Family Research Council Is Now A Church In Eyes Of The IRS

TPM Article Topics
1

This article was originally published by ProPublica, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom.

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1423577
2

I think I’ll register my law firm as a church. No scrutiny. No taxes.

17 Likes
3

If religious institutions such as the school in Maine can now receive public tax dollars, then religious institutions must be included to the realm of the taxed.

24 Likes
4

All you need to do is make up some ridiculous BS and claim that you sincerely believe it and you are all set, a new Religion!

2 Likes
5

If the IRS questions you about that, just proclaim the you practice sharia law. /s

15 Likes
6

I am surprised the FRC waited until 2016 to file as a Church. It’s mission has been to support right wing evangelical initiatives and politicians since it’s founding.

@rob_beatty7_waiters, your lawfirm would be following in the footsteps of the Westboro Baptist Church. It was among other dispicable things a lawfirm turned church.

8 Likes
7

Are you guys seeing the outline yet? Citz United is the tap that Roberts turned a dozen years ago. IRS is full of evangelicals, as are state education boards, the military, DOJ and the rest.

Evangelical churches use cult tactics to recruit, they do it in schools across the Midwest, and they do it as a stated aim of their faith.

Collusion between the rich and the church is setting us up for a second Reformation, and ‘originalism’ is the way they will do it. They have the justices now, and they are using them.

15 Likes
8

You mean “Sharia Lawn”?

6 Likes
9

Love it!

1 Like
10

This is just such BS. I’ll bet the Ku Klux Klan has registered as a church also. The IRS should treat all non-profits the same - no transparency limits on churchs.

This smacks as a blatent violation of the Establishment Clause in the 1st Amendment. Treating the FRC any differently than Goodwill Industries or Save the Children is ESTABLISHING a religion as a preferred organization WRT the public’s right to know.

20 Likes
11

The IRS treatment of all of our religious institutions does smack of a violation of the establishment clause, because it is. Sadly the IRS treatment of churches is well established in law. Our congress people of all stripes love churches. The best we can hope for is they don’t treat any religious group better than another.

2 Likes
12

Thereby underscoring the long-standing need to stop making churches tax exempt.

17 Likes
13

I call bullshit.

4 Likes
14

White Christian evangelicalism has very little to do with Christ and a lot to do with establishing a state religion based on racist quasi-Christian sounding principles. There is a reason we think of the South when we think of evangelicalism.

8 Likes
15

The “religious” thread between the FRC and the KKK is their “belief” that colored people are inferior. The FRC wants to take away their rights to vote, while the KKK wants to hang them from trees.

It’s a distinction without a difference. Neither group has ANYTHING to do with Jesus of Nazareth or His teachings at the Sermon on the Mount. As a TRUE believer, I can tell you that members of both these groups are unrepentent sinners and likely going straight to Hell.

5 Likes
16

Hell is just a myth created for purposes of control and to make sure we believe our enemies will suffer after their death.

4 Likes
17

Dude! Get off my Sharia Lawn!

5 Likes
18

I worked with them in LA 25 years ago in a pretend-education nonprofit that at the time was 30 years old, and targeted schoolchildren.

The original iteration involved an hour-long program that only the first 45 minutes of were shown in schools. It ended on a cliffhanger, and the children were encouraged to find out how the show ended by attending a showing ‘off-campus’ that was staffed by evangelicals trained to argue with other religions - I saw the training materials.

This has been going on a long time, and we are seeing it bear fruit right now.

6 Likes
19

Frankly, I have never understood how churches can own real property and have employees and pay salaries to ministers and leave them untaxed? It is not making laws regarding the practice of religion to require religious people/institutions to pay taxes. I guess the stretch argument is that it would require “parishoners” to give more to the church to cover those taxes and it is against the church’s “beliefs” to “demand” more money (that the church doesn’t get to keep for whatever it wants)???

7 Likes
20

“The IRS uses a list of 14 characteristics to determine if an organization is a church or an association of churches, though it notes that organizations need not meet all the specifications.”

I just read that list, and while TPM doesn’t meet all the specifications, it still meets a number of them.

So I think I spot a new angle, not just for Mr. Marshall and company, but for us as well…

Brothers and Sisters, can I get an “Amen” for tax-deductible Prime Membership fees?!

23 Likes