This is a column I know I probably shouldn’t write. It’s personal, revealing, perhaps makes me seem uncaring, yet I feel there are others who share similar sentiments.

So. Let me start it this way. It seems we are living in the most prevalent fund-raising time ever. Ever.

Look at your church bulletins and newsletters. There is certainly no dearth of worthwhile charitable giving opportunities. One might even say there is often a plethora of causes in search of donors.

Look at your newspaper. There won’t be many issues where there aren’t solicitations for your consideration. Events to support. In the plural.

Then there’s the telephone. Oh, yes. You may get numerous such calls almost every week. Especially is this true around the holidays, but certainly not limited just to those seasons.

Let us not leave out our mail. That source might well be the greatest purveyor of solicitations. All worthy causes, of course.

I do not wish to cast aspersions on any of the causes that seek donations. Some may be more worthy than others, but such judgments are rendered subjectively, I suppose. Almost anything that helps needy people or animals has to have merit. Especially if the administrative costs are low, with the bulk of monies collected getting to the intended recipients in some form.

There are, primarily, two motives that lead most of us to contribute: the desire to do good here on this earth; a feeling of guilt if we don’t contribute.

The guilt factor is used, also, to one extent or another, in the realm of organized religion. That and fear of the hereafter. Such a belief in no way diminishes my sense of something greater than man; a higher power. Another subject.

Yet when it comes to giving, I suspect there is, at minimum, a feeling of uncomfortableness when we choose not to participate in any fundraising appeal. Call it human nature, I suppose.

In a logical, pragmatic sense, a family’s personal finances should be considered. Perhaps above all else. We aren’t all able to be generous and regular contributors. And those who can’t shouldn’t feel less worthy because of it.

Well, now. I suspect this is quite enough about fund-raising. More than enough.

You might want to put the paper down now and check your mail, if it has come.

Who knows, you might have received an appeal for a monetary contribution. You think?