The Long Arm of the IRS

I watched a segment on The News Hour this evening about an IRS investigation into the tax-exempt status of a church in Southern California. The issue is whether or not the church endorsed a particular political candidate; if it did so, the church could lose its tax-exempt status under the law. I’m surprised the Left isn’t all over this one. Actually, I’m surprised everyone isn’t all over this. The IRS is investigating over 100 tax-exempt organizations to determine if they should lose their tax exempt status due to “political activity.” The LA Times reports:

Over the last year, the Internal Revenue Service has looked at more than 100 tax-exempt organizations across the country for allegations of promoting — either explicitly or implicitly — candidates on both ends of the political spectrum, according to the IRS. None have lost their nonprofit status, though investigations continue into about 60 of those.

The LA Times further reports some conservative churches are rallying against the IRS investigations.

When Ted Haggard, head of the 30-million-member National Assn. of Evangelicals, heard about the All Saints case Monday, he told his staff to contact the National Council of Churches, a more liberal group.

Haggard said he personally supports the war in Iraq and probably would not agree with much in the Rev. George Regas' 2004 sermon at All Saints, which was cited by the IRS as the basis for its investigation. But Haggard said he wants to work with the council of churches "in doing whatever it takes to get the IRS to stop" such actions.

"It is a violation of the Constitution for the IRS to threaten that church. It may not be a violation of IRS regulations, but IRS regulations have been wrong," said Haggard, who is pastor of the 12,000-member New Life Church in Colorado Springs.

Central to this investigation is All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, CA. The incident that initiated the IRS investigation of this particular church was a sermon given on October 31, 2004 – three days before the presidential election – that was decidedly anti-Bush. Here’s the link to the entire sermon. You can read it and judge for yourself. If you don’t want to read the whole thing, here are a few excerpts.

“God loathes war. At the time of the trauma of September 11th you did not have to declare war. You could have said to the American people and the world, ‘We will respond but not in kind. We will not seek to avenge the death of innocent Americans by the death of innocent victims elsewhere, lest we become what we abhor.’ ”

Jesus continues: “Mr. President, your doctrine of preemptive war is a failed doctrine. Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster. “It will take years for the widely felt hostility in Iraq and around the world to ebb. The consequences of arrogance, accompanied by certitude that the world’s most powerful military can cure all ills, should be burned into America’s memory forever.

And…

Jesus began his ministry in Nazareth saying, “I have come to preach the good news to the poor and liberation to those who are oppressed.” Poverty is a religious issue.

The gap between rich and poor is greater than it has been in 50 years. The poor are getting poorer, the health care crisis is getting worse, the income of the typical household is stagnating, the average weekly wages have fallen, and the safety net for the unemployed and the casualties of the American system has been shredded. And in the midst of all that, President Bush asks and gets income tax reductions where 50% of the tax savings goes to the top 1% of the wealthiest Americans, those averaging $1,200,000 a year in income.

All of that would break Jesus’ heart.

And…

If Jesus entered this debate, I think these words might come from his lips: “Shame on all those conservative politicians in the nation’s Congress and in State Legislatures who have for years so proudly proclaimed their love for children when they were only fetuses—but ignored their needs after they were born.”

Yes, yes Jesus admonishes us. “It is the cruelest irony how so many of these antiabortion politicians have no interest in the things that make a newborn child healthy and beautiful. It violates every standard of decency to force a poor woman to have a child, and then deny her good prenatal care.”

All of this needs to be part of our thinking on November 2nd. Conservative politicians with the blessing of the Religious Right have strongly advocated the dismantling of social programs that provide a decent life for children once they enter this world. The ultimate test of a society is the kind of world it creates for its children. And what we have allowed to happen to children in America is a moral scandal and breaks the heart of God. No matter what rhetoric is used, any public policy that makes a child’s life more miserable is an abomination before God.

On November 2nd vote all your values. Bring a sensitive conscience to that ballot box.

I’m firmly against the IRS’ investigation of churches and their political points of view. If the law is explicit in its prohibitions against making political points from the pulpit, then the law should be changed. Personally, I do not agree with the All Saints rector’s politics. I’d vote with my feet and resign from any organization that held views incompatible with my own. But I’d want his church’s tax exempt status to remain intact.