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To: SeekAndFind

Not necessarily. Eliminate all tax exemptions and special treatments for charitable organizations and the government has no stake in the matter. Problem goes away. THAT is what was intended by Separation of Church and State.


2 posted on 10/05/2011 9:53:58 AM PDT by wizwor
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To: wizwor
Eliminate all tax exemptions and special treatments for charitable organizations and the government has no stake in the matter. Problem goes away. THAT is what was intended by Separation of Church and State.

Hang on. How does suddenly introducing taxing authority remove the government's stake? How would you tax a church or a charity? Why would you want to?

8 posted on 10/05/2011 10:05:13 AM PDT by Mr. Bird
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To: wizwor
"Not necessarily. Eliminate all tax exemptions and special treatments for charitable organizations and the government has no stake in the matter. Problem goes away. THAT is what was intended by Separation of Church and State."

Goverment gets involved in private corporations all the time. Why do you think eliminating the tax exemptions makes government less likely to get involved? It seems like they would be more likely to get involved, because then churches would just be another business to government.

And "THAT" was never intented by separation of church and state. Our founding fathers recognized that God was supreme over government. That government shouldn't be taxing God, because God is the higher authority. Like it or not, THAT's what the founding father's intended. They recognized God as evidenced by references to Him in the Declaration of Independence and the constitution. They never intended Freedom of Religion to be Freedom from Religion. They even put in the constitution a prohibition on government prohibiting the free expression of religion. They just didn't want government dictating to religion or dictating religion to individuals.

9 posted on 10/05/2011 10:08:04 AM PDT by DannyTN
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To: wizwor
Eliminate all tax exemptions and special treatments for charitable organizations and the government has no stake in the matter. Problem goes away.

This has nothing to do with whether a church is tax-exempt or not. It's trying to apply laws banning job discrimination to tell a church who they can have as a minister. It's the same law that would be applied to a for-profit, taxable corporation.

"The government has no stake in the matter" is worth nothing in an era of massive government intrusion into the private sector. The Obama Administration thinks it "has a stake" in everything you do and in every economic decision you make.

11 posted on 10/05/2011 10:16:21 AM PDT by Campion ("Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies when they become fashions." -- GKC)
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To: wizwor
No it wouldn't. Then a church could be sued for not hiring a gay transvestite.
24 posted on 10/05/2011 1:48:27 PM PDT by redgolum ("God is dead" -- Nietzsche. "Nietzsche is dead" -- God.)
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To: wizwor

No, that doesn’t solve it. You can still sue a private business for discrimination in hiring or firing - it happens all the time.

The original case involves who is a minister, that is, a strictly religious employee, and who is not. This is because religious employees - not because of non-profit status, but specifically because of religious employment - are exempted from decisions by civil authorities on the interior procedures of that church or religious organization.

However, Obama is going one step beyond and saying there is no category, even the traditional one of specifically religious employees of a religious organization, that should be exempt (and this has nothing to do with their non-profit or tax exempt status).

This is very dangerous.


26 posted on 10/05/2011 2:56:46 PM PDT by livius
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