I'm interested in volunteering with a "habitat for humanity" type of place, or shelter for the homeless or the like, however I'd like the organization to not have any religious affiliation if possible. Anybody know of such places, around the Raleigh area?
Thanks

7/7/2008 3:41:58 PM

There is the Food Bank of Central and Eastern NC located off Tarheel Drive (which is off Wolfpack Road) right off Atlantic above the Beltline.

http://www.foodbankcenc.org/

And my personal favorite, ReTails Thrift Shop which benefits AnimalKind and their efforts to help provide a spay/neuter for only $20 to low-income pet owners across the Triangle.

http://www.animalkind.org/retails.html

Oh and try http://www.volunteermatch.org. They are probably the best database/search function provided for all non-profit agencies looking for volunteers. I've found quite a few over the years.

[Edited on July 7, 2008 at 4:30 PM. Reason : volunteermatch]

7/7/2008 4:28:24 PM

No faith affiliation at all or is interfaith OK?

7/7/2008 4:30:19 PM

Quote :

"I'm interested in volunteering with a "habitat for humanity" type of place,"

um, did you check: http://www.habitat.org/

7/7/2008 7:35:49 PM

Quote :

"'m interested in volunteering with a "habitat for humanity" type of place, or shelter for the homeless or the like, however I'd like the organization to not have any religious affiliation if possible"

Umm do you know how to read?

7/7/2008 7:37:57 PM

Habitat might as well be non-christian. they dont shove their faith in anyones face.

I mean, they're partnered a big project with Planned Parenthood for chrissakes.
(http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/may/08052308.html)


so yeah, okay, they're christian, but they're about as inoffensive as any faith organization can possibly be. Ive seen secular orgs that were far more zealous in their advocacy for some political position or other.

Quote :

"Habitat has an open-door policy: All who desire to be a part of this work are welcome, regardless of religious preference or background. Habitat for Humanity has always had a policy of building with people in need regardless of race or religion, and we welcome volunteers and supporters from all backgrounds. --http://www.habitat.org/how/christian.aspx"

[Edited on July 7, 2008 at 7:51 PM. Reason : ]

7/7/2008 7:43:05 PM

indeed, an organization with NO religious ties at all may be difficult, furthermore, people can't project the level of connection you would find appropriate. If you're looking for something that doesn't care about your religion, promote their own, or operate under the guise of a religious group, that would be like 75% of the things out there.

7/7/2008 8:40:17 PM

i dont' know. the one time i did habitat, there was a group prayer at the beginning.

7/7/2008 9:32:46 PM

When I've been, there wasn't a prayer. It is in a different city, though. Finding another non-religious organization w/ the same goal as habitat is going to be tough. Habitat really does a lot of good...the obvious house, financial counseling, job counseling, and getting the resident into helping on thiers and other houses.

7/7/2008 9:43:18 PM

come on, didn't you know? Christians have a monopoly on helping people. Non-christians, without the threat of burning in hell, have no incentive to ever help anyone else

7/7/2008 10:03:00 PM

When i had to organize service projects for a group on campus, I have to say, I was bothered by both the religious people, and the people who didn't want to work with the religious people.

Even boy scouts are religious-ish (Scout oath FTW). It's hard to get away from it.

[Edited on July 7, 2008 at 10:15 PM. Reason : ]

7/7/2008 10:15:03 PM

Oh boy.

While I get extremely annoyed with Bible-thumping moonbats--- who cares if a charitable organization has a religious affiliation? Many Christians, Jews, and Muslims are genuinely altruistic and have open-door policies for volunteers and don't even talk to you about their religion. I volunteered for a homeless shelter in downtown Miami that was run by a bunch of nuns through the local Catholic church. The only thing they asked us to do was to not use any foul language there and to be very patient with the people there. Pretty reasonable requests. A decent percentage of the volunteers were Jewish and some were agnostic. Although the nuns were pretty intense and kinda OCD-ish, they were very nice and never once tried to convert anyone or talk about religion.

Groups that use charity as bait for religious agendas are in the minority. The ones that do that are dispicable, but they aren't as common as many think.

7/7/2008 10:29:39 PM

I am simply for helping people in need, and do not have any interest in furthering a religious group/agenda. Habitat may not be as batshit crazy as some others, but Jesus/word of God, etc. is littered in their "mission" statements.

