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Message
re: Religious 501(c)(3) need to be suspended
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:47 am to FooManChoo
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:47 am to FooManChoo
quote:Churches should pay real estate taxes. 100%. My church, too. The churches use public infrastructure that our taxes pay for, such as the road and highway system to get there, the drainage system to make sure the roads don't flood so you can get there. The cost of obtaining easements for water, gas, electric. If there's a need for it, our police and fire services are at their disposal, too.
Churches are not businesses. Pastors and other paid staff already pay personal income taxes. Most small churches couldn’t afford to keep the lights on if they were not exempt from federal and state taxes. You could easily add a financial burden of 15% to 30% which most churches couldn’t absorb.
That doesn’t even touch on the intrusion of the state into the church.
So why do churches get a tax exemption and not have to pay like everyone else does for all of these services? Don't give me this separation of church and state stuff. That has nothing to do (or shouldn't) with being a responsible organization that pays for it's share of city and state services.
1
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:48 am to FooManChoo
quote:
Churches do not operate like businesses where profits go to shareholders as bonuses but to the community through mercy services and ministry outreach, which is why there is a not-for-profit designation today.
You're describing expenses with your examples.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:48 am to wackatimesthree
quote:
Was the government the entity who approved the structure I offered as a solution to taxation?
Absolutely. If they decide to tax Option A and not Option B they're attempting social engineering. That works out so well every other time they try it, so let's apply it to churches?
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:48 am to Flats
quote:
I also don't understand why this is only about religious 501s. Well, I have my suspicions but it's not logical.
It would apply to all of them, IMHO
Posted on 6/25/26 at 8:50 am to SlowFlowPro
quote:
It would apply to all of them, IMHO
The OP and most of the discussion is specifically about religious exemptions. That's weirdly inconsistent.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 9:49 am to FooManChoo
quote:
The power to tax is the power to destroy.
Churches are not businesses. Pastors and other paid staff already pay personal income taxes. Most small churches couldn’t afford to keep the lights on if they were not exempt from federal and state taxes. You could easily add a financial burden of 15% to 30% which most churches couldn’t absorb.
That doesn’t even touch on the intrusion of the state into the church.
hmmmm,
something about..... Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 10:02 am to Flats
quote:
The OP and most of the discussion is specifically about religious exemptions. That's weirdly inconsistent.
I think, and I could be wrong, he's targeting religions in a somewhat ironic way to attack what he perceives as inauthentic/fake religions being critical of his preferred politics.
I knew when he made this thread it would get reacts, b/c the common sentiment from the more traditional social conservatives....differs greatly from his OP thesis.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 11:50 am to Flats
quote:
If they decide to tax Option A and not Option B they're attempting social engineering.
That's literally what you are arguing for, not me.
I'm arguing for taxing every organization the same way.
House churches and bivocational pastors don't get taxed because they are in a special classification (which again, is what you are defending here). They don't get taxed because according to the rules of how everyone gets taxed, they don't qualify to pay any.
Because they don't take in any money or own any assets.
If you think that's some kind of special classification designed to pick winners and losers at the government level, I guess we need to roll back the tape and discuss income taxes in general. Because it sounds like you think under an income tax situation people who don't have any income should still pay income tax for the system to be fair.
This post was edited on 6/25/26 at 12:08 pm
Posted on 6/25/26 at 12:21 pm to FooManChoo
quote:
So you are suggesting fewer churches then?
If the community can only support n-1 churches, then that's what the community gets.
Perhaps the Methodist churches will be able to support fewer pride parades with 501(c)(3) being suspended. The real world is full of choices and tradeoffs.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 12:46 pm to LemmyLives
quote:
Perhaps the Methodist churches will be able to support fewer pride parades with 501(c)(3) being suspended. The real world is full of choices and tradeoffs.
Flats, this is what I was describing in my post above
Posted on 6/25/26 at 12:55 pm to wackatimesthree
quote:
If you think that's some kind of special classification designed to pick winners and losers at the government level,
That's what our entire tax code is, and I'd just as soon leave religion out of that pissing match. I believe the potential harm is far, far greater than whatever problem this is supposed to solve.
What problem is this solving, BTW? Has anybody run the numbers on how cities and towns are failing because churches don't pay property tax or is the magnitude of the tax exemption trivial and people just don't like that churches don't pay property tax because it's not fair?
Posted on 6/25/26 at 12:57 pm to LemmyLives
quote:That is why the Global Methodist Church broke away from the heathens so please don't group us in with them.
Perhaps the United Methodist churches will be able to support fewer pride parades with 501(c)(3) being suspended. The real world is full of choices and tradeoffs.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 1:00 pm to DeBoar
So you want to get rid of tax exemption for an entire class non-profits because one person criticized the President and you don't like that?
Seems like a huge overreaction.
Seems like a huge overreaction.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 1:02 pm to DeBoar
I remember this clown from Jerry Springer 
He has been disciplined by the Archbishop there many times. I don't view this guy as a Catholic at all.
