Welcome to Call to Decision
Pastors Challenging Who?
by Robert McCurry
Just in case you don’t know who it is that a few pastors are challenging, I won’t keep you in suspense. World Net Daily reported on September 26, 2009,
Dozens of pastors around the nation are challenging an Internal Revenue Service rule that anti-Christian activists often invoke when they want to silence the message of churches, according to the Alliance Defense Fund.
The organization has announced that more than 80 preachers are taking part in its second annual Pulpit Freedom Sunday this weekend (Sept 27).
The pastors will preach Sunday sermons related to biblical perspectives on the positions of electoral candidates or current government officials, exercising their constitutional right to free religious expression, the ADF said.
They will do so despite a "problematic" IRS rule that activists use when they want to silence the message of Christians, the ADF said.
"Pastors have a right to speak about biblical truths from the pulpit without fear of punishment. No one should be able to use the government to intimidate pastors into giving up their constitutional rights," ADF senior legal counsel Erik Stanley explained.
"ADF is not trying to get politics into the pulpit. On the contrary, the whole point is that churches should be allowed to decide for themselves what they want to talk about. The IRS should not be the one making the decision by threatening to revoke a church's tax-exempt status. We need the government to get out of the pulpit," he said.
The censorship for church pastors has been in place since the Johnson Amendment was added to the Federal Tax Code in 1954. However, enforcement has been spotty and the results have been vague, even though critics of Christian churches contend it limits what they can say from the pulpit.
The IRS has repeatedly launched investigations of churches based on allegations from organizations such as Americans United for Separation of Church and State, whose officials have taken advantage of the vagueness to report church "offenses."
Stanley explained that, contrary to the misunderstandings of many, tax-exempt status is not a "gift" or "subsidy" from the government.
"Churches were completely free to preach about candidates from the day that the Constitution was ratified in 1788 until 1954," explained Stanley. "The real effect of the Johnson Amendment is that pastors are muzzled for fear of investigation by the IRS. Rather than risk confrontation, many pastors have self-censored their speech, afraid to be critical of blatant immorality in government and foregoing opportunities to praise moral government leaders. The participants in Pulpit Freedom Sunday refuse to be intimidated into sacrificing their First Amendment rights."
The Pulpit Initiative is a strategic litigation plan which, through lawsuits, is intended to restore the right of every pastor to speak scriptural truth from the pulpit about moral, social and government issues.
Bob Unrue, September 26, 2009, World Bet Daily
And what are the rest of us supposed to say? “Hip hip hooray!”?
First, I do not wish to criticize the ADF or these 80 pastors for this action to call attention to a situation that should have been dealt with long ago, that is, government interference with churches, pastors, and preaching. But I can’t say, “Hip hip hooray!” in this instant matter. More on this later.
Second, since I am not acquainted with the church polity where these 80 pastors preach, it is unwise for me to direct any comments directly to them. However, I can direct my comments to pastors and churches at large on this subject.
Let’s begin by defining the problem. I am not a lawyer and my comments are not “legal advice.” However, I can read and understand the English language. I hope you can also.
“Tax-exemption” is a “privilege” granted by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to organizations that voluntarily apply for this “privilege” and qualify for “tax-exemption” by meeting a prescribed criteria under the 501(c)(3) IRS Code. It is a contractual government “license” to function and receive “tax-deductible contributions.” Interestingly, churches are not mentioned in the 501(c)(3) code and churches are in fact “mandatory excepted”—not “exempted” but “excepted”--from filing for this “license” and “tax-exempt” status. A church is by constitutional right—non-taxable.
Since there is no federal or state lawful/constitutional definition of “church”, how would the government recognize a “church” if it found one? IRS Commissioner Jerome Kurtz purportedly solved this problem in 1977 when he structured, implemented, and mandated for the first time in America history a 14 point criteria for a “church.”
Church
Defined - IRS Church Definition
1. A distinct legal existence
2. A recognized creed and form of worship
3. A definite and distinct ecclesiastical
government
4. A formal code of doctrine and discipline
5. A distinct religious history
6. A membership not associated with any other
church or denomination
7. An organization of ordained ministers
8. Ordained ministers selected after
completing prescribed studies
9. A literature of its own
10. Established places of worship
11. Regular congregations
12. Regular religious services
13. Sunday schools for religious instruction of the
young
14. Schools for the preparation of its ministers.
According to the IRS, not all of the 14 criteria must be met by every individual church, but a “reasonable” number of them, as arbitrarily selected by the IRS, must be met.
Since the majority of churches in America have volunteered to be government approved and licensed by the IRS 501(c)(3) tax-exempt code, it is reasonable to believe that the majority, if not all, of these 80 pastors are the pastor of a government approved and licensed State church. Remember “tax-exemption” is a “privilege” and a “privilege” granted can become a “privilege” rescinded.
An incorporated/IRS 501(c)(3) “church” is a State church.
In an August 14, 1983 issue of The Temple Times I said:
“A State church is a church that is recognized by the State, serves the State, provides revenue for the State, and serves a public purpose that is not contrary to established public policy. This is exactly what was decreed for churches of America.
Churches will be registered with the State by tax-identification numbers.
Churches will be producers of revenue for the State by paying taxes ‘to assure the solvency of the Social Security Trust Funds.’ Taxable organizations are answerable to the government – open to the inspection and dictates of the government.
Churches will be agents of the State by confiscating and remitting to the State taxes that the State has ordered the church to confiscate from the remuneration of church ministers.
Churches will be servants of the State by keeping records for and remitting records to the State.
Of course, this is just the beginning. The full impact of what will be imposed on the churches is yet to be seen. Once a State church has been decreed, the door is open to an endless number of impositions.”
Since this instant matter regarding the 80 pastors has a defective point of beginning, it arrives at a defective conclusion. But I commend the ADF and these 80 pastors for striking at a truth and alerting others to a serious problem that demands the attention and response of every pastor and church in America.
Wake-up, Pastors! Wake-Up, Christians!