Casino news source: The Philadelphia Enquirer - http://www.philly.com/
God, mammon, and casinos
Leaders of houses of worship near planned gambling houses debate the potential damage vs. the millions in casino charity.
The two casinos soon to take hold on the Philadelphia riverfront may be a gambler's dream come true.
For some religious leaders whose houses of worship sit near the future slot parlors, however, gaming poses a tough balancing act between morality and practicality - between what they view as sin and the need for more resources for their congregations.
On the one hand, gaming offers a dangerous temptation for congregants already struggling with poverty, addictions and related ills, these clergy say, citing national surveys.
On the other, the two casinos have pledged up to $33 million annually in charitable grants to bolster Philadelphia neighborhood organizations.
That's the dilemma.
"Gambling is not a spiritually healthy exercise," said the Rev. Harriet Kollin of St. John the Evangelist Episcopal Church at Third and Reed Streets. "It's a distraction from any kind of activity that one might engage in to flourish as a person."
Would she take casino money to support her church? Kollin was ambivalent.
"I don't know, I don't know - it's a tough question," she said. "If I do, then I'm supporting the casinos; if I don't, then we'll be shortchanging ourselves from whatever money is available."
Kollin's small church is within walking distance from the future site of Foxwoods Casino, which plans to install 3,000 slots on Columbus Boulevard along the Delaware River in South Philadelphia.
Five miles upriver, SugarHouse Casino is planning to install 3,000 slots not far from St. John's Memorial Baptist Church in the city's Kensington section.
"It's going to be a problem - you know it. I know it. Moses knows it and he ain't even here," said St. John's pastor, Nathaniel J. Holder, who worried that his congregants, many of whom are recovering from drug and alcohol addictions, could become problem gamblers.
Holder demurred when asked if his church would apply for casino charitable funds.
"That's a difficult question. I'm not on the board of trustees," he said, referring to the church's six-member panel that would make the decision.
"It could be good and it could be bad. One thing that comes to mind is that God creates us. He is able to take something bad and make it good. He can take something dishonorable and make it honorable," the pastor said.
The Rev. Carl N. Fitchett, of Mount Moriah Temple Baptist Church on Wharton Street in South Philadelphia, put it this way: "I'm not going to ask [the casinos] for the money - they would have to ask me to take it."
Fitchett's congregation recently took out bank loans for a $300,000 church-improvement project. He said he would be "hard-pressed" not to take casino money if offered. But it "would be inappropriate to file for a grant with the casino," he contended.
Lutheran Settlement House, a multiservice community center affiliated with the Lutheran Church, is less than a mile from the SugarHouse site. Open to everyone, the group serves about 11,000 clients, including 5,000 seniors, many of whom already enjoy gambling as a pastime in Atlantic City.
Executive director Beatriz Vieira said Settlement House caseworkers would be alert to signs of gambling-related problems. But she also welcomed the possibility of casino charitable assistance for the group's $3 million annual budget, which at the moment comes from state, federal and private grants.
"The best hope is that [the casinos] will be good neighbors," Vieira said. "We will start with the assumption that there will be good intentions. If that changes, our position will change."
There's no ambiguity about gambling in the mind of Chukri Khorchid, imam of Al-Aqsa Mosque on the edge of the city's Northern Liberties section.
"Gambling destroys families [and] is against our religion," he said. "I wouldn't call [gambling-derived charity] clean money in the first place."
Rabbi Israel Wolmark, who for years led the Young People's Congregation Shari Eli on Moyamensing Avenue in South Philadelphia, said gambling is a reality that area residents have had to deal with long before the recent casino licenses were awarded in Philadelphia.
"Some people say gambling is evil," Wolmark said. "Some people may be addicted, but in those cases, if they're not gambling in Philadelphia, they are going to gamble in Atlantic City. They will gamble anyplace that they can find to gamble... . Why not keep the money at home? You know, charity begins at home."
Using complicated formulas based on anticipated revenues, SugarHouse has proposed to donate up to $3 million annually to neighborhoods near its casino; investors in Foxwoods have pledged donations of an estimated $300 million over 10 years. The casinos are projecting total annual revenues between $365 and $420 million.
Though the Rev. Jesse Brown Jr.'s Calvary Evangelical Lutheran Church, in West Philadelphia, is not near the future casinos, he is one of the city's most vocal religious opponents of slots.
It's not charity, he contends, it's hush money.
"There is no love of the city. They are here to take the money and run. If that means they can give up just a couple of million dollars here and there, that's what they'll do," Brown said.
"People who will be the recipients of it, of course, will love the money, but the bottom line is all of that is just a way in which you cut a deal with the devil, and it's not a deal I am willing to cut."
Brown said churches would likely end up spending more money out of existing emergency programs to provide groceries and utilities for congregants who get in over their heads at the casinos.
And the churches could find that their emergency funds have fallen short, he said, because "moneys that should end up in the collection plate may end up in those one-armed bandits."
A nationwide survey of 2,631 adults, conducted by the State University of New York at Buffalo and published two years ago in the Journal of Gambling Studies, found that people who lived within 10 miles of a casino were much more likely to blow household budgets on gambling.
Of course, not everyone who gambles loses control.
"Eighty percent of people who gamble will have no problems. Fifteen percent will have some problems. Five percent will become addicted. This applies across the board to legal and illegal gambling and even state lotteries," said Eddie Looney, executive director of New Jersey's Council on Compulsive Gambling, which has broad experience with the 12 casinos in Atlantic City.
Samuel R. Hutchins, pastor of Ebenezer Seventh-Day Adventist Church at 15th and Christian Streets, knows one thing for sure: Some members of his flock will certainly gamble.
So part of his job, he said, is to preach restraint.
"I personally teach my congregation that gambling is not advised," he said. "They are taking finances that... the Lord has blessed them with, and using them on a game of chance." |
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