IRS Warns Churches About Political Activities, Tax-Exempt Status
IRS regional manager Peter Lorenzetti told pastors attending the Faith Leaders Summit meeting in Washington that activities that could result in loss of tax-exempt status include endorsing or opposing candidates, campaigning for them or making contributions to their campaigns.
But pastors are free to do any of those things as private citizens, U.S> Rep. G. K. Butterfield, D-N.C., said.
“You simply cannot do it in your capacity as the pastor of the church and give the implication that the church is endorsing the candidate,” Butterfield, a former judge, said.
Lorenzetti said churches can distribute voter guides that educate about political issues without favoring a particular candidate.
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Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson: How Liberal Women Are Building a Shameless Society
Wow, dude. Way to be slut shaming, degrading, bigoted, sex shaming misogynist. To the goddamned extreme.
Fuck you and the religion you rode in on.
~Mooglets
Kansas Pastor Says the Government Should Kill Gays: AUDIO
“They should be put to death. That’s what happened in Israel. That’s why homosexuality wouldn’t have grown in Israel. It tends to limit conversions. It tends to limit people coming out of the closet. — ‘Oh, so you’re saying we should go out and start killing them, no?’ — I’m saying the government should. They won’t but they should. [You say], ‘oh, I can’t believe you you’re horrible. You’re a backwards neanderthal of a person.’ Is that what you’re calling scripture? Is God a neanderthal backwards.. in his morality. Is it his word or not? If it’s his word, he commanded it. It’s his idea, not mine. And I’m not ashamed of it.”
Listen at the above link…
~Mooglets
N.J. man charged with killing Etan Patz confessed crime to prayer group 30 years ago, report says
Pedro Hernandez confessed last week to the 1979 murder of 6-year-old Etan Patz in lower Manhattan. While the admission was the first by Hernandez, 51, confessed to authorities, it may not have been for members of St. Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic Church in Camden, to which he belonged, according to a report by the NY Times.
Wow. Just… wow.
~Mooglets
CHILD ABUSE: TODDLER SINGS ‘AIN’T NO HOMOS GONNA MAKE IT TO HEAVEN’ IN CHURCH
I know the Bible’s right, somebody’s wrong
I know the Bible’s right, somebody’s wrongAint no homos going to make it to heaven
View the video at the link…
~Mooglets
Witch-hunts: The darkness that won't go away
It is a poison that annihilates relationships, breaks down family bonds and destroys communities. Despite the social damage, witch-hunts are still commonplace in Nigeria, Ghana, Tanzania and here in South Africa. MANDY DE WAAL speaks to Nigerian humanist and witchcraft researcher, Leo Igwe, and explores Africa’s witchscape.
Richard Dawkins tribute to Christopher Hitchens
Smoke Detectors Violate Our Religious Beliefs, Say Amish
I’m sorry, but when an adult consciously makes the decision that his or her religion is more important than the life of their child, that’s the point at which I say fuck you, follow the law or your children go to better homes.
~Mooglets
Vatican ‘probes Legion of Christ priests over child abuse’
The Vatican is reported to be investigating seven priests of the Legion of Christ order in connection with allegations of child abuse.
In a statement to the AP news agency, the Mexican order said seven cases had been referred to the Vatican’s department that deals with sex crimes.
The Legion of Christ’s founder, Marcial Maciel, sexually abused many boys and young men over a period of 30 years.
He was disciplined by the Vatican in 2006 over the abuse.
One of the cases being investigated in relation to the seven priests is recent, while others date back several decades, the order said in the statement given to AP.
The investigation will be handled by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican office that investigates allegations of sexual abuse.
While it is under way, the suspects will be kept away from children.
‘Immoral acts’
“Over the past few years, in several countries, the major superiors of the Legion of Christ have received some allegations of gravely immoral acts and more serious offences… committed by some legionaries,” AP quoted the statement as saying.
The order has previously insisted that Fr Maciel was an isolated case.
The BBC’s Alan Johnston in Rome says that if these new allegations are proven it will show that the rot in the order had spread beyond its disgraced leader.
In 2009, the Church launched an investigation into the order after Fr Maciel, who died in 2008, was also revealed to have fathered a daughter by a mistress.
A year later, Pope Benedict XVI appointed an envoy to implement a complete overhaul of the Legion of Christ, saying it had to be “purified”.
The previous pope, John Paul II, long held up Fr Maciel as a model to the faithful, despite persistent allegations of sexual abuse, which were later proven.
