Election Season: Be aware of political activity in churches

[Jim123]

And be sure to report any church's political activity to the IRS, as this could constitute activity resulting in revocation of their tax-exempt status.


http://atheism.about.com/library/decisions/tax/bldec_BranchMinistries.htm


Note to moderators: Could you make this a stickie until election day?

[atonal chaotic]

Or maybe as a violation of the McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act. If it's gonna be used to silence third parties and issue-based activists, why shouldn't it be used to silence churches as well?

[EverLastingGodStopper]

Here's a website devoted to reporting political activity in churches to the IRS:

Americans United for Separation of Church and State: http://www.au.org

Make sure you read the September 2006 issue of Church and State magazine (http://www.au.org/site/PageServer?pagename=cs_2006_09). The subject is "Churches, Politics And The IRS."

[Toto]

Here's a pertinent article with a buried lead:

Anti-Abortion Group Loses Tax Exemption (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/15/us/15tax.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin)

This anti-abortion group, Operation West, flagrantly violated IRS rules by campaigning against Kerry by name and soliciting tax-deductible donations to do so:....

[Catholics For A Free Choice] noted an advertisement Operation Rescue West placed in the July 15, 2004, edition of The Wanderer, a Roman Catholic weekly, seeking tax deductible contributions to help “defeat’’ Mr. Kerry, thus enabling President Bush to appoint Supreme Court justices who would overturn the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

At the Democratic convention, members of Operation Rescue West drove around a truck featuring a large photo of a late-stage aborted fetus and the words “Kerry’s Choice.”

A no brainer. But in addition:

Politicians across the political spectrum are courting churches this year as never before. The latest example is Attorney General Phill Kline of Kansas, a Republican who recently sent a memorandum to his campaign staff directing them to get him in front of as many congregations as possible at receptions and church services and to get ministers to introduce him to their wealthy congregants.

In a four-page memorandum dated Aug. 8, which was first reported by The Lawrence Journal-World, in Lawrence, Kan., Mr. Kline lists several churches that have agreed to distribute campaign literature. He also mentions the need to create lay campaign committees in each church and to collect church members’ e-mail addresses.

. . .

Marcus S. Owens, a lawyer who formerly headed the I.R.S. division that oversees charities, said some of the suggestions in the memorandum would cause churches to violate the law.

“Assume you’re a pastor who doesn’t know a lot about the law, and here’s the attorney general of the state coming to you and telling you it’s O.K.,” said Mr. Owens, who represents several nonprofits that the I.R.S. is investigating for possible political infractions. “Who’s going to be in a position to refute the attorney general?”

[Toto]

IRS demands records from liberal church (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-allsaints16sep16,0,6898628.story?coll=la-home-headlines)

Stepping up its probe of allegedly improper campaigning by churches, the Internal Revenue Service on Friday ordered a liberal Pasadena parish to turn over all the documents and e-mails it produced during the 2004 election year with references to political candidates.

. . .

The IRS investigation was triggered by an antiwar sermon delivered by its former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, at the church two days before the 2004 presidential election. The summons even requests utility bills to establish costs associated with hosting Regas' speech. Bacon was ordered to testify before IRS officials Oct. 11.

The congregation of the church will discuss refusing to comply.

[Toto]

Latest on All Saints Episcopal Church (http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-me-allsaints18sep18,1,2982838.story)

"I want to begin my sermon by once again expressing my gratitude to the Internal Revenue Service," he said, eliciting loud laughter from the congregation. "Those brothers and sisters really know how to shine a spotlight on a struggling church and swell the number of worshipers."

Bacon dedicated about half of his 20-minute sermon to the IRS issue, explaining that defiance could land the church in federal court. He asked parishioners to send him e-mails with their thoughts. He also noted that the summonses and other correspondence related to the case would be posted on the church's website, http://www.allsaints-pas.org .

Bacon told the congregation that, although he recognized that the church could not endorse or oppose a political candidate, neither could it remain silent in the face of "dehumanization, injustice and violence."

"History is shamefully littered with the moral bankruptcy of people who were Christian in name but not behavior," Bacon said, citing indifference by some Christians to slavery and the Holocaust.

[Toto]

IRS eyes religious groups as more enter the fray (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/18/us/politics/18church.html?_r=1&oref=slogin)

With midterm elections less than two months away, Christian conservatives are enlisting churches in eight battleground states to register voters, gather crowds for rallies and distribute voters’ guides comparing the candidates’ stands on issues that conservatives consider “family values.”

This election year, however, the religious conservatives are facing resistance from newly invigorated religious liberals and moderates who are creating their own voters’ guides and are organizing events designed to challenge the conservatives’ definition of “values.”

Both religious flanks are looking nervously over their shoulders at the Internal Revenue Service, which this year announced a renewed effort to enforce laws that limit churches and charities from involvement in partisan political campaigns.

[Lógos Sokratikós]

Beware of political activities in churches? As if you could miss it!

Ohh... It says "be aware".... Ah gotcha! ;)

[Toto]

Pastors Guiding Voters to GOP (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-churchvote1oct01,0,7179475.story?coll=la-home-headlines)

This is a rather alarming article - alarming that these pastors should be so brazen about skirting the law.

The Rev. Rick Scarborough, a leading evangelical in Texas, has recruited 5,000 "patriot pastors" nationwide to promote an agenda that aligns neatly with Republican platforms. "We urge them to avoid legal entanglement, but there are times in a pastor's life when he needs to take a biblical stand," Scarborough said. "Our higher calling is to Christ."

The campaign encourages individual pastors to use sermons, Bible studies and rallies to drive Christians to the polls — and, by implication or outright endorsement, to Republican candidates. One online guide to discussing the election in church, produced by the Focus on the Family ministry, offers this tip: If a congregant says her top concerns are healthcare and national security, suggest that Jesus would make abortion and gay marriage priorities.

. . .

Pastors have a right to work directly for candidates on their own time, as long as they don't use church resources. In a recent article aimed at evangelical preachers, Staver wrote that they "should feel free" to go even further and endorse a candidate from the pulpit because he thought the IRS law was unconstitutional. He repeatedly noted that the IRS had rarely sanctioned churches. The Church at Pierce Creek in Binghamton, N.Y., is the only one ever to lose its tax-exempt certification, for sponsoring newspaper ads that opposed presidential candidate Bill Clinton.

Far more often, IRS agents resolve complaints by training church leaders to avoid future missteps, said Lois G. Lerner, who directs the IRS unit for tax-exempt groups. In 2004, the IRS resolved dozens of complaints this way, including such blatant violations as churches donating to a candidate's campaign or placing political signs on their property.

Given the slim chance of serious sanction, "I encourage pastors to exchange their muzzles for megaphones," Staver wrote in the Rev. Jerry Falwell's monthly newspaper, the National Liberty Journal.

[crazyfingers]

IRS officials stepping up enforcement (http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/10/19/irs_officials_stepping_up_enforcement/)

The story focuses mainly on the Mormon Church and IRS rules as a sidebar a story about Mitt Romney and his use of the Mormon Church to build a national political network.