{"id":2974,"date":"2010-09-26T02:20:35","date_gmt":"2010-09-26T09:20:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=2974"},"modified":"2010-09-26T02:20:35","modified_gmt":"2010-09-26T09:20:35","slug":"today-is-pulpit-freedom-sunday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2010\/09\/26\/today-is-pulpit-freedom-sunday\/","title":{"rendered":"Today Is Pulpit Freedom Sunday"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, you ask, what is Pulpit Freedom Sunday?  It\u2019s a special day for hypocritical Republican pastors to demonstrate their patriotism by breaking US law and to demonstrate their faith by openly endorsing Republican and Republican candidates with anti-Christian agendas from the pulpit.<\/font><\/p>\n

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\"Hypocrite\" In a fashion right out of the annals of right wind [sic] demagoguery, September 26th, 2010 brings us the third installment of "Pulpit Freedom Sunday<\/a>." <\/p>\n

Brought to us by the Alliance Defense Fund [pseudo-Christians delinked] as a challenge to IRS rules not allowing specific endorsements of political candidates from the pulpit. Churches can, and do, pass out flyers that are very partisan, "voter guides" that are nothing more than right wing propaganda, and take positions on legislation and initiatives<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The Mormon Church was the single biggest funding source for California’s Proposition 8, for example. The IRS law gets them get away with so much, but of course it’s not enough for the right wing mouthpieces wanting to dominate all areas of American life. <\/p>\n

The blow hards would have you believe they are being censored<\/strong>. Not true, they are free to say whatever they want. The IRS regulation only restricts them from endorsing candidates if they wish to keep their tax-exempt status.<\/p>\n

IRS regulations specify that 501(c)(3) organizations, which include churches and other religious organizations, are prohibited from \u201c[participating in or intervening in]\u2026any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for public office.\u201d Rev. Rul. 2007-41, 2007-25 I.R.B.<\/p>\n

It’s not the right to speak the ADF is looking to ensure, but the "right" to do it essentially on the tax payer dime<\/strong>. For if they were labeled in accordance with their political activity, their tax duty would change. <\/p>\n

Billions of dollars of potential tax revenue are lost every year to churches choosing to abuse the privilege… [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Portland Examiner<\/a>><\/p>\n

As the Treasurer of a small non-profit public service group, I do not endorse candidates during activities for that organization, because we are 501(c)(3) pending.  That\u2019s the law, and vecause of my volunteer work, I know a few things about it.<\/font><\/p>\n

No organization is subject to the ban on endorsements, unless they voluntarily apply for 501(c)(3) status and voluntarily agree to abide by the laws pertaining to that status.  Nobody twisted their arms.  Nobody is discriminating against them or violating their rights.  If they do not wish to keep their own commitment, they may freely withdraw at any time and do as they please, but without a tax exemption.<\/font><\/p>\n

When they lie under the false cover of faith, they should be relegated to Infernal Revenue, because Internal Revenue is too good for these Republican hypocrites.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So, you ask, what is Pulpit Freedom Sunday?  It\u2019s a special day for hypocritical Republican pastors to demonstrate their patriotism by breaking US law and to demonstrate their faith by openly endorsing Republican and Republican candidates with anti-Christian agendas from the pulpit. In a fashion right out of the annals of right wind [sic] demagoguery, […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-religion","category-5-id","category-47-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2974\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}