In recent years, the Church has been rocked by cases of paedophilia by priests, and accusations that it did not do enough to investigate the allegations.
A Response to ‘Five Reasons Christians Should Continue to Oppose Gay Marriage’
We’re at a point when even a notable Republican pollster is warning the party that it’s to their own detriment to fight equal rights for gay people. You would think Christian groups would come around to that way of thinking eventually, too, but that may take another generation or two. Most Christian leaders refuse to accept the fact that gay people just aren’t a problem for most people, including younger Christians.
The Illinois Family Institute, a SPLC-certified hate group, offers five reasons Christians should continue to fight against gay marriage (written by Kevin DeYoungof The Gospel Coalition). When you read their list, it’s clear they’re out of ideas. They know they’re fighting a losing battle, and they’re clinging to whatever bigotry might still go unchallenged by their members:
Catholic H.S.: Gay Student Can’t Accept Matthew Shepard Scholarship Onstage A gay high school senior was told that he cannot formally accept the Matthew Shepard Scholarship at his Catholic school’s annual awards ceremony, despite being encouraged to apply for the award by school administrators.
A gay Iowa teenager has been told that he cannot receive the Matthew Shepard Scholarship at his Catholic school’s annual awards ceremony.
Prince of Peace Catholic school senior Keaton Fuller was initially told that he could accept the scholarship at his school’s awards ceremony on May 20. According to the Eychaner Foundation of Des Moines, which granted the scholarship, Fuller even learned of the scholarship from his school, and the principal issued a statement to notify the scholarship committee that he could accept the award at the ceremony.
But weeks later, the opportunity to formally accept the scholarship at his high school has been revoked after pressure from the local Catholic diocese. “It is difficult to understand how after I have spent 13 years at this school and worked hard during all of them, I would be made to feel that my accomplishments are less than everybody else’s,” Fuller wrote in a letter to the student body and staff. “This whole ordeal has been incredibly hurtful, and I am even sadder that this will be one of my last experiences to remember my high school years by.”
The Matthew Shepard Scholarship grants $40,000 to an openly LGBT student attending the University of Iowa the following fall. Fuller won the scholarship based on his academic work as well as his efforts to reduce homophobia at school and in his community.
As of Tuesday morning, more than 4,000 people have signed a Change.org petition supporting Fuller and asking the school’s principal, superintendent Leland Morrision, and Bishop Martin J. Amos change their minds.
Catholic Bishops Engage In Witch-Hunt Against Girl Scouts
The Girl Scouts of USA have withstood an arrant assualt from conservative legislators this year, having been both characterized as a “radicalized organization” that supports abortions and the homosexual agenda, and accused of partnering with the recently oft-beleaguered Planned Parenthood by GOP lawmakers. Now, the Scouts are being attacked by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops for their “offensive” program materials and alleged association with groups that conflict with Catholic teaching.
Coinciding with the Scouts’ 100th anniversary celebrations, U.S. Catholic bishops have launched an official inquiry:
The new inquiry will be conducted by the bishops’ Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth. It will look into the Scouts’ “possible problematic relationships with other organizations’’ and various “problematic’’ program materials, according to a letter sent by the committee chairman, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne, Ind., to his fellow bishops. […]
Girl Scout leaders hope the bishops’ apprehensions will be eased once they gather information. But there’s frustration within the iconic youth organization — known for its inclusiveness and cookie sales — that it has become such an ideological target, with the girls sometimes caught in the political crossfire.
And the Catholic leaders are also attacking the organization for its supposed connection to Planned Parenthood. The Scouts have consistently and unequivocally denied this accusation, which still has yet to be proven true. The supposed connection between the groups stems from a Girl Scout workshop at a 2010 United Nations event in which an International Planned Parenthood brochure was made available to girls in attendance. The brochure was aimed at young people with HIV and contained pertinent information on how to safely lead active sex lives. Spokespersons for the Scouts maintain that the organization possessed no advance knowledge of the brochure, and thus played no role in distributing it.
The smears against the Girl Scouts, like the Planned Parenthood claim, are a manufactured controversy from right-wing publications. “It’s been hard to get the message out there as to what is true when distortions get repeated over and over,’’ said Gladys Padro-Soler, the Girl Scouts’ director of inclusive membership strategies. The Scouts have addressed most if not all of their critics’ concerns on their official website.
