Originally published on Forbes.com July 23rd, 2014
The Freedom From Religion Foundation has scored another victory, kind of. It had taken on the IRS over the agency’s apparent reluctance to do anything about church politicking. The case prompted the intervention of Father Patrick Malone of the Holy Cross Anglican Church in Milwaukee. Holy Cross Anglican doesn’t have its own church building so they meet at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, which is kind of ironic if you remember how the English monarchs earned the title, Defender of the Faith. Nonetheless, Father Malone thinks it important that he be able to tell his congregants who to vote for and is unmoved by the notion that his parish’s exempt status is probably not worth the powder to blow it away. Father Malone’s intervention was backed by the Becket Fund, which has quite a bit more in the way of resources.
Churches are generally not-for-profits. As a matter of fact, being a church is probably the most enviable tax status available. Recognition as a 501(c)(3) is automatic for churches and they are not required to file Form 990. (Freedom From Religion Foundation has a case going on that issue). Then there are the unlimited tax free housing allowances for the mega pastors of the mega churches. You don’t want me to get started on that. FFRF has won in district court on the housing allowance issue and we are breathlessly waiting an appellate decision. Churches are not, however, exempt from rules limiting political activity by not-for-profits.
Some preachers have decided they don’t like that rule about not engaging in political activity. They have started something called “Pulpit Freedom Sunday”. The idea is that they give political sermons, which they tape and then send into the IRS. After six years of this idiocy, they are underwhelmed by the IRS response.
The IRS seems to have simply ignored Pulpit Freedom Sunday. So what is going through the IRS’ collective mind on this issue?
You can read the article if you want their speculations. My thinking is the IRS has just over 90,000 people working for it and only a bit over 20,000 are actually enforcement people. (According to Ted Cruz, though there are 110,000 agents, who he wants to send to watch the border. He’ll replace the income tax with a Fair Tax, which will require nobody at all to collect it. I guess because it is so fair. Either that or he is a candidate for moron in chief.) The revenue agents who are really the heart of enforcement are educated as accountants. How many of the 20,000 or so accountants tasked with collecting over $2 trillion dollars should be diverted to listening to sermons to figure out how political they are? Zero sounds like a pretty good number to me. Plenty of other places to fight crime.
Of course, FFRF did not like this apparent hands off church politics attitude, which is why the lawsuit was started. Well, for now, it is settled. Apparently, the IRS has satisfied FFRF that it has a protocol in place to enforce rules about churches getting involved in elections. Of course, at the moment, the IRS is hampered in enforcing rules concerning any not-for-profits engaging in politics, but that is another story.
The IRS and FFRF have filed a joint motion for dismissal. Father Malone and Holy Cross have not joined in the motion. Apparently, there is hope there for more discovery and dismissal with prejudice. Reminds me of the Rick Warren case, that the Ninth Circuit wanted to keep alive. We’ll see what happens.
In the meantime, this year’s Pulpit Freedom Sunday is scheduled for October 5. You won’t find me in the pews, but you can follow me on twitter @peterreillycpa.