Free Republic

The story is told that when Tennessee frontiersman Davy Crockett served in the US Congress (between 1827 and 1835) he voted for a bill appropriating $20,000 for relief for victims of a fire that broke out in Georgetown. When he returned home, a constituent farmer chastised him for supporting the bill and for “giving what is not yours to give.” The farmer told Crockett the constitution does not grant Congress the power to give charity and if it did, “You will very easily perceive what a wide door this would open for fraud and favoritism and corruption, on the one...

I will find you and pay you back. Thank you.

If you enter Amazon's website through this link, you can donate 0.5% of each purchase to the charity of your choice. Mine is the NRA. It bears repeating that this is entirely free....Amazon pays for the donation, not you. A good way to donate if you are going to be doing any Christmas shopping.

In the year 257 AD, the Roman emperor Valerian stepped up the persecution of Christians, especially in the city of Rome itself. The principal targets of his campaign were the clergy and laity who came from the upper classes of Roman society. One of those caught up in Valerian’s persecution was a deacon named Lawrence. Lawrence was in charge of the Church’s property used to support Rome’s poor. Lawrence was offered a deal: in exchange for turning over the property, he would be spared arrest and execution. He agreed, adding that he needed three day to collect the church’s riches....

Aaron Rodgers and David Gruber partner for season three of itsAaron.com. This year Aaron and David are highlighting three amazing organizations who are doing big things for many people. In this episode, Aaron surprises Annie, the creator of Gold In September (GoldInSeptember.org). And together they surprise the entire neighborhood.

I was looking about on the web for information on fundraising groups and came across this site that focuses on groups aiding military veterans.

We’ve known liberals are cheap, miserly (dare I say niggardly?) in their approach to charity which actually requires giving one’s own money away instead of passing laws to force the rest of us to fund charitable causes. Those who followed politics during the embarrassment of the Clinton brothel years remember that Bill Clinton donated his used underwear to charity in order to gain a tax credit. This fits right in with new data on who gives and who does not give. We now have proof that liberals are cheap and conservatives are generous. A recent report from The Chronicle of...

A few weeks ago, I was in New York City to meet someone for drinks, and got on the subway at 34th and 7th to head downtown. I dislike the New York subway for many reasons. It is the only such system in a major Western city to look as if it had been swapped with the metro of a third-world backwater. Pick any otherwise dodgy country on Earth, and chances are the subway of its capital city is a gleaming tube with smooth rolling stock and palatial stations. Not New York. The trains lurch between filthy platforms like...

Last month, the United Nations announced it would need nearly $1 billion to effectively fight the virus, which has killed more than 3,400 people across West Africa since March. If it is not contained, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates there could be hundreds of thousands of Ebola cases in coming months. "Every day we delay, the cost and the suffering will grow exponentially," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said at the time. The United States and other governments have pledged tens of millions of dollars to pay for everything from medicine and protective clothing for aid workers to...

People in the Bay Area gave a smaller percentage of their income to charity than residents of most large cities, according to a study published Monday by the Chronicle of Philanthropy. Among the nation’s largest 50 metro areas, San Francisco and San Jose metro areas ranked 45th and 48th, respectively, in 2012. The only two large cities that ranked below San Jose on the generosity list were Providence, R.I., and Hartford, Conn. Their residents gave just 1.9 percent of income to charity. Among the 50 largest metro areas, the most generous was Salt Lake City, whose residents gave 5.4 percent...

Poor and middle-income Americans are reaching deeper into their pockets when donating to charity, while the nation’s wealthiest are giving less, according to a report by Chronicle of Philanthropy that analyzed taxpayers’ IRS data. On average, Americans give about 3 percent of their income to charity each year, according to the report released Monday. But the giving gap between the rich and poor is significant, especially in view of the widening income gap. The report shows those who earned $200,000 or more donated 4.6 percent less of their income between 2006 and 2012; those who earned less than $100,000 gave...

