Church Finances: Follow the Prophet, He has the Money

Hinckley made it clear that the church doesn’t share financial statements because the information belongs to those who made the contribution. Since 1959, Church finances have not been disclosed to the public, and we can see that church leaders have actively tried to hide finances from the public. Even so, there are disclosures that can be surmised and deduced by diligently looking, as one site, the Widow’s mite, has done. They disclose the Mormon Billions which have been discovered as well as many other reports and studies related to LDS Church finances.

Past church leaders reminded members as they enforced payments of tithes to the church that the church wouldn’t require the tithing forever. And a clever ellipsis is used in lesson manuals today to persuade members that past leaders taught that everyone should pay tithing when in reality, they only wanted donations from a member “who has means”.

LDS Church has in reserves at least $32 Billion. Has stated "we expect to see the day when we will not have to ask you for one dollar of donation for any purpose, except that which you volunteer to give of your own accord, because we will have tithes sufficient in the storehouse of the Lord to pay everything that is needful for the advancement of the kingdom of God." Joseph F Smith. — “We expect to see the day when we will not have to ask you for one dollar of donation for any purpose, except that which you volunteer to give of your own accord, because we will have tithes sufficient in the storehouse of the Lord to pay everything that is needful for the advancement of the kingdom of God.” Joseph F Smith
https://missedinsunday.com/memes/finances/tithes-sufficient/

Church Humanitarian Spending

Oaks shed some light on the church’s humanitarian giving in 2016. He spoke of church welfare work and claimed that it spent 40 Million each year on this work.

In 2016, Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said that each year The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spends about $40 million on welfare, humanitarian and other LDS Church-sponsored projects around the world and has done so for more than 30 years. — In 2016 Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said that each year The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spends about $40 million on welfare, humanitarian and other LDS Church-sponsored projects around the world and has done so for more than 30 years.

In the year 2015 we had 177 emergency response projects in 56 countries. In addition, we had hundreds of projects that impacted more than a million people in seven other categories of assistance, such as clean water, immunization, and vision care. For more than 30 years the magnitude of these efforts has averaged about 40 million dollars a year…
The service traditions of our membership give us a resource of committed and experienced volunteers. To translate that into numbers, last year our volunteers donated over 25 million hours of labor in our welfare, humanitarian, and other Church-sponsored projects (this is a total of over 14 million Church service hours by missionaries, nearly 8 million by welfare and humanitarian workers, and over 4 million by welfare work in wards), not counting what our members did privately.
The Complementary Functions of Religion and Government in a Global Setting, Elder Dallin H. Oaks at University of Oxford
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/transcript-elder-oaks-university-oxford

Oaks using the phrase “not counting what our members did privately” indicates that the church counts every hour of labor for church-sponsored projects as part of the overall church efforts. I wonder what value they place on each hour of labor.

Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said that each year The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints spends about $40 million on welfare, humanitarian and other LDS Church-sponsored projects around the world and has done so for more than 30 years.
That would account for approximately $1.2 billion on welfare and humanitarian efforts over the past 30 years. Elder Oaks also said that in the last year alone, Mormon volunteers have devoted 25 million hours of labor.
LDS Church welfare, humanitarian efforts average $40 million per year, apostle says
https://www.deseret.com/2016/7/12/20591934/lds-church-welfare-humanitarian-efforts-average-40-million-per-year-apostle-says

So we can see that between 2016 and 1986, the church donated a total of 1.2 Billion dollars to welfare and humanitarian aid, averaging $40M each year. This likely includes the volunteer labor of members and missionaries in church-sponsored projects.

As we know from whistleblowers from within the church investment company, the church has over $100,000,000,000+ in investments. But the church brags about $40,000,000 in charitable aid for the last 30 years? Is the church paying an honest tithe? Do they give back 10 percent of what they receive? It’s considerably less than 10%, even less than one-tenth of a percent!

It’s even less when we consider that the total donated includes all the combined man-hours from various helping hands projects to clean up and serve people after hurricanes etc. Which isn’t an organization donation, it’s individuals giving of their time and energy to help others. The church capitalizes on volunteer work from members of the church and claims it as its own charitable giving. These volunteers came and often slept in a tent or their truck or best case in the cultural hall of a local church building. They likely fed themselves, but perhaps there were expenses that leaders we able to expense or reimburse from the church. But more often than not, it’s the member’s dime who pays the way.

SEC Settlement

The church was recently fined a massive 5 million dollar fine in a settlement with the SEC for hiding and misrepresenting investments with illegal filing practices. By studying Elder Ballard’s history with the SEC we could reasonably assume they learned a few tricks from him but in the end were still outed by whistleblowers for fraud. The settlement of Five Million sounds like a lot, but in this case, it equates to the amount of money the church earns on investments in just a few minutes. They have been obfuscating investments for decades and in the end, this is a tiny penalty to pay for the massive dishonesty perpetuated upon the nation and all the church members! This settlement shows that the First Presidency knew about these misstatements and intended to hide the money so that members would continue to pay tithing.

"Church leaders were concerned that public knowledge of the fund’s wealth might discourage tithing. Paying tithing is more of a sense of commitment than it is the church needing the money. So they never wanted to be in a position where people felt like they shouldn’t make a contribution.” Roger Clarke, Head of Ensign Peak Advisors | wasmormon.org — “Church leaders were concerned that public knowledge of the fund’s wealth might discourage tithing. Paying tithing is more of a sense of commitment than it is the church needing the money. So they never wanted to be in a position where people felt like they shouldn’t make a contribution.” Roger Clarke, Head of Ensign Peak Advisors

Follow the prophet, follow the prophet, follow the prophet he has the money.

More like Follow the money, follow the money, follow the money, it’s under the management of the first presidency and Ensign Peak Advisors and is hidden in over a dozen shell companies so they can obfuscate their wealth and keep investing millions even if they have to settle for a few million after breaking the law they can keep bragging about the amount of good their donated funds do.

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