What made me think about it was a priest I saw on the news this morning and he wrongly stated that he couldn’t talk about politics from the pulpit.
The reality is that he can openly endorse a candidate or speak openly about any political policy he wants but will lose the tax exempt status if he does.
Personally I’d like to see more churches ditch the exemption and speak openly against that restriction on free speech.
>The reality is that he can openly endorse a candidate or speak openly about any political policy he wants but will lose the tax exempt status if he does.
De Facto violation of the first amendment then, as the policy (which is authorized by the Congress) in effect regulates religion.
>Personally I’d like to see more churches ditch the exemption and speak openly against that restriction on free speech.
I agree; it’s a limited application of “you are never more free than when you have nothing to lose.”
You see, I hope, that this is all part of the secular plan. If our taxes are supporting government-designated charities, we have less to give to our churches and their institutions. The tax-exemption may be short-lived if this battle’s lost.
Couldn’t disagree more. This is the double standard trick box, the secular left likes to paint.
However, the same secular left who now threaten Dolan & Co. Couldn’t get enough religion in politics in th 1960’s. From the civil rights movement, to the anti-war movement Churches and their ministers spoke their minds unapologetically. The IRS would never dare threaten MLK.
Think about the political ministers from the 1960’s? The Reverend Martin Luther King, te Reverend Joseph Lowery, the Reverend Jessie Jackson, Sloan coffin at Yale, Father Berrigan. Father Drinan was a communist priest elected to Congres!. The liberal left gorged themselves with religion in polotics in the 1960’s when it suited their purposes. Now they act shocked that there is gambling in Casablanca?