Donate or Die

Donate now! read the flashing banner in the corner of the website I was using to learn a little history on the church at Corinth. As I closed the window in disgust, I began to wonder why it bothered me. Everywhere you look in modern Christianity, it seems, there's a beggarly hand held out for your spare change: on the corner of a website featuring an eloquently written and well researched historical article, In the basket that goes around at any church you attend while the preacher 'tenderly exhorts' you to give generously; Even in a military chapel where money for the bills and the chaplain's paycheck are already taken care of by Uncle Sam.
But as a Christian, I should be able to look at the issue maturely, taking away anything to be learned from the situation, and 'spitting out the bones' as the old analogy would run, right?
Or does it bother me because it bothers unbelievers, who are turned off by this unprofessional and seemingly faithless approach to meeting the 'needs' of the 'church'?
I wish there was a way to freeze any financial intake for churches that had to be requested, and see which ones actually survived because the members stepped up and met the need,
without having to be prompted every sunday that they're going to get 40 virgins (or whatever reward you want to throw out there, although the latter would probably elicit a generous revenue from the guys) if they give their pennies to "God's work".
Alright, I got to rant about that for a minute. Now I'll get back to my original intent... Coming soon: a look at 1 Corinthians chapter 1.