A Kentucky woman with nearly 400K followers on TikTok, whose handle is @nikalie.monroe, asked churches to help a starving baby amid the current SNAP crisis, in which recipients of the food benefit have not received their November payments due to the government shutdown.
She does the experiment in more than 40 parts on her TikTok page, where she calls the churches with the sound of a crying infant in the background. She asks for baby formula, clarifies that she doesn’t want money, and that she is willing to pick it up.
More often than not, churches turned away her ask for help, citing that they don’t offer those services, they only help ‘active’ members, or they asked her to seek help elsewhere. Several of the churches that offered help surprised viewers. She received offers from a small grandpa at a church in Appalachia, a few Black churches, a couple of Catholic churches, Buddhist centers, and Islamic Centers. Mega Churches seemed never to have services or help available despite their oversized budgets and congregations.
The news of churches refusing to help lit the Internet ablaze with response videos and anger. Churches in the United States are often granted the 501(c)3 nonprofit status, which grants them freedom from paying taxes on funds collected in the church and often affords them specific discounts when purchasing for the organization.
Some churches are granted this status simply because they exist as a religious institution and are seemingly not required to offer any charitable giving.
This surprises many because historically, churches have been seen as the locations of help for many in a community. Apparently, this is a minority.
The glaring disparities between Christian churches’ lack of charity and their incessant asks for money raised the ire of many who watched this.
Some on TikTok didn’t agree with the experiment and made videos in rebuttal. However, in true TikTok fashion, those videos were quickly stitched and mocked for their lack of compassion, just like the churches that said no.
Check out the stitch below.
The experiment has caused people to confront their churches and to question whether their church would, in fact, help a starving infant.
