certainly wouldn't have a house without his responsible stewardship of our credit rating.

But he does not think we can afford to give anything to charity at the moment. In the past, when I've come to him with a certain cause I want to contribute to, he has agreed on the condition that we cut back on something we're currently paying for. My Netflix subscription, for example, was canceled so we would have money to give the Archdiocese of Chicago for their annual campaign.

In general, I think his method is both morally and financially sound. I don't need a Netflix subscription (good bye, dear historical romances.) I feel much better about giving money to my church than spending it on entertainment. But as of right now, there's nothing more we can chip away at to find extra money. We're living frugally and responsibly. So if we want to give to charity (which I do) we have to start giving up the things we need to share with others.

The paint is an example. I want to give equal the amount we've just spent on painting our house to refugees from the Darfur conflict. So I suggested that instead of painting the rest of the walls this weekend, which we had planned to do, we wait another month so we have money to give to Darfur. To put it simply, I was met with resistance.

And this is my quandary. I don't have any money of my own. Neither does my husband. The money he makes at his job, we share. The money I've made, we share. We are a unit, a partnership, and neither of us can act unilaterally.

Yet what to do when my conscience urges me to spend in a way that he disagrees with? How much say should one partner have over the other's spending habits, especially in a marriage where we trust each other to make responsible financial decisions for the general good of our family?

As a Catholic, I know that my marriage is a vocation. It is through it that I am called to serve God. Subsuming my own desires for the sake of my marriage is absolutely necessary, even when those desires aren't directed for my own benefit. My mother has counseled me numerous times to simply leave the issue alone, to serve the poor in non-monetary ways. For the most part, I try to do this. But I am called so strongly to do something for the poorest of the poor, particularly in Africa where my heart has always been drawn.

Moreover, I know that we DO have money to give to charity. It is important for me to decorate our house and create a welcoming place for us to live, just like it is important for me to send my son to Montessori, to give him the best start possible in his education. Yet when it comes right down to it, neither of these things are so necessary that if my husband were to lose his job tomorrow, we wouldn't immediately stop spending money on them. There is money in our budget for Darfur, if we are creative and willing to sacrifice.

Yet if one partner is not willing to make that sacrifice, then what?

I'm attempting something this week which can be characterized as courageous or deceitful, depending on how you look at it. My hope is that it's courageous, and when I share my experiment with my husband, I hope he'll see it that way, too. I ask for your prayers as we work through this division, and for our future together. If anyone wishes to share their insight on unity in a marriage, believe me, I'm all ears!

I get my sinning started first thing in the morning.

I'm trying to convince myself I don't need a bath mat. Why is it so hard not to spend money? I mean, I obviously am spending money. I bought my son a bike helmet at Target on Monday. I would have bought myself a round pail with a locking lid for my daughter's dirty diapers on Tuesday, but I can't seem to find a store that carries one. Today I dropped $100 at the grocery store for a week's worth of groceries. These are things I need, so I have to buy them. I don't have to buy myself a bath mat. We have an old towel on the floor which absorbs excess water just fine. It looks kind of jenky, as my sister would say, but it works.

So why do I look at it every morning and think to myself, "Man, I want a bath mat"? Why can't I just get over it and accept that I'm not going to buy the bath mat?

I'm also struggling with a desire for accolades. I want my husband to say something like, "Tienne, I've noticed how you're trying to save our family money by not buying a bath mat for the bathroom. I think it shows your strength of will and commitment to your ideals, and I'm proud of you."

This isn't going to happen for a bunch of reasons, primarily because my husband would just never say something like that and also because I haven't talked to anyone about this blog or what I'm trying to do. So it's doubly futile to hope for some kind of verbal acknowledgment or praise.

And I shouldn't need it. I mean, I'm not doing this for the accolades. I'm doing it because I think it's right.

So why do I feel disgruntled that I'm not being verbally stroked for my efforts?

I think it reflects just how difficult it is to be countercultural. As a faithful Catholic and natural living advocate, I ought to be used to this experience. In college, I used to respond to guys expressing interest with a flat "Just so you know, I'm a good Catholic. I don't have sex." And I have received a few indulgent smirks when revealing that I don't believe in punishing my kids or that a hospital is one of the worst places to have a baby.

