No one is claiming that Christians didn't care about the poor, why Christian Conservatives were once among some of the most progressive and GENUINE Christians, and were responsible for the end and outlawing of slavery, child labor, and were instrumental in female suffrage and universal emancipation, just to mention a few!

Christianity is vastly more than that whether something derived from the word of a prophet or just massively plagiarized story telling, But regardless of its origins or authenticity or not, is a golden rule code for living, and not just for professed Christians, but some very civic minded Atheists as well!

Conversely, Christianity and conservatism is a mutually incompatible juxtaposition. With guys like Trump and other money changing merchants, utterly unable to empathise with the poor and downtrodden, but self evidently know how to further exploit them, build walls to keep them out, and instead of being the good Samaritan, know how to kick them when they're down?

D Trump and his record as a formerly bankrupt and too big to fail businessman, is illustrative of the lip service mentality of the born into wealth wealthy, and is ambitious in the extreme, inasmuch as he is seemingly working hard at becoming the richest most POWERFUL man in the graveyard, where no doubt, his patent diabolical deal with the devil will finally play out?

It is easy for the very wealthy to be generous with their CHRISTIAN charity, however in Australia most of it seems to be coming from those with the least!

But as illustrative as that is, the lowest form of life is surely those who steal from the poor and pick the eyes out of our aid bins or charity!

And let's not forget or leave out mean spirited anti Christian tax avoidance! You can't take it with you! And being able to pay your fair share in a land like OZ is a privilege!
Phrosty.

Such a silly premise and challenge. Atheists don't 'do' charity in the name of Atheism, or rationalism or whatever. We do it in the name of whatever we believe in. Contrary to popular religious argument, atheism isn't actually a belief system.

There are plenty of charitable organisations that were founded by atheists and are run by atheists, such as the Fred Hollows foundation, Medicins sans Frontiers, Engineers Without Borders etc.

The major difference being of course is that they don't claim to be spreading the word of Atheism across the land or actually want to be
'role models', especially of the kind that will of course enable more conversions to atheism, the way Christians do it.

They don't do it because they are on a mission for secularity. They do it because they care about their fellow human beings, and they do it as individuals. Which makes them invisible to you.

All the 'secular organisations' you refer to are just clubs, not churches. I wouldn't expect my local canasta club to be feeding the worlds poor either.

The various levels of the secular US government between them pay out over a trillion dollars a year in welfare. This is more, I suspect, than every religious institution that ever existed put together. Add in the similar payments from other secular governments, including our own, and the efforts of religion dwindle into utter insignificance.

How is it possible for the West to pay, and go on paying, such fabulous sums year after year? Simple: by focusing on reality and investing in genuine, empirically verifiable solutions to real problems, we have raised income levels to a point where there is a large surplus that can be used in this way. Theocracies, on the other hand, remain committed to models of science and economics that bar progress. Simply put, they need religious welfare because they haven't yet learnt to do without it; and the religious certainly aren't going to teach them to.