I agree that some businesses that are classed a non profit should be taxed since they are truly a shell and are evading taxes.
Churches on the other hand are a different story, the average church has less than 70 members and most of the time the pastor has to have a second job just to pay the bills. If we put taxes on top of their fixed and variable expenses there will be a lot of churches that will close their doors and people will suffer as a result.
The government needs to change their business model as a small business owner would have to when the economy gets bad!
Make no mistake, if ANYONE says that they want to tax the churches, they REALLY mean that they want to *destroy* the churches. They may claim that churches are a "gravy train" but they know very well that the majority of churches are functioning Sunday-to-Sunday and would fold up overnight if they had to pony up taxes. The ones that survive would be forced to scale back non-essential services like charity and community outreach. They know this, and welcome it. There would be fewer churches, and the ones that remain would focussed on survival and would be blissfully quiet and disengaged. There are a lot of "conservatives" that would like that very much.