Mike the Usurper wrote:

On June 9, the church received a letter from the IRS stating that "a reasonable belief exists that you may not be tax-exempt as a church … " The federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections.

Now they're going after churches for preaching peace? It's okay if they support blowing people up? Funny, I don't remember seeing "Thou shalt not kill (unless you have a war, then it's okay)" in the Commandments. I don't remember seeing "Turn the other cheek, but if he hits that one too, you can kick the crap out of him," in the New Testament either.

If you think about it, this happens all the time. The IRS should either enforce the rule or drop the rule.

Think about Satan Sharpton - I mean, Rev Sharpton. He had political campaign speeches in a church. So did Al Gore, and not to mention a string of Republicans.

My opinion is that none of them should do this stuff from a church.

Decius wrote:

On June 9, the church received a letter from the IRS stating that "a reasonable belief exists that you may not be tax-exempt as a church … " The federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections.

I had no idea that this kind of thing was grounds for loosing tax exempt status. Lots of meaty philosophical questions in here. No, I don't buy the idea that this is politically motivated in absense of data that demostrates a pattern across a spectrum of cases.

This story reminds me of that other one from a couple months back about a church that actually expelled a member because they voted for a liberal candidate. I think both cases are worthy of investigation by the IRS.

Decius wrote:

On June 9, the church received a letter from the IRS stating that "a reasonable belief exists that you may not be tax-exempt as a church … " The federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections.

I had no idea that this kind of thing was grounds for loosing tax exempt status. Lots of meaty philosophical questions in here. No, I don't buy the idea that this is politically motivated in absense of data that demostrates a pattern across a spectrum of cases.

This is one of the reasons that Nashville 2600 is a non-profit corporation, but not a 501(c)3 Charitable Non-Profit. Under those rules, you have to stay away from political topics, but there's no real good definition of what a "political" topic is in the IRS context. I'd only be glad to see this rule being enforced if it goes both ways - say in taking away the tax exempt status of the church that hosted Justice Sunday or that openly endorses one candidate over another (as an official stance, not as a collective poll of its congregation).