I’ll give you that this is probably not a constitutional issue.

Should probably have read: I’ll give you that taxation is probably not a constitutional issue.

On the face of it, “Get the hell out of here, but leave your wallet by the door” didn’t sound right to me. Couple that with my misunderstanding of tax law (which is only somewhat clearer now), and I had my first position. I have to concede you are probably right that constitutional law still prevents us from pulling out stops between church and state, even if state taxes church. Still, as I wrote: “We are talking about power hungry, ‘We are so persecuted’ Christians, after all.”

They have been making a power grab for some time. These days they are better organized, and they are gaining momentum. I am not sure taxation is a fight worth picking at the moment. Crank call one of our right wing fundamentalist loud mouths, and if you can be at all convincing that tax exemption for churches is under serious threat, you could then sit back and listen to why I get an uneasy feeling about it.

Get the line between church and state so solid and thick that same-sex marriages are legal in all states, that abortion is not under constant attack (and there have been some calls too close for comfort), that I don’t have to copy and mail to my childrens’ schools the law regarding prayer in the classroom, etc., and then pick with them the kind of fight that will surely cause them to stand together tighter and stronger.

Get the line between church and state so solid and thick ... and then pick with them the kind of fight that will surely cause them to stand together tighter and stronger.

Correct strategy, I agree.  Unfortunately part of the money they are using for a power-grab comes from our taxes in the form of that untouchable exemption.  It’s a disadvantage we’ll just have to live with, I suppose.

DOF: It’s a disadvantage we’ll just have to live with, I suppose.

Consi: There are precious few organizations whose community value would be missed more.  The better question is how do we encourage more of these organizations?

Connect the dots. Why not beat them at their own game?

Okay, an uber response as best as my limited abilities shall permit:

DOF:

In the United States, the practice of exempting institutions from federal taxes evolved
during most of this century, but its beginning goes back to the Civil War and stems from
British common law. At the state level, institutions dedicated to religion, education,
poverty relief, or social welfare have received special treatment under tax law since Colonial times.

In 1863, when the federal government imposed a corporate income tax for the first time, it exempted charitable organizations. The Revenue Act of 1894 and the Revenue Act of 1913 also provided that organizations operated for charitable purposes would be exempt from tax. Donations by individuals to charitable organizations were
made tax-deductible in 1917. Corporate donations have been tax-deductible since 1935.

In the Revenue Act of 1968, the federal government for the first time placed limits on the use of tax-exempt bonds for private purposes. Section 501(c)(3) institutions were exempted from those limits; but today, only acute care hospitals are exempt from limits on the amount of tax-exempt financing available to them. Before 1968, the use of tax-exempt bonds to finance the projects of health care or educational institutions depended entirely on state law.

The Congress has never provided a statutory definition of the term “charitable.”
In 1923, an Internal Revenue Service ruling narrowly defined “charitable” as the relief of
poverty. That definition remained in force until 1959, when the Treasury’s final regulations putting into effect the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 changed it to conform to a much broader “generally accepted legal definition.” The broader definition had its roots in common law, which recognizes as charitable activities several that go beyond providing relief for the poor, such as advancing education, religion, or community benefit.

In writing the regulations for the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, the Treasury relied on
judicial decisions, which echo the British Statute of Charitable Uses of 1601. A British
legal decision of 1891 defined “charity” as consisting of “four principal divisions: trusts
for the relief of poverty; trusts for the advancement of education; trusts for the
advancement of religion; and trusts for other purposes beneficial to the community.” That
broad standard of charitable activity remains in effect and underlies current U.S. policy.

CBO Papers, THE POTENTIAL EFFECTS OF TAX RESTRUCTURING ON NONPROFIT INSTITUTIONS,
February 1997

You and I are in agreement about our mutual outrage with the Church’s handling of the priests.  That’s about as much as I’m going to say on that topic. 

Justice:

I support the right of an individual to pray regardless of location.  I don’t support a teacher leading a prayer in the classroom.  Outside of that, the issue is large enough to support several threads to flesh out the details.

zilch:

Momma said it ain’t right to go chasing rabbits when ya got other responsibilities on the farm.  In light of that, I’m going to try to stay on point, which excludes a discussion of Africa. 

My point above stands.  I correctly qualified my statement:

Setting aside the question of whether the morals espoused by the church at a given point in history are “better,�

. My point was that you and others have correctly pointed out that religion has been extremely effective:

as a mechanism by which society may obtain certain behaviors from its respective members via a carrot/stick approach.

In fact, it has been the predominate means thus far through our recent history, say the past 2,000 years.

