Tithing and Stewardship

The short and honest answer is no. The tithe — a tenth — belongs to the Law of the Old Covenant, where it supported the temple, the priesthood, and the poor (Malachi 3:10). Christ did not abolish it: He told the Pharisees they were right to tithe even their garden herbs, "these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone" (Matthew 23:23) — but in the same breath He warned that they had "omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith." The tithe was never the point; the heart was.

So the New Testament does not legislate a percentage. What it gives instead is a spirit. St. Paul asks each Christian to set aside a gift "according as he purposeth in his heart," adding the line that governs all Orthodox giving: "not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver" (2 Corinthians 9:7). The widow who dropped in two small coins gave more than the rich, Christ said, because she gave out of her poverty. Many Orthodox still find the tithe a wise and freeing target to aim at; others give more or less as their circumstances allow. What the Church asks of everyone is that the giving be real — planned, sacrificial, and joyful — rather than the loose change left over at the end of the month.

A parish is not funded by magic. Clergy must live, buildings must be heated and repaired, the poor must be fed, and the mission must go forward; "the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel" (1 Corinthians 9:14). This is why many parishes ask members to make a yearly pledge, or to become "stewards" of the community — a word chosen deliberately over "dues," because belonging to the Church is not a membership fee but a shared responsibility for a common home.

The tradition keeps one balance carefully. Adorning the church is good, but it must never crowd out the poor at its door. St. John Chrysostom pressed this on his wealthy hearers without mercy: "Would you do honour to Christ's body? Neglect Him not when naked; do not while here you honour Him with silken garments, neglect Him perishing without of cold and nakedness." Giving to the parish and giving to the needy are not rivals; both are ways of offering to the same Lord, who receives what is done for "one of the least of these." Support of the Church and almsgiving belong together.

Orthodoxy treats giving as a spiritual exercise, close kin to fasting and prayer. To give away money we could have kept is a small, regular death to greed — a training of the heart to trust that God provides. The Fathers speak of offering God the "first-fruits" rather than the leftovers: deciding on the gift first, before the rest of the budget swallows it. Christ Himself is quoted by St. Paul as teaching "It is more blessed to give than to receive" (Acts 20:35).

This runs deeper than finance. Humanity's calling is to receive the whole of creation as a gift and hand it back to God in thanksgiving — the vocation of man as priest of creation, enacted every Sunday when bread and wine, the fruit of human labor, are carried to the altar in the Divine Liturgy. Money given to the Church is a piece of that same offering. And like almsgiving, it is best done quietly: not to be seen, not counted as a transaction that buys standing, but given and let go. The reward the Gospel promises the cheerful giver is not a receipt but a freer heart.