It's amazing to me, though, how virulent the hostility can be to the idea that we don't have the right to spend our money however we want it. Of all the norms in our society, money may be one of the most untouchable and entrenched. People simply DO NOT want to admit that there's a moral component to the way they spend money, or that they have an obligation to people outside their family circle.

I mentioned at dinner one holiday ago that we Americans have an obligation to take care of the world because we are so incredibly rich. One of my relatives immediately piped up, "Well, not me! I'm totally broke." I replied, "You have a house with running water and a television. Your kids are well fed and educated. They have toys. You have more outfits than there are days in a month. Compared to the rest of this world, you and your kids are living like kings." But I could see that she completely disagreed with me -- in her mind, she was poor because she still had to think about money. She still had to plan where it went, save for the things she wanted, and worry about having enough for the things she needed.

I think the culture of our society has such a skewed perception of "rich" because we rarely see the truly poor. The Heritage Foundation posted a study a few years ago that studied poverty in America, and found that

Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrigerator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry and he had sufficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs.

There are people in need in this country, of course, people who are homeless, or going without food so their children can eat, or unable to pay their heating bills, or working in unsafe and toxic conditions. In fact, America has the widest gap between rich and poor in the world. But the average person who qualifies for assistance in America is better off than an upper class person in a developing nation. Small wonder, then, that we can't see how rich we are, if that's who we classify as poor.

And it's not just wealth that places us so far above the rest of the world. The advances in technology that we enjoy as a matter of course are so remarkable that they would be beyond the imagination of even a rich American of the previous century. As the Futurist has famously stated:

Consider John D. Rockefeller, a name nearly synonymous with wealth. At one point he had a net worth as high as 1/65th of US GDP at that time, a figure that would be the equivalent of $190 Billion today - four times what Bill Gates currently has. He owned land, employed people, and had political clout that would seem extraordinary at any time in history. But, having died in 1937 at the age of 98, Rockefeller never had photographs of his childhood, never watched a color film, never flew in a jet engine airplane, and never saw a photograph of the Earth taken from space. If Rockefeller wished to travel from New York to Chicago, it took him and his entourage more than a day. If his servant cut him during a morning shave (or even if he did it himself), a cloth bandage was the only kind available. His underwear did not have elastic, and since no cohort of servants could have realistically alleviated that problem for him, he probably spent every day accustomed to irritating hassles that would be unacceptable to even the poorest Americans today. He couldn’t have even obtained a tube of mint-gel toothpaste or a can of chilled Coca-Cola from a soda machine.

Just as I'm struggling to imagine how my mother went her whole childhood without central air or forced heat, most of us can't imagine living without a refrigerator or running water. These things are so natural to us, so ingrained in our lifestyles, that an existence without them is simply incomprehensible. How DO the 33 million people currently living in refugee camps survive? The conditions are brutal, and that's not even counting the emotional turmoil, the grief of losing family members, the stigma of interracial rape, the threat of continued violence, the adjustment to having lost a limb, etc etc etc.

In light of all this, how can I possibly step out of my hot, clean, wonderful shower, a luxury unattainable by the vast majority of this world's inhabitants, and fret about a BATH MAT? And then fret that no one is complimenting me for not buying one?

My selfishness is mind-boggling.

Picture credit.

Q & A

What is all this exactly?

Take the Poor With You is a way of thinking, mostly centered around awareness of the many people in this world who are much less privileged than I. When I am aware, I am grateful. When I'm grateful, I want to give back. My goal is to always be thinking globally, so that everything I do benefits the world instead of just myself.


What does that mean in practical terms?


The general guidelines are explained best in the "Three Rs to Remember" post. Basically, I am trying to reduce my consumption and live more simply, support companies that are responsible to the poor, and balance my spending on myself with donations to charities.


Why not just sell everything and go live on a commune in Africa?

