I posted an article on the shrinking of the middle class as an increasing number of people are falling into the category of low-income. “Squeezed by rising living costs a record number of Americans – nearly 1 in 2 – have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income.” While I did not say much about the article I did say “Is it un-Christian of me to doubt these numbers?” A Facebook friend responded to me with a private message to voice his disagreement with my obvious bias. Out of that has come an interesting exchange from our different – but not opposite…

My friend asked me why I was not writing a piece on Christmas. Well for all the reasons so many use to support their own reservations about Christmas – crass commercialism mind-numbing jingles exhausting rounds of parties and social events and yes a proliferation of blogs about the true meaning of Christmas I have taken the easy way out. I don’t like that but it’s easier – until this year. Leigh Vickery our editor at The Gathering published one of Luci Shaw’s poems and I’ve read and reread it because for me it captures the essence and the riddle of Christmas. How can One who “hurled a universe” be compressed…

Question: Fred we are just getting started with our foundation. I am interested in learning how other foundations meeting the IRS requirements of obtaining statements of good standing and the most recent letter of determination with the organizations the foundation chooses to support. What steps do others take to make sure they are always in compliance? Is there any way to verify this information? Thank you for your time and effort to reply. It is appreciated.   Thank you for responding to “Ask Fred” on the website.  Here are starting points:  1.  Proposal cover letter from the Chief Executive Officer to include:  endorsement of the proposal explaining how it relates to…

One of my favorite books is Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I’m sure that’s so because I like his premise that some decisions and appraisals made quickly are more accurate than those made after deliberation. Having said that I don’t like to find books that challenge that! Unfortunately that is what Daniel Kahneman does in Thinking Fast and Slow. Most of us (and especially those of us who consider ourselves intuitive) have what he calls “cognitive illusions”. This is a false belief that we intuitively accept as true. While we think we make good decisions on our own experience or our ability to judge situations we actually have a poor record…

The Boston Globe article “Why We Give” I wrote about in the previous blog made me curious about Deborah Small at The Wharton School. It turns out she has done quite a bit of research on charity and why people give…or don’t. One of her papers is titled, “The Face of Need: Facial Emotion Expression on Charity Advertisements.” Maybe it’s just me but I found the results fascinating. Did you know: Pictures showing sad faces are far more capable of producing similar states of sympathetic sadness than pictures of happy faces can create happiness on the part of the viewer. A phenomenon known as “emotion contagion” occurs when people pick…

An article titled “Why we give to charity” in the Boston Globe caught my eye last week.     “What we find is that when people are thinking more deliberatively . . . they end up being less generous overall ” said Deborah Small an associate professor of marketing and psychology at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Is it possible to be both generous and smart about it? A lot of donors would like to think so but new research suggests that it may be harder than we realize. And while there may be things we can do to make sure our money doesn’t end up wasted charity appears to be one area where…

Part of my Dad’s ability to communicate with people was his use of aphorisms. When I was a young man I thought he either read them heard them from others or they just appeared spontaneously as he spoke. “Wait to worry” “Only criticize as much as the person can correct” and “It’s unfortunate when money accumulates faster than wisdom” were among the hundreds of one-liners we heard growing up. I never thought about the real source of those one-liners until late in his life. We were sorting through his papers and found a stock certificate for 100 shares that were practically worthless. They were all that was left of what…

I love the martial arts choreography in movies like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. I asked a black belt friend how he hardened his hands for real (not staged) competition. It seemed simple enough. Set up a five-gallon bucket of white rice and punch your hands in it 10-12 times in a row five times a day. When that no longer hurts use a five-gallon bucket of dry beans for several weeks and then graduate to five gallons of sand.  While it takes time to become hardened it is a simple process. My martial arts friend cautioned me “Be careful. The process is irreversible once the calluses are there….and you could…

I think ironies make life interesting unless they become cause for cynicism. One of those ironies is our spending a full day of thanksgiving with our attention on gratitude and blessings whole families volunteering to feeding the poor at the Salvation Army or a homeless shelter and so far the retail industry has not figured out a way to turn the focus to presents cards and extravagance – other than food. Still a whole population of shoppers cannot be content with a day of rest and a consumer economy counting on a 24 hour splurge for 40% of their annual revenue cannot allow more than a single day to celebrate…

Last week I attended the annual three day Faith Angle Conference conceived and hosted by Michael Cromartie the Vice President at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.  He also directs the Evangelicals in Civic Life program as well as having served on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom from 2006-2010.  (http://eppc.org/scholars/scholarid.10/scholar.asp).  It’s my good fortune that Mike invites me to sit on the “outer circle” of observers who are there to listen but not contribute to the discussion – except during the meals and breaks!  Every year has different themes and speakers but the format is consistent.  Three presenters make remarks and then the invited journalists and scholars are…