to think 'Christian Aid' is a religious charity?

[bigmouthstrikesagain]

A woman came to my house this evening to collect a Christian aid envelope that had been posted through our letterbox last week. I looked for it but I think it had gone to the recycling bin and I had no intention of giving any money as

1. I do not give to religious charities I prefer secular.

2. I do not like people coming to my house to ask for money - no matter the ccause - I like to choose when and how to make my donations.

I told the woman this and she made a very sour face and said 'well we are not a religious charity' as I bade her a firm goodnight and shut the door.

I do appreciate that Christian aid are doing there best to help people all over the world in very difficult situations and not just evanglalising to the poor. But they are still imo a religious charity - so I prefer not to donate to them - or Sally Army etc. There are plenty of good works being done by other charities without religious affiliations so I do not have to.

I stuck 1.70 in the envelope and smiled tonight when the lovely lady thanks me for the 3 rd time.

She was far nicer than the rspca monthly directdebit wanter the the other day.

YA definately NBU...plenty of secular charities to give to

Our church goes to the local shelter every Christmas and spends several weeks scrubbing toilets, serving food, chatting to people, etc nothing "religious" about it other than doing what we feel we were called to do, not to mention the donations of money and food we give them. We sponsor a school in Haiti, there are over 60 directly sponsored children (about half the amount as we have people in our church, so some people have more than one per family) again it's about taking responsibility for the world we live in, not being "religious". We're motivated by our faith to do good things that aren't about evangelising, just showing our fruit. As far as I can see Christian Aid is doing exactly the same thing, Christians motivated by their faith to change the world at a very basic level.

My dad used to organise Christian Aid collection in our area. I used to sort out the money - always enjoyed the odd old farthing with a wren on it, or foreign coins ... we had quite a bagful of non-legal tender.

If I had to give to a religious charity this would probably be it - but there are plenty of non-religious ones, and I give to various of those. Also I prefer to give with proper thought rather than to doorsteppers or chuggers.

BTW, offtopic a bit but do any charities actually want odd bits of foreign dosh - we've a few low-denomination rupees that Cooks wont exchange. I'd give those to anyone but from my past experience CA wouldn't have wanted them.

Just done a Google search and there are a few. Oxfam shops apparantly take them. RNIB, Age UK, CPL, Unicef. Any international charity should be able to accept them as they can send it on to the right country.

I wouldn't touch Oxfam with a barge pole, but I do give to Christian Aid, as they believe in life before death, and are one of the charities with the lowest admin costs, so most of your donation goes to those who need it. Their remit is not to evangelise either - it is to help.

They also work as others have said to provide aid and relief to anyone irrespective of the religion or colour of the recipient of the aid. I'd rather give to them ahead of most other charities I could list.

I am a dyed in the wool atheist and I always put something in the envelope in Christian Aid week. It's always the same guy who comes round, sometimes he brings his son. Emptying your change out once a year is nothing, really nothing, and I'd rather do it monthly than have to fend off yet another fucking chugger on our high street!

yes you are eing unreasonable OP - and very petty IMO.

I'm a CA volunteer this year, first time since I was a teenager... this thread has made me nervous about collecting them now!

Whats the best intro? Was thinking 'Hello, I'm the Christian Aid volunteer, here to collect your envelope please' to make it clear I'm not a chugger...

I'm not particularly religious, not a church goer, and hate cold callers, but I do have a soft spot for Christian Aid. Not even quite sure why - I think it was because the lovely lady who used to collect every year when I was a child had such a kind face.

I also have a relative who collects envelopes and I remember it being a standard way my parents gave some money to charity. I'm not religious myself and give more despite it being 'Christian' Aid, rather than because of it, but I'm perfectly happy to have it as one of the various ways I give to charity.

It would probably irritate me beyond belief if a chirpy irritating student who was on commission popped up at my door to collect the envelopes - knowing it's a local volunteer makes all the difference. It makes me feel like I'm joining in an ordinary local collection for a good cause, rather than being targeted by marketing people or chuggers. Being manipulated bothers me a lot more than Christian Aid week even though I can be a hard-line secularist at times.

I think OP you should have just said no thank you, I prefer to give to chariety in other ways, with a nice friendly smile, instead of picking out the religious aspect to be sniffy about with the collector.

