Over on Alternet.org is a great article on how a religious law group is pressuring churches to violate IRS tax law by intervening in political campaigns.
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http://www.alternet.org/democracy/89023/?page=entire>
You can read the whole article there. For the sake of discussion, I want you to pay attention to this part;
Cureton’s comment occurred after Folger mentioned that some members of her church were thinking of voting for U.S. Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
“It just seems to me that the messages are somehow not reaching the congregations,” Folger said. “Is it the pastors that need to speak more clearly? What’s the answer?”
“I think that’s the case,” Cureton replied. “The pastors need to speak clearly about it. I’ll tell you we are working with the Alliance Defense Fund on a series of sermons this fall for pastors to preach, so that they educate their people on the issues.
“We’re gonna be talking about the value of life, the value of family and the value of freedom,” he continued, “basically talking about abortion and stem-cell research and then also about the gay agenda and then finally about our Christian heritage and how it’s being stripped from every corner of society. And then finally we’re gonna be doing a candidate comparison message that is going to ask pastors to cross the line.”
“Really?” said Folger. “What do you mean ‘cross the line’? You’re going to be suggesting they tell people who to vote for?”
Cureton replied, “We’re going to prompt pastors, and say to them that, you know, we really believe that they need to challenge some of the things, some of the thinking that we have going on in our society, which is that separation of church and state doctrine, that we really need to preach the Bible on these issues and apply them to the things that are going on in the culture today.”
Other organizations have indicated they would like to challenge the IRS regulation. Last year, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty ran a full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal trumpeting the claims of a minister in the Midwest who insisted he had violated the law and challenging the IRS to act. (The ploy turned out to be a publicity stunt to promote a Becket Fund Web site.)That's right, folks. This is what it's about:
brainwashing. The Religious Right, or at least the most hardcore element of the Right, isn't interested in furthering the spiritual development of its members; it wants to keep them voting and contributing to the GOP.
It's not about GOD, they don't believe in the teachings of Jesus. This is their God
and the separation of church and state is their Satan.
Currently, they're trying to find a dupe to take the ball and run with it thru the courts. The article lists one already.
But wait- there's more
“I think very few clergy will yield to the Alliance Defense Fund’s worldly temptation,” Lynn said. “And those who do will find their churches’ tax exemptions in jeopardy. I assume the ADF will provide a list of congregations unwise enough to join this move, and we’ll be ready to report those churches to the IRS.”
Lynn said clergy know they are free to speak out on religious, moral and political issues. But they cannot use tax-exempt resources to support or oppose candidates for public office, which includes statements from the pulpit by church officials and other indications of campaign intervention. This isn't your local Christian Methodist church with 50 members and 5 staffers doing this; this 'crash the gates' mentality is coming from those super-sized McChurches with highly politicized clergy, tens of thousands of attendees, and even a Starbucks in the church. This isn't about teaching people not to promote abortion, this is about using their religious status to act as de facto fundraisers for GOP coffers, regardless of whether that's the will of the people of their church or not. This is about hijacking a (albeit scummy) political party thru 'bundling' and the church wants to be tax-free religious 'lobbyists' and 'bundlers'.
Kudos to those thousands of churches (liberal or otherwise) who aren't falling for this BS attempt to crash the courts before Obama or McKinney wins in 08.