Some people are called to that vocation. Others are called to support them. Jesus called us all to be His disciples, but He only called twelve to leave their families and walk with Him as He proclaimed the Gospel. In my vocation as a wife and mother, in my location in America, in my own capacity and with the talents God has given me, I want to do as much for the poor as I can. So while taking care of my family and providing a loving, God-centered home, I'm trying to live simply, be responsible with my money and time, and donate where I can to assist those who are directly ministering to the poor.


Is this some sort of religious thing?

I am a devout Catholic. Everything I am and everything I do will be impacted by my faith. Take the Poor With You is not about religion, it is about love. For some, the two are synonomous, but you don't need to be a Christian to understand that there are those who need our help, and we are morally bound to provide it if we can.


I work hard for my money. Why should I give it away?

If hard work were the only requirement for wealth and prosperity, then most of the world's rich people would be poor and most of the poor would be rich. The real disparity is not in effort, but in opportunity. So if we've been blessed with opportunities and talents, it's our responsibility first to make good use of them, and then to turn around and share them with others. That means building schools, providing food and humanitarian aid, working for justice and democracy, promoting fair trade and international business ethics, working to cure and prevent deadly diseases and ensuring that basic human rights are met in every country around the world.

If everyone adopted this method our economy would tank. We need motivated workers for businesses to succeed and active spending to support commercial enterprise. Living "simply" and giving to charity sound like good ideas in theory, but people just won't work as hard if there's no benefit for them.

There's plenty of benefit. It's the difference between enough and too much. Imagine a restaurant with two tables. The first is piled high with food: omletes, salad, roast beef, smoked salmon, honey glazed ham, onion rings, green beans almondine, spinach pies, bread of all kinds, drinks of all kinds. The people at that table are eating, laughing, talking with their friends, pushing back from the table and rubbing their stomachs. "Oh, I ate too much!" "I'm so full!" The other table has nothing but bread. Does it make sense for the first table to call out for dessert and tip the waitress to add extra chocolate sauce, when they are already so full they can't sit comfortably? Does it really matter in this scenario who has money and who doesn't? Will the restaurant go under if the first table buys a decent meal for the other table instead of ordering dessert?


The purpose of money is to buy things. Of course. But it's what we buy, why we buy it, and for whom that matters.



But you're taking things too far. Your posts sound like you consider it wrong to buy a chai at Starbucks. Shouldn't you enjoy life once in a while?

I think there's room for a discussion on why we enjoy buying things so much. We truly do not need most of the things we own. So why do we buy them? To impress our neighbors? To feel the pride of ownership? To soothe an anxiety or distract us from a worry? Simply because we can? Why do I want that chai latte? It isn't the caffine fix. I can spend 7 minutes boiling water for tea at home and it would jolt my system in the exact same way, and for pennies. A treat from Starbucks fills a desire in a specific way that homemade tea or free office coffee does not. THAT'S what we're buying. Starbucks, for the most part, treats their employees well and offers fair trade varieties of their coffee, so I'm not saying we shouldn't support Starbucks! I am saying that we cling to our rituals and our freedom to spend frivolously for the wrong reasons.


Of course we should enjoy ourselves once in a while. God is a loving father who wants to provide us with good things and see us happy. But we can think before buying that chai: is there someone who needs this money more than I? Can I buy a tall instead of a grande and donate the difference? Can I get a plain coffee instead of an iced frapuccino with caramel swirl and donate the difference? Can I donate the same amount I'm spending to charity? Can I go without coffee today and strengthen my will? How can I take the poor with me, right here, right now, and make a difference that matters?


And that's the point.

Accountability

Jennifer F. brought up a great point that I've been meaning to post about for a while :

...what is the best source for finding out which charitable organizations are reputable? How did you know, for example, that Heifer.org actually does what they say they do?

This is really important. If we're dedicating ourselves to improving the lot of the poor around the world, then accountability is essential. I want to give to a reputable organization whose purposes are in line with mine. And I want it run by someone innovative and intelligent who listens to the poor and works WITH them to give them what they need. I want to support an organization with a superb track-record and a history of success, as well as one whose finances are cross checked by certifying agencies.