My ex-H did some volunteering through CA in Cambodia, and although there was no direct direct religious conversion involved, you didn't get help with housing or food if you didn't convert to christianity. I certainly wouldn't give to these folks after what I have heard. Action Aid is truly non-religious and is very very careful about how they spend their money. I much rather donate to them if i ever get around to doing it.

The poor woman on your doorstep probably didn't know very much. One thing Christian Aid does is raise money through Parishes, so it get volunteers from local churches to collect money from people in their street. So unlike committed volunteers or those paid employees who accost you in the High Street, they are not necessarily very well trained or experienced.
If you don't like Christian Aid give to Oxfam or another of the disasters emergency charities.

CHristian Aid, like Cafod, do an amazing job. In some parts of Africa there would be no hospitals or schools if it weren't for them.

YANBU I can't believe she tried to argue with you that christian aid is not a religious charity!

I also give to non-religious organisations, you can't be too careful with this sort of thing.

Interestingly there is are "no cold calling" signs up on our streets (official ones on the pavement with the number for the local police) and Christian Aid are amongst the few organisations who see themselves as exempt from this instruction.

OP...I don't think you have enough to do with your time...perhaps some volunteering for a secular charity...?

I'm athiest but always give to ChristianAid because I've read about the good they do and I like that its volunteers & not 'chuggers'. Collectors here are really nice & polite.

Are you sure it was Christian Aid Mad, and not Cafod?

She did a face because you were being rude, and she did not expect that. You were in a roundabout way criticizing her, her choices, her belief, the voluntary work she was doing. You did not have to do that. You did not have to "justify" it either. You could have said a simply "sorry" and smiled, and closed the door, but oh no, you had to go further. YOU had to evangelize to HER. Get that!

But, Christian Aid is a religious charity in that it is run by Christian people. It is not a religious charity in the sense that they only do missionary work, and evangelize, and collect money to spread the gospel.

It is a shame that ignorance and religious intolerance would stop you from helping worthy causes. But it is your choice what charities you support of course, but you dont have to be rude and smug about it.

I don't mind charities like this who simply put an envelope through the letter box that you can put a few quid in or whatever. What I resent is Chuggers. On the high street is bad enough but I've had 3 different charities come knock on my door, asking me for my bank details and to commit to donating a set amount each month. Plain bloody cheeky imo. I'm not handing over details like that to a sodding stranger, are they mad?

YANBU - guy knocked at my door t'other night - told him I had recycled envelope and he offered me another - said I didn't want to donate. He was very nice about it and called DD a lovely little boy . It's up to you who you give to and woman could've just accepted your reasoning. I don't give to religious charities either, ever. Is my choice.

quint - Saying 'I don't give to religious charites' is the reason OP didn't give - why should she say 'sorry' instead - no need to be sorry for making a choice based on own beliefs.

@ Scary, I remember the name but they were working in conjunction with another Christian NGO, so either could be to blame.

For those of you who are collectors are you not given a briefing or a set of FAQs or something? I generally say 'no thankyou I don't give to religious charitities' and they say OK.

It would seem this lady was having to make it up as she went along.

I don't give to religious charities, because I think aid should be evidence based and accountable to it's beneficiaries and I don't think adding god to the mix helps with that. ButI do shop in my local Childrens Society charity shop, which I suppose is a bit hypocritical.

I can't remember who said it upthread but % admin costs is not a good way to judge charities. It assumes that they work like humanitarian versions of Western Union, transfering cash to people in need. In general they don't work like that. You need to look at what they do, their impacts and value for money. Low admin costs is not a good proxy for effective operations, and is too easily manipulated.

Shelterbox which was also mentioned seems like a wholely inefficient way to give aid - paying for boxed of stuff to be assembled and stockpiled in Devon to be sent out. Aid workers and logisticiand in the field would get a better deal buying locally or direct from China where most stuff is made nowdays.

I, and the rest of the Youth Group did the CA collection one year - no briefing, but that was a long time ago. If I'd been asked if it was a religious charity it wouldn't have occurred to me to say anything other than 'Yes, of course'. We certainly didn't argue the point if people didn't want to give anything - it would so obviously have been rude.