LDS tax exemption to go away?

[20/20hind]

Interesting thought.

http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/f ... 4dc04.html

[Corsair]

The LDS church has three weapons against a change in tax exemption. First, there is the longstanding tradition against taxing churches in American jurisprudence and English Common Law. Second, as much as the LDS church annoys other Christian denominations, I am confident that other churches would lobby in our favor if tax exemption were on the line. This is a change that could affect every other church if just one church loses the tax break. The third bulwark is the well-founded legal counsel that the church retains, Kirton and McConkie. These guys will take on this challenge as possibly their most important fight in defense of the LDS church.

Still, the increasing growth of secularization in the United States could change this. But it's still a generation away at best.

[Hagoth]

I agree. It would open the door to doing the same for the churches that give all of those Republican legislators their claim to superiority over the heathen world.

[Hagoth]

What I really would like to see is a law that would require all tax exempt entities, religious or otherwise, to be fully transparent with their finances. It would present a very clear choice: reveal your finances or pay taxes. I don't see how any faithful member of a religion could have a serious argument with this. If you believe your church is honest and reputable there should be no anxiety about having them show what they do with their members' and donors' money. The old it's-God's-money-so-you-don't-have-the-right-to-question argument would be moot.

[Vlad the Emailer]

Kind of like the October surprise, if there is something there, it has to all be uncovered completely and brought to light in the right way. For instance, that $120,000 is indeed a relatively modest sum compared to other "corporate execs", but what about the houses(s)? Who paid for/is paying for them? How much of that 120K do they actually spend on themselves, or is everything provided for and the 10K/mo is just gravy? What about money they receive to chair all those subsidiary companies? I sincerely doubt it is part of the 120K.

A TBM in the comments made the point that when these details come to light, the facts are not a problem and end up being faith promoting. That's fine, but I can't help but wonder if those are all the facts.

[wtfluff]

A TBM in the comments made the point that when these details come to light, the facts are not a problem and end up being faith promoting. That's fine, but I can't help but wonder if those are all the facts.

Let's just think about this Corporation's past history of "Honesty".

Based on that history, there's no way "those are all the facts".

[fh451]

I would be surprised if this amounted to anything. While I would really love for the church (and all religious organizations, for that matter) to be required to be financially transparent in order to receive tax-exempt status, it's probably a ways off. Maybe a massive scandal would do it (not necessarily LDS), but religions have thus far been remarkably resilient against these kinds of threats.

As a matter of fact, I would really like them to not have tax-exempt status at all except for what can be proven charitable work. A guy can dream.

fh451

[20/20hind]

The article brings up the church being charged with election fraud, 13 counts of it and ended up having to pay a fine. I had never heard of that before. I believe religious organizations that not only endorse, or actively participate in a polical arena should be transparent in their financials. They actively pursue legislation against LGBT rights. I think it will be years before they disclose financial info but it's the right thing to do. Which means they will fight it to the end

[2bizE]

If the church were to lose its tax exempt status, would that mean all US tithe payers would no longer get to claim their tithing as charitable contribution?

[moksha]

This is the ad to be aired:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yC5os3W56E

[Meilingkie]

In the Netherlands all Churches neet to file fully transparent reports to maintain their tax-exemption.
Needless to say the report the Church publishes online are woefully inadequate compare to the
- Jehovah´s Witnesses
- Dutch Reformed Church
- Catholic Dioceses

So the Church might run into some issues.........

[document]

I'm on the board of a few non-profits. We are audited quite often by the IRS and our state in order to maintain our tax exemption status. I've always assumed churches are audited regularly as well. To the state, we have to prove that we are paying our state sales tax appropriately (we raise money through selling books). The IRS, we have to show the fruits of our labor and show that we meet the criteria for tax exemption.

Are the bars just set lower for churches than secular non-profits? I just always assumed that churches are audited as well.

Heck, I'm going to ask our treasurer of our church corporation tonight. I'm seeing him, he's been there for over 20 years. If our little book room is audited regularly (twice in the last five years) I'm sure they would have been.

[moksha]

The world's largest cable-television company is refusing to broadcast ads soliciting information targeting the LDS Church's tax-exempt status because the activist behind the spots cannot provide documentation of the faith's financial holdings.

http://www.sltrib.com/home/4812171-155/ ... nt-air-ads

[Vlad the Emailer]

It's crap like this from the Tribune article that are the reason the corp keeps winning the battles and, so far, the war:

Karger acknowledged at his Tuesday news conference he had no scholarly reference for the sexual-abuse assertions, but said he has heard stories from "dozens" of former Mormons who allege they were molested or assaulted by perpetrators associated with the church.

"I've heard stories"??? Really?

I wouldn't doubt for a minute that the corp applied pressure to get Comcast to change it's mind, as is alleged, but without meaningful, verifiable back up, the whole thing ends up being nothing more than faith promoting "anti-Mormon persecution" that does more harm than good.