I may end up helping the habitat people none the less. I suppose this is because I'd rather help than not, even though ideally my help wouldn't benefit a religious organization. I do not mind helping a religious people, just not a religious agenda.

Thanks a lot for the links, especially volunteermatch.org looks good.

7/7/2008 11:45:23 PM

You should do it through a religious organization but work against them and spread rational, non religious thoughts.

7/8/2008 12:17:56 PM

Quote :

"I'm interested in volunteering with a "habitat for humanity" type of place, or shelter for the homeless or the like, however I'd like the organization to not have any religious affiliation if possible."

I think you'll find that sticking to this, will limit your options severely. Most of the places that are out there and are evangelizing to everyone they help... won't let you inside the club if you're not of their sect anyway.

volunteermetch.org is one of the better webpages out there for this sort of thing... but do try to see the forest rather than just the trees. If your goal is to do good a good thing, focus on doing that rather than sticking points between some obscure text-based mission statement and the actual work being done.

Or, if you've got a soft spot for a particular cause or need that you don't see being filled... you could consider starting your own non-profit.

7/8/2008 12:25:16 PM

Since I have been staying here for the past two weeks, Duke University Medical Center has plenty of opportunities for involvement. They have volunteers who help people find their way around, people who volunteer through the Ronald McDonald House who staff parent and child areas, people who sit with children on the bone marrow transplant unit to give parents some time off, people who just come rock babies who are left alone, etc. The giving here at a hospital like Duke is phenomenal. However, even if you volunteer at a hospital through an organization without religious affiliation, you do deal with religion in a tangential manner because people turn towards their faith in times of need.

My son has been prayed for to more gods and in more languages than I can count in my time here. A Hindu doctor came in to do an art stick and said his prayers prior to sticking my son and a Christian phlebotomist praised God when she was able to drawn blood from my son without tears. . .

7/8/2008 12:42:53 PM

im either an atheist or an agnostic depending on your definition, but if my kid were sick i'd be happy if people prayed to jesus, mohammed, and the elephant-god-thing with 100 arms.

and i think religiously-oriented charities are good things. as long as they don't tie their services with religious proselytizing. and most of them don't.

as far as prayer? hell, you can find public school systems sports teams that pray before games. doesn't make it right, but it's a function of the individual leaders/participants moreso than the organization.

7/8/2008 1:06:26 PM

Quote :

"but Jesus/word of God, etc. is littered in their "mission" statements."

And why is that a problem? Most of these charitable organizations that mention their religious beliefs in their mission statements are doing so because the founders believe they're doing charitable work for their God(s). Unless you go to an organization that operates directly out of a church, there is really almost no chance that you'll get any nasty religious cooties on you. I've been to habitat on a few different occasions, not once was religion ever brought up, and never once did I even think that the people I was working with had a religious agenda they were pushing to "further the cause".

It seems like you're against working with a group of people that wants to help people simply because they are religious and do their work because they believe their God(s) told them to do it. Why not give any one organization a shot and see if they really have some sort of agenda (do they really push their religion or do they just help people? Do the organizations members seem hostile towards nonbelievers, or do they try to push beliefs onto the people they help?), instead of making silly prejudgments about them based off of a few paragraphs on their website. There is a REALLY big difference between service groups that push a strongly religious agenda (like youth services at a church that offer daycare during the week) and groups that carry out their work because they feel they were called upon to serve their fellow man (groups like habitat, etc which don't force religious gospel down the throats of those they help).

If this is really a big sticking point (keep in mind this will greatly limit your opportunities for community service needlessly), then check with local city governments to see if they have any community service programs that you can volunteer for. Any government-based community service or aid organization shouldn't have any sort of faith-based mission, but I can't think of any of these that you can just go and casually take part in on a weekend.

7/8/2008 2:11:20 PM

This is why this guy pisses me off

http://youtube.com/watch?v=VxGMqKCcN6A

Let's see you go build some houses. Then we can talk about how the world can and should do without religion.

7/8/2008 3:54:36 PM

because there wouldn't be any charitable organizations without religion....

7/8/2008 7:54:41 PM

And nobody is claiming that. A majority of the ones you hear about do have religious mission statements and religious founders, and if you're avoiding those you greatly reduce your options for community service rather needlessly.

7/8/2008 8:06:24 PM