Poll: Most Baptists Oppose N.C. Lottery

Mar 25, 2005, 10:56 am (7 comments)

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More than half the respondents to a Baptist web poll want any North Caolina lottery proposal killed in the state legislature.

Responding to a question asking how they would urge their legislators to respond to a proposal for a state-operated lottery in North Carolina, 56 percent of respondents to the poll at www.northcarolinabaptists.org said they want lawmakers to kill a lottery by vote in the legislature.

Another 42 percent of respondents would have their representatives in state government provide for a statewide referendum, requiring voters to register their opinions about a lottery at the polls.

Two percent of respondents wanted the legislature to provide for county-by-county referendums.

Lottery opponents welcome a decision made in the legislature to hold their representatives accountable. House Speaker Jim Black has told the press he wants an up or down vote on the lottery rather than calling for a referendum.

Black told the Winston-Salem Journal that he intends to put the issue up for a vote on the House floor next week.

"Several legislators are on the record saying that although they personally oppose a lottery, they think it is good to let the citizens have the decision making power," said Steve Sumerel, executive director for the Council on Christian Life and Public Affairs. "Now those statements must come home to roost."

Jim Royston, executive director-treasurer of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, says raising revenue through a lottery is bad government.

"While we oppose the lottery on moral grounds, the solid argument that should win in the marketplace is that a lottery is bad government" Royston says. "Instead of making the difficult budget decisions to properly fund schools through fair taxation and cut programs with no positive effect, bad legislators want to seduce gullible, desperate folks who can least afford it to fund the schools with their grocery money."

To prove his point, Royston quotes an ad from the Holiday Food chain in California, which ran in the Sacramento Bee after California instituted a lottery.

"In the first six months of the California lottery, our food chain sold $1.8 million in lottery tickets," the ad said. "During that same period of time, our food sales were off $1.8 million. We have ceased selling lottery tickets because we believe it is a moral issue when people use money for lottery tickets rather than buy food to feed their families."

Raleigh Biblical Recorder

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CARBOB

Does anyone think that the Southern Baptists would be for anything that someone else might enjoy. They are not even thinking about the money generated from the lottery. Well, everyone knows that hellfire and brimstones will rain down on the people who play the lottery. I think it's only been about 5 years since they started speaking to each other in the liquor store. LOL

 Carbob 

MADDOG10's avatarMADDOG10

  wake up people of N.C., it is not a "sin" to wager money to benefit yourself , others and your own childrens education. it benefits "everyone" including the elderly.  the "seeds" you plant today, can only prosper...!!      open your eye's!!!!! 

LOTTOMIKE's avatarLOTTOMIKE

these same baptists will be the first in line for tickets,hypocritical b.s.....

Winners

you are sooooooooo right they will be the first in line. So they need to butt out. Just bring in the lottery!!!

LOTTOMIKE's avatarLOTTOMIKE

PrisonerSix

Quote: Originally posted by Winners on March 25, 2005





you are sooooooooo right they will be the first in line. So they need to butt out. Just bring in the lottery!!!

Sounds like North Carolina is going through what Louisiana went through back in the late 1980s when Louisiana was talking about bringing in a lottery.  The churches were all very much opposed to it in both heavily Catholic south Louisiana and heavily Baptist north Louisiana on moral grounds, supposedly.

Many legislators at the time were opposed to a lottery but a few die hards kept the idea alive.  Finally, the legislature voted to have a statewide referendum on a state lottery.  It was voted in with 69.2% in favor.

The truth is since the lottery, video poker, and casinos have been legalized in Louisiana, BINGO and other charitable gaming have seen a decline in revenue.  Makes me wonder if that was the churches' real fear all along.  In my opinion, those opposed to a lottery based on the idea it takes money from the poor should also be opposed to this sort of gambling.

When my brother attended Catholic school, my parents helped run BINGO games to help raise money for the school.  Alot of the players were poor people, welfare recipients, and the elderly, all hoping for a big win, and this was 30 years ago.  A priest in south Louisiana noticed this several years ago and caused a great deal of friction between himself and the diocese by refusing to raise money for the church through BINGO.

If these groups don't want gambling in the state, they shouldn't be profiting from gambling either.  BINGO and charitable gaming are gambling, whether you like it or not.  It exploits many of the same people a lottery would, and the only difference is who's pocket the money goes in to.

Just my opinion.

PrisonerSix

LOTTOMIKE's avatarLOTTOMIKE

more or less these religious people only care about the gambling when some of the money is not gonna go through their pockets or hurt their bingo games its all b.s........

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