He has been disciplined by the Archbishop there many times. I don't view this guy as a Catholic at all.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 1:22 pm to Flats
quote:
That's what our entire tax code is
O.k., if that's the way you want to look at it. I guess anything other than a flat tax would resemble that assessment, which is fair enough.
quote:
I'd just as soon leave religion out of that pissing match.
But that's the thing. You can be as religious as you like and choose to not be involved in that pissing match at all. That's my whole point.
No one is proposing being taxed on the basis of religiosity. The proposal is taxing organizational income and assets. You do not have to have those things to be religious.
What I am asking is why there is an assumption of entitlement to have those things. Having them is not a requisite to worship or observe any religion I know of; it's just a choice.
Not to mention, getting special exemptions doesn't exempt churches from the entire tax code struggle. All it does is makes them a winner instead of a loser. But it's not like it really sets them aside.
This discussion reminds me of when gay marriage was being debated and gay people would claim that the government was discriminating because they wouldn't let them get married. People on the opposite side would (rightly, IMO) point out that they absolutely could get married, just like anybody else. They could marry someone of the opposite sex.
The gays claimed that if they couldn't marry anybody they wanted, that = discrimination.
That seems to be your argument here. Churches should be able to accumulate assets and income without taxation and if they can't, then they are being discriminated against even though they can still worship to their hearts desire without incurring a tax bill. They can't do it any way they want, they have to do it the way everybody else has to do it, so that = discrimination.
quote:
What problem is this solving, BTW?
1. It would be reducing the degree to which winners and losers are picked
by government to have assets and income taxed the same for all
organizations.
2. Right now religious tax-exempt non-profits do not have to file tax returns
or Form 990 with the IRS, so the potential for mismanagement of funds,
fraud, or other types of exploitation of donors is high.
3. Church assets and organizations benefit from infrastructure and local,
county, and state services just like all other organizations. Why shouldn't
they have to kick in for them? Especially when some of them have assets
that rival my child's middle school campus?
Besides, this again sounds like the gay marriage argument. "What do you care, it's not affecting your life? What's the harm?"
I'm not sure those are great arguments. I certainly didn't buy them in the context of gay marriage, anyway.
This post was edited on 6/25/26 at 1:24 pm
Posted on 6/25/26 at 1:34 pm to wackatimesthree
quote:
What I am asking is why there is an assumption of entitlement to have those things.
I don't think it's an assumption, just an acknowledgment that's how we do things here. Yeah, there are down sides but it seems to work ok, and I don't think you've proposed a great argument to change it. You don't even know the magnitude of the tax income you're talking about and I see a huge, huge downside to giving the government this power that it doesn't currently have, and I hope people would have that same attitude about government power in general.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 1:57 pm to FooManChoo
quote:
have no idea, but by our current laws and tax code, they are required to pay individual income taxes.
On declared income. How about their free rent at the parsonage? How about exorbitant per diem on their "work trips"? With no tax returns just what are the checks and balances?
Posted on 6/25/26 at 2:50 pm to Flats
There really are striking differences between black and white churches in America. It's pretty rare for a white guy to worry about his wife sleeping with the preacher but if you're working out of town and ask your black co-worker if something happened because your wife saw his preacher's car in his driveway at 8 am you have to be sure and tell him you were joking before he heads home ballbat in hand.
Posted on 6/25/26 at 3:01 pm to DeBoar
Scientology will fight this with their huge fortune
Posted on 6/25/26 at 4:12 pm to Flats
quote:
I don't think you've proposed a great argument to change it
It's essentially the same argument for switching to a flat personal tax from a graduated income tax.
Do you think that argument is insufficient as well?
After all, what we have now is working o.k. (The tax part of our situation isn't the problem; it's the spending side that has our arse in a crack.)
To me, advocating for something that is more fair is a sufficient argument for change.
quote:
You don't even know the magnitude of the tax income you're talking about
Well, it's not really an argument based on tax revenue or practical result. It's an argument based on principle. Like I said, fairness.
But based on that comment, it's either a lot of tax revenue or it's not. If it's not, then why not just pay it? If it is, then the problem in that case is obvious.
quote:
I see a huge, huge downside to giving the government this power that it doesn't currently have
Oh, the government has the power all right. That's one of the things that has actually been in the Constitution from the beginning. They've always had the power to tax. They've just chosen not to in this case. They can do it any time they want.
quote:
I hope people would have that same attitude about government power in general.
Now it sounds like we're making the same arguments that people made about Trump's "no tax on tips."
"Any reduction of taxes is a step in the right direction."
I opposed that too. Because it's only a step in the right direction in my world if it's applied equally.
Like I said way earlier, if we're talking about not taxing any organization's assets or income, cool, I'm on board. If we're talking about lowering taxes on everybody, cool, I'm on board.
I'm not for government sponsored winners and losers, though, and I would hope that people would have that same attitude about government picking winners and losers in general.
And yeah, I know you've said that the current tax code is all picking winners and losers, but I don't see how maintaining this unequal treatment—which is, by definition, what it is—does anything except support the winners and losers dynamic. I personally am for moving away from that as much as possible.
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