–Many people today fail to realize that social problems often have spiritual aspects, whether the person has a religious background or not. The spiritual problems either cause the physical problems or are caused by them. Formerly, most social work was carried out by the church and church based agencies who analyzed the needs and ministered to both physical and spiritual needs. Now the government has taken over ministering to physical needs and many Social Workers are not from a church background and do not recognize the spiritual problems or are restrained from dealing with them due to agency rules. Since most people now go to the government programs to solve their physical problems, the church no longer has the opportunity to analyze and minister to spiritual needs. They meet he physical needs but do not meet the spiritual needs and do not deal with the cause. Providing physical needs without dealing with the cause is a waste of time and money. As a result, the physical problem is either not solved or soon returns, which proves frustrating to the social worker. It is like pumping air into a tire without fixing the leak. Depending on how fast you pump the air, you will either never get it blown up or if you get it blown up, it will soon go flat again once you stop pumping in air. As a result, our social problems have only gotten worse and we are getting to where it is getting too costly to keep pumping money into it trying to solve it. Since the war on poverty began, we have pumped enough money into it to provide a decent living to every man, woman, and child in America, yet the problem has only gotten worse. We definitely need to take a new approach.