You take issue with the product, not the delivery systeme when you say:

...but we can do better than that now.

Leaving aside the unanswered questions surrounding the changes that have occurred that support a belief that we can do better now, as well as many, many more, your simple statement has done nothing to detract from the thrust of my point. 

OB:

Fair’s fair.

We’ve already seen in this thread that you are getting more than your fair share in community services when contrasted with the property taxes that would be collected, which is why the issue was expanded to all tax emptions.  Your property tax issue, standing alone is a dead horse.  In the spirity of a liberal blog, let’s take a PETA friendly stand together and agree not to beat a dead horse.

Elwed:

We the people, via our representatives, decide tax policy. 

As long as a secular organization providing any or all of services that the Catholic Church does and that you consider qualifying for tax exemption is awarded the same benefits as the CC, then this whole argument is moot.

Then this whole argument is moot, and I’m glad to read that you are of a like mind.

Consigliere: I support the right of an individual to pray regardless of location.  I
don’t support a teacher leading a prayer in the classroom.

I’ve mistaken you for someone else then.

Then this whole argument is moot, and I’m glad to read that you are of a like mind.

It would take me more time than I can free up to convince myself that religious organizations do not enjoy tax advantages that secular organizations do not.

Even if so, it’s just one particular argument out of many. I find it deeply troubling that the First Amendment exists in the first place. In my reading, it exists to prevent citizens from getting screwed by a collusion of State and Church and to prevent civil unrest of the religious don’t get their way.

To pick on another point, you claim credit for the benefit to society by people who received an education by Catholic institutions, yet you are quick to disavow the “abominations”. You can’t have it both ways, you know.

If an organization causes harm to society, should it receive a tax penalty? The Catholic Church qualifies in my opinion, as does the Republican Party

It would take me more time than I can free up....

yet we see

To pick on another point…

And

The seperation of Church and State in the U.S. is not designed to protect the secular from the religious, but the religious from themselves. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

but the story changes

In my reading, it exists to prevent citizens from getting screwed by a collusion of State and Church and to prevent civil unrest of the religious don’t get their way.

I guess between you and zilch, it’s not only the word “better” that is a moving target.

I guess between you and zilch, it’s not only the word “better� that is a moving target.

Consi, that doesn’t really deserve an answer in excess of “bullshit”, but I’ll humor you anyway.

You raise a number of points that warrant an in-depth answer. I do not have the time for that, but I do have the time for a couple of much shorter posts. There’s no moving target that I can see.

Protecting the religious from themselves is entirely compatible with the prevention of civil unrest. The State siding with a single religioun or worse, a single religious denomination, is also a recipe for civil unrest and preventing this is a measure to protect the religious from themselves.  What moving target?

Regarding the definition of “better”, the answer depends on the question, doesn’t it? It wouldn’t upset me if you can show that I take inconsistent positions if you rephrase a question with a different emphasis. Answering interesting questions often involves a tradeoff between conflicting goods, so what you catch depends on how wide a net you cast.

The overarching questions are whether religious organizations do more harm than good and which, if any, privileges they deserve. The secondary question, the one you are very partial about, is whether or not the Catholic Church has done and is doing more harm than good. I’ll leave the answer as an exercise to the reader, because I’ve now used up my time budget to expound on the definition of “bullshit”.

My point was that you and others have correctly pointed out that religion has been extremely effective as a mechanism by which society may obtain certain behaviors from its respective members via a carrot/stick approach.

“Extremely effective” is hyperbolic, consi, given that there’s no simple comparison to judge relative effectiveness, but otherwise I agree. 

In fact, it has been the predominate means thus far through our recent history, say the past 2,000 years.

Yep.  Never said it wasn’t.

You take issue with the product, not the delivery systeme when you say “but we can do better than that now”.

.
Yes I do, and that’s the whole point.  Consi, you’ve performed a bait-and-switch here: you defended the Church, and not merely for being a good disciplinarian.  Rather, you said

… the Church encourages responsible, productive, and caring citizenship.  To the extent that its members follow it, that is of societal value.

These values are what I was talking about when I said that “better” is a moving target.  Two hundred years ago, many people considered it responsible, productive, and caring to hold slaves.  Nowadays not so many outside of the Janjaweed do.  And the Church’s position on condoms is precisely to the point, as an example of how we can do better nowadays.

I guess between you and zilch, it’s not only the word “better� that is a moving target.

As elwed said, that doesn’t really deserve a reply.  But it is revealing.  Do you think it is a bad thing for our sense of what is “better” to change through time?