In short, I want my contribution to really do something, not just ease my conscience by assuring me that "At least I tried."

The best way to help the poor, of course, is to give of ourselves by volunteering. Soup kitchens, Goodwill, Meals on Wheels, visiting the sick or elderly or imprisoned...there are countless ways to serve the poor in every neighborhood. DoSomething.org has a volunteer page where you can enter your zip and find a list of volunteer opportunities right in your area. No need for accountability here; we know because we perform the acts ourselves.

But the poor aren't just in our own communities. Take the Poor with You really entails thinking about the global community, and many of our decisions have an impact that goes far beyond our immediate area, or even beyond the borders of our nation. Reading the stickers and tags on the goods I bring into my house reveals a diversity of geographical locations. Coffee from Kenya. Cotton from Egypt. Tea from India. Copper from Chile. Plastics from China. If my lifestyle and choices are impacting people all over the world, then I should help people all over the world, too.

And those in other countries are often deprived not only of the material goods we enjoy, but the philosophical blessings we take for granted: freedom, rule of law, education, the possibility of employment, the right to life, the right to worship, etc. I can't help them by myself; it takes a network of trained professionals just to reach the poor, let alone help them.

The good news is that there are many groups serving the world's poorest populations. The US alone has 1.3 million charitable organizations! Going back to Jen's question now: how can we know which ones are reputable? We've all read about organizations that diverted funds earmarked for a disaster to other programs, or worse, charities that turned out to be frauds. Responsible stewardship necessitates being careful about spending, even when we're not spending it on ourselves.

One place to start is with one of the many watchdog groups that rate charities and provide that information to the public. It's important to keep in mind, as this article states, that every watchdog group has its own criteria, and it may or may not be in line with your own. Moreover, the rules governing what a charity must disclose and how it must categorize it aren't hard and fast (with good reason: there are so many different charities and various ways of operating that it's nearly impossible to come up with a black and white set of rules that can apply to everyone.) So ratings change from year to year and watchdog to watchdog. Some of this confusion can be ameliorated by knowing what's most important to you in your charity: is it the source of income? Efficiency in response? Low percentage of administrative costs? Program effectiveness? etc etc.

One of the best watchdog/ratings sites is the American Institute of Philanthropy, which has a "Top Rated" list of organizations broken down into easily searchable categories. Charities must achieve a B+ or better on AIP's criteria to qualify for the list. Their full compilation of charities and ratings is only in print form, but for those of us who are inclined to buy one, a sample copy is only $3.

My favorite site is the American Council for Voluntary International Action (InterAction for short.) I worked there after college and learned to highly respect its efforts and ethics. InterAction aims to coordinate the efforts of US-based non-governmental organizations and advocate for an increase in global humanitarian aid. It ensures minimum standards for every one of their 160 members, many of whom are at the forefront of the humanitarian community. It's my quick-check: if an organization is a member of Interaction, it's legit, responsible and progressive.

InterAction is limited to organizations that focus on global humanitarian aid, but Charity Navigator lists and rates organizations of all kinds. You can search by category, name or rating, and save your favorites in My Charities. Their articles are worth perusing, and I found an interesting study that assessed giving trends by US city. Denver isn't doing so well!

If you prefer to do your own research, start at the Independent Sector, which has complied a list of standards so you can browse through and see exactly what sort of guidelines an organization (such as Catholic Charities) operates under. This site is especially helpful for those of us who care about the specifics of an organization's operations. As a Catholic, it's very important to me that the charity I assist does not act against the moral principles of my faith. In addition, IS's list of publications contains fascinating studies on giving and volunteering as well as recommendations for how charities can serve as more responsible stewards of the public's generosity.

Finally, Give.org has detailed financial, administrative and program information on every charitable organization that operates in the US. If you want to see the exact breakdown of a charity's income and expenses, this is the site. It's also enables you to rate charities on your own criteria, giving you access to much of the same information that the watchdog groups use.

Take heart! Despite the bad apples, many charities are responsible and do excellent work. With a little research and a discerning eye, we can feel confident that our money is being well spent.