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Because, really, what else would compel a restaurant goer to tuck a gospel tract into a check presenter? Folks who haven't worked in the service industry are always startled to learn how frequently servers' hard work earns them a pamphlet about heaven and hell instead of a cash tip. The practice is so widespread that tract publishers have even devised literature that looks like a dollar bill, allowing diners to fool and cheat their waitresses in one fell swoop.
To be clear, I have no problem with my customers unobtrusively spreading the gospel. I wish more diners would include printed material with their tips; I'd love to amass a collection of poems and news clippings my customers considered noteworthy. But the critical phrase here is "with their tips." What's infuriating about the gospel-tract habit is that the tracts are rarely accompanied by money.
I imagine tract givers would argue they're leaving behind something more precious than cash. Since I hate to wade into a theological debate, I'll just quote what a self-identified Christian blogger says on the subject of evangelical etiquette:
"May I challenge you to not only leave the gospel tract, but also to leave a generous tip?," Ashspeaks writes. "If we are God's children, and the money we receive is not ours but His, how can we hold on to it like that when we know the waitress is doing a wonderful job and probably needs it more than you (who has everything in Christ Jesus)?"
Christians are among the harshest critics of hit-and-run tract distribution, which they condemn as "bad testimony" and harmful to their reputation. When I called the American Tract Society, which has been pamphleteering since 1825, to learn more about the origins of tracts as tip substitutes, the staffer I reached groaned when I broached the topic.
Nobody at the American Tract Society had any idea how the tract-only method of tipping got its start. While I imagined my tract-leaving customers inspired by a grubby hand-wringing flim-flam preacher, there doesn't seem to be any one person behind the trend. Tract publishers universally exhort their customers to leave their literature "with generous tips at restaurants."
Diners who slip out the door, leaving only a Biblical flier behind, may call themselves Christians. We servers call them cheapskates.
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2-24-2010 @3:30PM TechyDad said... Not being a waiter, I've never encountered this. I did recently get preached to, though. My family was shopping at a nearby Walmart and as we entered an elevator this elderly couple came in behind us commenting on how we looked like such a "nice, young family." We thanked them and prepared for an uneventful elevator ride until the woman said "Jesus loves you." I politely informed the woman that we were Jewish, but that didn't deter her. She repeated it and the man insisted that they were "Jewish" too since Jesus's name was "Yeshua." They attempted to go on but I cut them off and told them we weren't interested. The elevator doors opened and they exited. Luckily, this elevator has doors on both sides. You enter in one way and exit another. While they walked out, we quickly ducked out the "enter" door to get away from them.
If I were ever to be convinced to change religions (a virtually nonexistent change to begin with), it wouldn't be via Walmart elevator ambush. I'd wager that preaching via "tip pamphlet and no cash" is just as worthless a conversion method (if not more worthless since I didn't provide that couple with any services).
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2-24-2010 @3:08PM bk said... This reminds me of when I used to work in a bar in East Los Angeles and would regularly be given pot (marijuana) instead of a tip.. same philosphy as the tracts: while that might be valuable to you, the only thing you can be sure is valuable to a server you don't know is CASH. Last time I checked my landlord doesn't accept drugs or religious love notes.
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2-24-2010 @4:37PM m00se said... Wow. I waited tables all through college. I think I only got tracts WITH tips, which if you must do it, is the right way.
I will say though that a Denny's I was working at was super close to the location of a Promise Keepers conference. One morning the restaurant was full (enough to keep 8-9 seasoned servers hopping) and it must have been at least 80% conference attendees. In 4 years of waiting tables, this was the absolute worst morning of tips I ever experienced. Lots of creepy, lascivious behavior directed at me from men older than my father though. All of the staff in the restaurant couldn't wait for them to leave.
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2-24-2010 @8:19PM Jen said... In over 6 years of waiting tables at 3 different restaurants, I definitively concluded that the rudest, most demanding, and poorest tipping customers were those that would make loud commentary/proclamations about being Christian. And they would often leave those tracts instead of tips. Way to leave a bad taste in my mouth about the religion!!
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2-25-2010 @12:21AM auraesque said... Oh, I received one of those dollar bill tracts once. I was confused more than anything, and I pasted it up in our breakroom. I wonder if it's still there.
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2-25-2010 @10:59PM Warren said... I'm an ordained Baptist minister, and I have actually been embarrassed at meals by people doing this kind of nonsense, trying to look more "spiritual" for the preacher. I've actually put money down on someone else's table who merely left a tract as a tip -- and I've preached against this kind of nonsense before.
Of course, I wonder how effective tracts are anymore. I know in the past they were used with some success, but I'm not sure people actually read the things anymore. But that's a topic for another blog.
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2-27-2010 @12:09PM Alana said... There's a paranoid part of me that wonders if these "tips" are actually left by angry cheapskate athiests, trying to discredit Christians. As a Christian I can't imagine stiffing a waiter like that. How is that acting like Jesus would act? But then, there are stupid people in all religions...
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2-28-2010 @5:40PM Geena said... There ought to be some sort of standing rule that religious tracts aren't a good substitute for ANYTHING - I've yet to wait tables in my chain of assorted jobs (not a people person really/a bit too impatient to make a good waiter), but I remember getting those dratted things in lieu of candy while trick-or-treating as a kid. I was never a little vandal, but I've never been more tempted to "egg" a house more in my life!
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3-01-2010 @2:59AM Jim said... This needs to stop. I often get coupons instead of actual tips as well. It drives me nuts and I want to follow the little jerks home. Get with the times and learn to tip properly. Read http://www.tiptheserver.com
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3-03-2010 @4:50PM Bea K. said... So Pastor Warren, you're an ordained minister, and feel embarrassed by this?? Wow, that's a new one on me. I might be able to understand where some of these other folks are coming from (even TechyDad to a certain extent, although Yeshua and His followers, who were Jewish by the way, preached the Gospel to Jews and non-Jews alike. Don't believe me, check out the Hebrew texts for yourself), but in your case I find this a little mind boggling.
Did not Jesus (Yeshua) gave those like you who call yourselves Christian (denomination was made up by man by the way and that includes the Baptists, not God) a mandate to go into ALL the world and spread the Gospel? Just becaue 'you' don't think tracts are effective any more doesn't make it so. I've seen many and I mean many (even in this day and time) come to know Jesus (Yeshua) through tracts they've found in various places.
"Trying to look spiritual for the preacher"?? Wow pastor Warren that's heavy, even for you. Can't wait to see what 'you' have to say to God for a response like this when you (me and everyone else) has to face Him. So, 'you've' decided that distributing tracts with Bible verses on them, are offensive to 'you', when they could be convicting a soul via the Holy Spirit and leading them to Christ???
Pastor Warren, if I were you, I'd seriously check my salvation, and see if you're complying with God, Jesus, and the Word, because from what I've read here I seriously doubt it. God help us, and all the rest of us.
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