I have literally been told at tithing audit (ok I'll use your eupehmism, tithing settlement), that NOT PAYING 10% of GROSS IS STEALING FROM GOD. "HE MADE US FREE, AFTERALL, IT'S ONLY THROUGH OUR SIN THAT TAXES ARE SO HIGH."
I will publicly take issue with your assertion that you didn't even spend 30 hours a week on Bishopric duties. By the time you honestly add up the LDS required Monday night family home evening lesson and preparation time, tuesday night young women's supervision and do not contact list visits, wednesday night young men's supervision and regular home teaching visits, thursday night nursery supervision and Relief society function supervision and temple recommend interviews, friday night bishopric meeting and designated missionary dinner night and couples geneology library work night, saturday stake Bishopric training / young women's camp / scout camp supervision / primary activity, and a 12-15 hour marathon on Sunday starting with ward bishopric meeting, ward council meeting, high priest council meeting, sacrament meeting, two hours of assigned sunday school supervision, counting / accounting / depositing of tithes / fast offerings / missionary fund offerings / SEPARATE humanitarian fund offerings, followed by nearly endless calls from members in some kind of need, liek the ones who request food from the bishop's storehouse which require a "worthiness" interview in which they are told no if they haven't paid a FULL TITHING ON THIER GROSS INCOME. now let's not forget the Temple work, Baptisms for the dead, annointings and endowments for the dead, and now the new edict to organize and supervise a four hour cleaning session on the building by 20 people on saturday afternoon because the fortune 50 sized corporation of the president doesn't want to pay janitors, ETC, ETC, ETC.
Sir, I question your ability to add, honesty, or both. Of course I know there must be slackers in the LDS Bishoprics, but I can tell you of a certainty that 30-50 hours a week on top of full time work, college (in my case), and family is to be expected.
If it wasn't based on fraud it would be one thing, but some of us took that temple recommend interview question about fulfilling our "callings" seriously.
Maybe God has relaxed those requirements in the ~4 years I have been out, when Harry Reid calls Ezra Taft benson an extremist in front of the BYU faculty and staff then later brags about holding a temple recommend I do wonder...
Yes, and I pay one-tenth (10%) of my net income. That is what the Lord has given me. (The rest He allows the government to take.)
Now, if someone wants to give 10% of his gross income, that is his business. The bishop is not supposed to question how any member calculates his or her tithing.
I have literally been told at tithing audit (ok I'll use your eupehmism, tithing settlement) . . .
The proper terminology is "tithing settlement," not "tithing audit." (Have you been away from the LDS Church so long that you have forgotten?)
The difference between a settlement and an audit is no mere euphemism. Audits are mandatory. An tithing audit would be a careful, methodical examination of one's financial records to verify compliance.
Tithing settlement is entirely voluntary. If a member chooses to participate, he is not asked to show the bishop anything. The member declares whether he considers himself a full tithe payer; the bishop is not to question such a declaration.
I will publicly take issue with your assertion that you didn't even spend 30 hours a week on Bishopric duties.
A bishop who personally does all of the things you listed is doing it wrong. Perhaps you have forgotten, but the bishop is supposed to call others to do much of the work.
Sir, I question your ability to add, honesty, or both. Of course I know there must be slackers in the LDS Bishoprics, but I can tell you of a certainty that 30-50 hours a week on top of full time work, college (in my case), and family is to be expected.
I am not deficient in mathematics, and I try to tell the truth; so perhaps I was one of the slackers. Or perhaps you are not as knowledgeable as you claim about the workings of the LDS church.