In June, the LDS formally declared they wanted to take part in a political campaign to eliminate the right of same-sex couples to marry in California.

Tax exempt much?

And why do these churches continue to believe they deserve to receive a tax exemption? 

Because Jesus said, “render unto thine pocket what is Caesar’s.”

A friend of mine, who happens to be a Presbyterian minister, is all in favour of ending all tax-exempt status for religious organizations. In her words “those exemptions made sense when the only organization that was equipped to deal with social ills and injustice was the church. But how many churches today spend the largest part of their offerings on feeding the hungry, comforting the weary, clothing the naked or housing the homeless? Others have taken over those roles, and to those others should go the cushion under their finances that was originally provided to the church. I object strongly to political messages from the pulpit, but that’s not why the church should lose its tax-exempt status. We should lose it because we are no longer (collectively) living up to the ideals that granted the status to us. In fact many churches have seperate incorporated charities to carry on their charitable works, sloughing off their original responsibilities to the communities that established them.”

Shorter: give tax exempt status to charities and not-for-profits that spend the larger part of their time and effort working in the communities, religious or non. Remove tax exempt status from those who do not do work in the communities, independant of political affiliations.

(Sighs.  Closes eyes, and rubs temples in a vain effort to get rid of the headache.)

For.  The.  Last.  Time.  You.  Deliberately.  Obtuse.  Fundamentalist.  Creeps:

There is no law whatsoever interfering with a the “clergy[‘s] ... constitutional right to endorse political candidates from their pulpits”.  None.  Zip.  Zero.  Never has been, isn’t, won’t be.  The ONLY thing at issue is a tax exemption which you only get because you are a religion.  If you wish to act in the political arena then you must play by political rules and no-one is stopping you from acting in the political arena; you merely lose a special tax privilege which applies only to people who are not participating in the political arena.

This entire nonsense boils down to you wanting to get the best of both worlds, to retain a privilege while avoiding the attendant responsibility.  Put in terms of a sports metaphor you want the baseball game to continue while you and only you are permitted to take your bat onto the basepaths and use it as you see fit.  I’d chide you for your hypocricy but there really is no hypocricy here.  You have always been open about the fact that America should be run by your kind and for your kind alone and everybody else should go to the pack of the bus.  The annoying thing is that you whine and complain and lie like mad (helllloooo, remember the Ninth Commandment?) about all this, saying that your Rights are threatened when in fact it is your Privileges, unfair advantages, that you want to retain.

Pastors unequivocally have the right to preach whatever the fuck they feel their god(s) tell them to preach.  They, however, do not have the same equivocal right to tax-exempt status.  Somebody kindly pull out the Constitution and show that to them.

Hell, this might backfire in a very important way- they may end up betting the house and losing it.

Why do these people want special rights?

gwangung:
Because they’re important and you’re not.  Because they’re special and you’re not.  Because what they believe is more important than what you think.  Because only they matter and you don’t.  Now fuck off and go paint their fence.

This is a sucker’s fight.  They’re counting on the left publicly freaking out over this so that they can indulge their martard complex, and paint all of us as anti-church, anti-god, and anti-freedom of speech.  They’re begging to be attacked, precisely because our attack will fit precisely into their framing of religious freedom issues in this country.  Don’t get me wrong, I think all these idiots should be stripped of their tax-exempt status, but this is purely strategy on their part to motivate the christian fundie whackjob base.

Brylock’s point is a valid one.  The problem with it, though is that they are ludicrously easy to energize; it’s like ramping a dog up to almost hysterical level.  That gives the left some freedom of movement, though.  If we shut up then the pastors get what they want because there is no corresponding counterpressure; if we push back then, yes, the fundies will froth and energize but they’re going to do that anyway.  They are, for the most political part, easily-led one dimensional simpletons at their ministers’ beck and call and nothing will give them any perspective or empathy.  It’s either fight ‘em or give ‘em what they want without a fight.  And, as others having noted, they are losing because the radical notions so dear to their heart are becoming a smaller and smaller part of the American cultural psyche. 

Really, it’s time progressives stopped implicitly thinking, “oh dear, I’m going into this with odds of at least three to one in my favour, so I must be doomed!!!”

(btw, Brylock, that jab about defeatism isn’t at you personally, at all.  I was moving out to a more general complaint about we on the left.)

Go to a big box nondenominational conservative church on Sunday 9/28 and be prepared to disrupt services if the priest should endorse a political candidate.

Actually, this crap should lead to a taxpayer revolt.  Why should my taxes subsidize someone else’s religious practices?  That’s basically what happens in many municipalities as churches don’t pay property taxes yet use town services (fire, police, etc).

So when a wingnut tries to argue that there’s not actually any separation between church and state in the Constitution (I’ve seen this plenty of times), and sits back while their church enjoys tax-exempt status, what exactly do they think is going on?

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Seeker, I agree with you, yet I would say that this is why the fight is almost pointless in the first place.  The people that this is going to rile aren’t going to vote democratic under almost any circumstance, so what’s the point of engaging in a fight that might get some of the people who would have stayed home to get up off of their butts and go vote? If we were able to successfully stop these endorsements or change the tax status of these churches, I agree that it would be a victory for the rule of law and the separation of church and state, but it will come with an electoral cost (probably with only minimal gain from liberals to counterbalance) that we could just as easily defer until after the election.  I’d say let it slide until after November, and then sue them or strip their tax exempt status, but do it after the election.  Coming out swinging before that point seems like harvesting the honey before you get the smoke gun or the beekeeper’s suit.  There’s probably an applicable Sun Tzu quote somewhere about not allowing your enemy to choose the time & location of the fight.  It’s not defeatism, it’s just electoral strategy.