Self-Centered Charity

"Religion is a great source of charity"

This is brought up quite often, they may say it in the form of "I am doing God's work" etc. I think it is true that religion motivates some people to do more charity work then they ordinarily would, there is one reason for this, which has little to do with helping others; it is self-centered in nature. It seems to be that it is not because they care about other people's well-being, but because they are looking to secure a place in eternal paradise. Some people believe if they donate a few items and/or do a bit of charity work, they will be rewarded for it in the afterlife.

You may be thinking that I am far off here, or that people don't just do charity work to suck-up to a god. Then why use religion as a reason for doing a charitable act?

Let me give an example to make this better understood. Let's say that this guy exits a McDonald's restaurant with a cheeseburger. You approach him and ask: "what were the reasons for you buying the cheeseburger?" Which is he more likely to say...

A) "I was hungry"
B) "to serve God" etc.

He would have sounded ridiculous for saying any reason that had to do with religion. But what if there was a religion called 'Burgeranity'; this particular fake religion teaches that if you eat a hamburger everyday, you will get an eternity in paradise after death. If you go up to one of these "Burgerians", after they leave a McDonald's and pose the question: "what were the reasons for you getting the cheeseburger?" they will naturally say it was for religious reasons. The "religious reason" is eternal paradise.

While everyone needs food, the "Burgarians" ate burgers more often then they ordinarily would have. This is because they thought it would help them get into paradise after death. Christianity, for example, teaches people that doing charity work increases their likelihood of getting into heaven (the parallels should be obvious). Most people are altruistic to a certain degree; however would the people that claim to do charity work for religious reasons, do the same amount if they didn't stand to benefit? Probably not, plus they wouldn't claim their reasons as being religious, it would be irrelevant (remember the cheeseburger-guy example).

When a person does charity for religious reasons, they might as well say "I am helping these people out, not because I actually care about them, but so I can spend an eternity in paradise". At least that would be more honest.