The Scouts also maintain that they do not take a position or develop materials on issues in relation to human sexuality, birth control, abortion, and that “parents or guardians make all decisions regarding program participation that may be of a sensitive nature.”
At least one quarter of the organization’s 2.3. million members are reported to be Catholic, so officials worry that an attack from the Catholic church could further drive down participation in the organization. “For us, there’s an overarching sadness to it,’’ said Girl Scouts’ spokeswoman, Michelle Tompkins. “We’re just trying to further girls’ leadership.’’
Atheists’ political activity is growing
One of the biggest growth areas in political activism around religion is coming from an unlikely source: the nonreligious. And it’s happening far from the marbled corridors of power in the nation’s capital.
The Secular Coalition for America, an umbrella organization that represents 11 nontheistic groups including American Atheists and the American Humanist Association, is looking to take its secular-based activism out of the nation’s capital and into the states.
Beginning in June, the Washington-based SCA will install directors in 18 states including Hawaii, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Alabama. State directors will meet with local politicians and train and mobilize local nontheists to lobby on behalf of secular issues and causes.
Why? Activists say the most important policies that affect nonbelievers don’t come from Washington.
“The majority of erosion to church-state separation is at the local level,” said Serah Blain, the SCA’s first state director, appointed in Arizona in January. “It’s in city councils and school boards and statehouses. And that’s where these things really affect people’s lives, with laws on bullying and abortion and access to health care. And they are passing without much opposition because it isn’t seen as glamorous to lobby locally.”
The announcement comes on the heels of SCA’s appointment of Edwina Rogers, a veteran Republican lobbyist, as its new executive director, a move the group has spun as a means to greater access on Capitol Hill. It is also the latest indication that nontheists — atheists, humanists, skeptics and others who hold no supernatural beliefs — are working to become a political force in their own right.
Amanda Knief, who recently joined American Atheists after working as the SCA’s government relations manager, said nontheists must “show elected officials that we are a political movement that needs to be recognized. That kind of recognition has been lacking because it is not politically savvy. So we need to show them that we are there and that we count.”
This year already represents a high-water mark for political organization and activism among nontheists:
The Reason Rally drew more than 10,000 people to Washington in March, where speakers urged them to contact local and national representatives and ask them to support church-state separation, science education, marriage equality for gays and lesbians, and ending government support of faith-based organizations, among other causes.
The SCA’s 2012 Lobby Day, an event that included training in lobbying techniques and meetings with congressional staff, attracted 280 people from almost all 50 states — up from 80 at the same event a year ago.
Cecil Bothwell, a Democratic candidate for North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District is running as an atheist. If he wins, he will join Rep. Pete Stark, D-Calif., now the only openly atheist member of Congress.
Enlighten the Vote, a nonprofit that supports atheist candidates and issues, is actively seeking atheists to run for public office and trains atheists to lobby their politicians.
The National Atheist Party was established in March 2011 and now claims members in all 50 states.
Ryan Cragun, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Tampa who studies American atheism, sees the growing political organization among nontheists as a sign of their maturation as a movement. Yet while Cragun says he personally supports the movement, he does not believe it will have a major impact this election year.
“They are reaching a level of maturity where organization is necessary to maintain structure and keep the movement going,” Cragun said. “But until you are talking about lots of money or lots of voters — and I don’t think they have either of those at this point — I don’t think they are going to be national players.”
That may be a long time coming, said Ellen Johnson, executive director of Enlighten the Vote and former president of American Atheists.
“It is hard to get atheists to agree on anything but their atheism,” she said. “We are mostly liberals, I will grant you that, but once you veer off into anything besides (church and state) separation issues, most atheists will argue.”
The hiring of Rogers to head the SCA is a case in point. Since the announcement of her appointment a week ago, reaction from members of the organizations it represents has been highly mixed.
P.Z. Myers, a University of Minnesota biologist and an influential atheist blogger, denounced her ties to President George W. Bush and former Sen. Trent Lott and her donations to Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s presidential campaign.
Jacques Berlinerblau, a Georgetown University professor and expert on faith and voting, has taken a more wait-and-see attitude.
“Ms. Rogers is confronted with a daunting task,” he wrote on May 4 on the Chronicle of Higher Education’s website. “For all of its chest-thumping and self-congratulatory praise, secularism’s standing in the judicial, legislative and executive branches is arguably at its lowest ebb since the 1950s. And don’t even get me started on its predicament in state houses across the country.”