A prominent animal-rights charity is not a friend of the furry kingdom. Americans love animals, even cats. Eight million stray dogs and cats find their way into animal shelters every year, and the lucky ones are adopted into a warm home with a loving family. Shelters are operated by small charities usually called “humane societies,” whose good deeds are funded by private generosity. The Humane Society of the United States trades on the good of others to finance a radical agenda. In May, the Humane Society and a handful of other radical animal-rights groups had to write a $15.8 million...

Know whether the organization is spending your money in a way that lines up with your beliefs. Fausin Weber, left, and Deacon Brian Edwards of Pope John Paul II High School in Hendersonville, Tenn., participate in the ALS ice bucket challenge on Aug. 22. CNS photo This summer, people from all over the country were dumping buckets of ice water on themselves to raise awareness and money for the ALS Association’s fight against Lou Gehrig’s disease. As the ice bucket challenge became both more widely known and wildly successful through social media, many pro-life advocates were morally conflicted because the...

[...] Satanic ritual? Yes. Rituals abound in “Christian” America. Whenever spectators watch singers like Beyonce, JayZ, Rihanna, Lady Gaga and especially Nicki Minaj, they are indoctrinated and involved with blatantly satanic rituals that stem from the deep abyss of the occult. Some of these very same artists have taken the ALS IBC. Gaga doesn’t utter a word as she baptizes herself, arrayed in a sexy black leotard, sporting black lips, perched in an ornate black chair. Gaga doesn’t use a bucket; she instead uses a large silver bowl associated with pagan worship. Do you think she would take the IBC...

Showing his support for those suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease, the superintendent of Catholic schools for the Cincinnati Archdiocese took part in the ice bucket challenge Aug. 21. Superintendent Jim Rigg was joined by Tom Otten, principal of Elder Catholic High School, on the school’s campus. The challenge has taken the nation by storm to raise money in support of research into the disease, which is formally known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS. ALS is a progressive neurodegenerative disease for which there is no cure and no proven treatments. In the challenge, people are asked to share videos through...

Cases in West Africa's Ebola outbreak this year have risen to 2,240, including 1,229 deaths, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Tuesday, reporting the toll in four countries, including Nigeria. While Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation and No. 1 oil producer, appears to be containing its smaller outbreak, Liberia and Sierra Leone are struggling to halt the spread of the deadly Ebola virus among their populations. On Friday, these small two West African nations and a medical charity chided the WHO for its slow response, saying more action was needed to save victims threatened by the disease and hunger.

One in seven Americans – more than 46 million people, including 12 million children and 7 million seniors – rely on food pantries and meal service programs to feed themselves and their families, according to a new study from Feeding America, a provider of charitable food assistance to low-income Americans. In what Feeding America says is “the largest and most comprehensive study of people seeking food assistance in the United States ever conducted,” more than 60,000 people confidentially answered questions about their personal circumstances. The study represents findings from 200 Feeding America food banks, which annually provide more than 3...

I wonder how the Ebola doctor feels now that his humanitarian trip has cost a Christian charity much more than any services he rendered. What was the point? Whatever good Dr. Kent Brantly did in Liberia has now been overwhelmed by the more than $2 million already paid by the Christian charities Samaritan's Purse and SIM USA just to fly him and his nurse home in separate Gulfstream jets, specially equipped with medical tents, and to care for them at one of America's premier hospitals. (This trip may be the first real-world demonstration of the economics of Obamacare.) There's little...

Everyone who knew Gershon Burd knew he was "a nice guy." He would purposely sit by an entrance to his yeshiva study group so that he could smile at people as they walked in -- but they really had no idea the depths of his goodness until he died last year, on his 40th birthday, in an accident. Testimonies poured in to his wife of 10 years about how he made lives better -- including through the charity he had quietly established to give money away. By only spending the minimum on yourself, you may find that you have...

A Methodist church in West Virginia was stymied in its efforts to help the needy last week when the county health department told them their plan violated state health codes. The parishioners at First United Methodist Church had decided to install a large refrigerator outside their building that those in need could access at any time. Anticipating concerns about food safety, they planned to stock it with only prepackaged food, and built a cage around it to prevent small children from climbing inside. “We just wanted a way for more people to have access to food, along with some privacy...