Background
When asked which commandment is first of all, Jesus answered, "Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength" (Mark 12:29-30). Gambling feeds on human greed and invites persons to place their trust in possessions rather than in God. It represents a form of idolatry that contradicts the first commandment. Jesus continued: "The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'" (Mark 12:31). In relating with compassion to our sisters and brothers, we are called to resist those practices and systems that exploit them and leave them impoverished and demeaned. The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 6:9-10a: "People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil."
Gambling, as a means of acquiring material gain by chance and at the neighbor's expense, is a menace to personal character and social morality. Gambling fosters greed and stimulates the fatalistic faith in chance. Organized and commercial gambling is a threat to business, breeds crime and poverty, and is destructive to the interests of good government. It encourages the belief that work is unimportant, that money can solve all our problems, and that greed is the norm for achievement. It serves as a "regressive tax" on those with lower income. In summary, gambling is bad economics; gambling is bad public policy; and gambling does not improve the quality of life.
—Book of Resolutions 2004, Gambling
Where the UMC Stands
The United Methodist Church opposes gambling in any form.
The church's position is stated in the denomination's Social Principles (¶ 163G of the 2004 Book of Discipline)
- Gambling is a menace to society, deadly to the best interests of moral, social, economic, and spiritual life, and destructive of good government. As an act of faith and concern, Christians should abstain from gambling and should strive to minister to those victimized by the practice.
- Where gambling has become addictive, the Church will encourage such individuals to receive therapeutic assistance so that the individual's energies may be redirected into positive and constructive ends.
- The Church should promote standards and personal lifestyles that would make unnecessary and undesirable the resort to commercial gambling—including public lotteries—as a recreation, as an escape, or as a means of producing public revenue or funds for support of charities or government.
In practice, this means that United Methodist churches should not raise funds through methods such as raffles, lotteries, or drawings for door prizes or through games of chance such as bingo. (from 2004 Book of Resolutions, Gambling)
What We’re Doing in This World
The Church has a key role in fostering responsible government and in helping persons develop health and moral maturity that will help them break free from unhealthy and damaging addictions such as gambling.
United Methodists should refrain from all forms of gambling practices carried on in our communities and should work to influence community organizations to develop forms of funding that do not depend upon gambling.
The General Board of Church and Society, the agency of The United Methodist Church whose purpose it is to seek the implementation of the Social Principles and other policy statements of the General Conference on Christian social concern, will provide materials for local churches and annual conferences on gambling. Not only will these materials provide churches with information about the problem of gambling, but they will also provide guidance for combating gambling in their local communities and assisting persons addicted to gambling.
The General Board of Church and Society, annual conferences, and local churches will also work with the National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling and other grassroots organizations opposing gambling to stop and reverse legalized gambling.
—Excerpted from 2004 Book of Resolutions, Gambling |