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It's the control over that sum of money and power that is intoxicating.

The assets not under their name does not matter. Just like politicians, they have wast control and power.

> Members willingly donate as an act of faith.

And I admire them for that just as much as I admire Evangelical TV-pastors and pyramid scheme marketers. Mormonism was invented by a conman, so it's not surprise that they are good cowmen.




The problem with that perspective is that there isn't a 'career ladder' here.

You don't volunteer for any position within the LDS church, you are 'called,' so if you happen to be pulled into the higher echelons, it isn't because you've followed your inner Wolf of Wall Street, but that your selfless service (i.e. no money or other reward) has been noticed and seen as a likely good candidate for even more selfless service of serving even more hours unrewarded.

There just aren't many people with a money or power motivated personality that would bother, and again, even if one had ambitions that way, there isn't a job application somewhere in the chain that gets you there.

Money in the Church is a spin-off of a highly educated membership (a large number of members, for instance, donate stock that they've gotten through work, and donate when it is at a much higher price than granted by their work,) with a large base in North America, that ended up with literally more money than they could spend based on their remit- that tithes goes to a narrow spectrum of possible uses. So they've ended up with a situation somewhat similar to the Norwegian Sovereign Wealth fund, where their rules of management of 'sacred' funds just starts adding upon itself faster and faster.

Charitable giving is supposed to come from a specific line item donation, Fast Offerings, and a very large amount of money does indeed go through that pipeline. There are a LOT of temples and chapels being built for the membership, and that has been made possible by the financial strength of the church, but it is a growing political problem that I will find it interesting how they deal with, but a much better problem than the near bankruptcy they had happen around the Great Depression that prompted a lot of the fiscal conservatism that ended up creating this situation.




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