This is one of those times when it’s really, really hard to remember why churches don’t pay taxes.
Just over at Pam’s House Blend on my regular blog scan, and here’s what Louise from Maine has to stir us up:
The anti-marriage folks in Maine, who, if you’re not following this, flog their bigotry by paying people from Michigan to gather signatures for a referendum against Maine’s Marriage Equality law, are out-fundraising the Equality Maine folks better than 2 to 1 between April 1 and July 5. Almost half the money came from Roman Catholic Churches or organizations (most of the rest from NOM — of “Gathering Storm” parody fame — and Focus on the Family, with just $400 from actual Maine residents. Of course, much of that time was before the law passed.)
The Diocese of Portland gave “Stand for [Het] Marriage Maine” $100k in actual money and over $10k in “in-kind’ contributions, Louise reports.
The Knights of Columbus forked over $50k. And Catholic Charities in Evansville, Indiana donated a thousand bucks, as did the Archdiocese of Santa Fe, NM.
As Louise aptly points out, aren’t these the same folks who are closing parishes and selling church properties? Aren’t these the same folks who say their parishioners’ donations go to charity work? to food and clothing and shelter for the poor and destitute? One might also wonder who is paying the salary for the Diocese spokesman who “has taken leave” to work for SFMM.
So the spokesbigot said the $100k was from a special fund donated to the Church for “this kind of activity.” And quite likely the donor got a tax deduction for it. And wouldn’t have if the donation had gone directly to the the anti-marriage PAC — as one commenter on the thread pointed out. Tantamount to money laundering.
Okay,maybe it’s time to not let people have tax deductions for donations to churches. The church may not have to pay taxes, but any donations they receive should be after-tax dollars.
The last time the Catholic Church was right about something, it was draft counseling in the Vietnam War, the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, and Liberation Theology (when, for once, the Church was on the side of the campesinos and not the landowners — think Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador).
But here in Vermont the Catholic church is also pleading poverty while doing everything they can to hide their assets from people who have sued them for the harms they’ve suffered as a result of sex abuse by the priests and concealment of sex abuse by the church bosses.
This is one of the many ways that churches abuse their tax-subsidized status. Churches are not only exempt from being taxed, donations to them are tax-deductible. A large portion of the “charitable” giving touted by the right as the alternative to government social services is to religious organizations – very little of which goes into actual social services.
(Religious congregations and other religious organizations received an estimated $106.89 billion, which is 35 percent of the total. src: http://www.philanthropy.iupui…. )
had any number of anti-gay “front groups” funded by these out-of-state religious political extremists. They come in various guises, from the ones that “have a good friend who’s gay, but..” to the ones who talk about your gay relatives, friends, and neighbors like they’re aliens with leprosy.
I think Mainers (or Mainiacs, as they sometimes call themselves) are a little like Vermonters in that they resent and resist outside political influences.