From Toxic Charity to Transformative Exchange: Creating an Initiative to Leverage the Work of Robert Lupton That Changes the Giving/Serving Paradigm of North American Churches and Charities

In his book Toxic Charity: How Churches and Charities Hurt Those They Help (And How to Reverse It), Robert Lupton criticizes many efforts seeking to alleviate poverty in North America as “toxic,” robbing the dignity and creating dependencies among the materially poor. The surging popularity of Toxic Charity and potential impact of Lupton’s new book, Moving the Poverty Needle, provide a timely opportunity to leverage efforts to shift the toxic paradigm in North America toward effective practices.
The purpose of this project is to refine a concept and business plan for a consulting-training initiative proposed by Lupton in 2013 to the Board of FCS Urban Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia. The initiative would enlist a cadre of effective practitioners to offer follow-up consulting, in addition to Lupton, and create strategic partnerships to test innovative prototypes for addressing poverty.
This DMin project involved a qualitative research intervention to assess the effectiveness of existing follow-up practices and the feasibility of creating the proposed initiative. Triangulating data were gathered by reviewing Lupton’s ministry through his writings, observing and surveying participants at the FCS Open House event, interviewing academic leaders and practitioners associated with Lupton from divergent perspectives (evangelical, liberation theology, and secular-civil social entrepreneurism), as well as exploring theological issues of material wealth and poverty. The method for analyzing and evaluating the data utilized a discernment retreat process based on Theory U by Otto Scharmer.
The results of the evaluation indicate wide-spread agreement of Lupton’s criticism of existing toxic practices and need for a paradigm shift toward healthy approaches. The FCS Open House demonstrated effectiveness in facilitating the implementation of some of Lupton’s proposed strategies; however, capacity is very limited; scalability is costly, and the scope of FCS is insufficient for a national impact. Overall, the feasibility for creating the proposed consulting-training initiative is judged to be impractical due to the cost to scale up nationally and the limited available leadership capacity. With his retirement as CEO of FCS, Lupton will limit his involvement to writing and speaking which limits the projects ability to raise capital and to coordinate collaborations with other consultants and organizations. An effective follow-up initiative requires broad collaborations, as well as identifying vast numbers of effective projects.
An alternative initiative and business plan is proposed in this DMin project to create a national social movement through Information Technology platforms that offer self-assessment tools and identify effective practices. An IT platform will minimize costs and maximize the scope and scalability. Ultimately, the system will include study resources, interactive forums, and an online crowdsource rating system to judge the toxicity as well as the effectiveness of projects (similar to systems such as Kiva and Charity Navigator).
Initially, volunteers will conduct a market test through online petitions and contests using free existing online sites. Students studying business, computer technology, and theology from Atlanta academic institutions will be enlisted through internships or an interdisciplinary class. If sufficient interest is generated, crowdfunding will raise startup capital to develop the expanded platform with rating systems and to hire staff.