Obama Pastors' Sermons
May Violate Tax Laws
On Christmas morning, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. compared presidential candidate Barack Obama's impoverished childhood to Jesus Christ's. "Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people," he then trumpeted. "Hillary [Clinton] can never know that."
Mr. Wright wasn't at a convention or a campaign stop. He was standing at the pulpit before the mostly African-American congregation of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, where Sen. Obama has worshiped for more than 20 years.
Sen. Obama's campaign issued a statement saying that he has repeatedly stressed that personal attacks "have no place in this campaign or our politics, whether they're offered from a platform at a rally or the pulpit of a church." The statement also said he "does not think of the pastor of his church in political terms. Like a member of his family, there are things he says with which Senator Obama deeply disagrees.'' Mr. Wright declined to comment.
Trinity's national parent, the United Church of Christ, recently disclosed that it's being investigated by the Internal Revenue Service for a speech Sen. Obama gave to 10,000 people at a church conference in June in Hartford, Conn., in which he mentioned his candidacy and parts of his platform, namely health-care reform.
Scholars and attorneys say that a growing number of congregations are delving into issue advocacy and partisan politics, a trend dating back to the 1980s, when the religious right enlisted churches to fight abortion. An increasing number of complaints to the IRS over church politicking have triggered agency probes into both liberal and conservative religious groups. A Baptist church in California has acknowledged it's under IRS scrutiny after a watchdog group complained that the church backed Republican Mike Huckabee in his recently ended bid for the White House.
"There have never been more audits than in the last three or four years" involving churches, says Marcus Owens, an attorney who represents some congregations and is a former director of the IRS's exempt-organizations division. But while the agency has issued dozens of warning letters aimed at halting advocacy for political candidates, it has only twice revoked a church's tax-exempt status since the tax law was amended in 1954, a spokeswoman said.
Under the law that governs tax-exempt organizations, churches are allowed to support causes or ballot initiatives such as laws to ban same-sex marriage. They also can hold a candidates' night for all office-seekers in a race. But according to guidance provided on the IRS's Web site, churches are "absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office."
The prohibition is aimed at preventing government subsidies -- in the form of tax breaks -- from going to organizations that support political parties. Other types of nonprofits are permitted to engage in partisan political activity but have more limited tax protections. For instance, their financial supporters aren't allowed to claim tax deductions for their donations.
With 6,000 members, Trinity is the largest United Church of Christ congregation. The church is centered in a poor Chicago neighborhood, near public housing and down the road from Cut Rate Food & Liquors, which posts a sign reading "No drug dealing." A review by The Wall Street Journal of 13 sermons at Trinity seen live or through church-recorded DVDs since late December found nine instances of ministers at Trinity appearing to promote Sen. Obama's candidacy.
From the Pulpit
Some of the sermons mentioned Sen. Clinton or her husband in unflattering ways. During that Christmas morning sermon, Mr. Wright declared that Hillary Clinton "ain't had to work twice as hard just to get accepted by the rich white folk who run everything or to get a passing grade when you know you are smarter than that 'C' student sitting in the White House." On Jan. 13, Mr. Wright told the Trinity congregation that some people say, "'Hillary is married to Bill and Bill [has] been good to us.'" Mr. Wright continued, "No, he ain't!" Sen. Clinton's campaign didn't respond to requests for comment.
Ellen Aprill, an associate dean at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles and a former adviser to the Treasury Department on matters including nonprofit tax law, says she believes those sermons are "clearly a violation. They're naming names.''
Donald Tobin, an associate dean at Ohio State University law school, who formerly worked for the Justice Department on nonprofit tax matters, adds that nonprofits cannot make endorsements or engage in a "pattern and practice that is designed to support one candidate over another." After being read sections of the Trinity sermons by the Journal, he said, "There does seem to be a pattern of attempting to tip the scales in a way for Barack Obama. And churches shouldn't be doing that."
Allusions to Candidate
In some instances, the church's ministers alluded to Sen. Obama without naming him. During a Trinity sermon observed by a Journal reporter on March 2, the Rev. Otis Moss III, the pastor, preached, "There was a non-Babylonian, a young man who heard the word of God and said, 'I have the audacity to hope!' Now the whole nation says, 'Yes, we can! Yes, we can! Yes, we can!'"
"Because that phrase is so identified with Barack Obama and because he is a member of the congregation, it's possible that it could be interpreted as an implicit endorsement,'' Ms. Aprill says. Mr. Moss didn't return calls seeking comment.
Congregants are hearing more about politics during worship services than they did decades ago, scholars say. A 2006 poll of 3,000 churchgoers found that about a third of Roman Catholics and white evangelicals and 42% of black Protestants said politics and social issues had been discussed from the pulpit at least "once every month or two," according to David Campbell, a political science professor at the University of Notre Dame, who commissioned the survey for a book he is helping to write on churches' civic life.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit, says it has filed 13 complaints with the IRS in the past year over alleged church politicking. They include allegations that churches made endorsements from the pulpit or on church stationery for Sen. Obama or Mr. Huckabee, says Rob Boston, a spokesman. One of those complaints involves First Southern Baptist Church in Buena Park, Calif., which has acknowledged that it's under federal investigation. The ministry endorsed Mr. Huckabee on its stationery and its Internet radio program, Americans United said.
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The above article is from the Wall Street Journal. I guess Mr. Wright's chances of being investigated or pretty good, seeing as how he preaches how EVIL America is, how that we DESERVED 9-11, where 3,000 innocent children in daycare, women, and men in offices, the Twin Towers of the world Trade Center, were the victims of a Sneak Attack on Civilians with NO warning, when NO War was declared, when Islamic Terrorists crashed two Jumbo-Jets into Civilian Office Buildings, causing 3,000 innocent children in daycare, women, and men to BURN TO DEATH, except for the ones who couldn't TAKE THE PAIN OF BURNING, so they JUMPED from thousands of feet, where they SPLATTERED ON THE SIDEWALK. That's what barack Obama's Pastor, his freind and Co-Writer, his Spiritual Guru, says we DESERVED, we HAD COMING. Oh, and so does his wife, she thinks America sucks, too. She was ASHAMED of our country, until BARACK started getting some Primary votes. NOW, that he will SAVE us, with his SPEECHES about "Hope", and "Change", she's SURE that all of our Home Foreclosures will stop, the Islamic Terrorists will REVERSE their policy of "Death to America!" "Death to All Jews!" And the fact that many families with kids have a hard time buying bread and milk? Well, Barack will fix THAT easy! He will just RAISE THEIR TAXES! That will help them a LOT!
May Violate Tax Laws
On Christmas morning, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. compared presidential candidate Barack Obama's impoverished childhood to Jesus Christ's. "Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture that is controlled by rich white people," he then trumpeted. "Hillary [Clinton] can never know that."
Mr. Wright wasn't at a convention or a campaign stop. He was standing at the pulpit before the mostly African-American congregation of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, where Sen. Obama has worshiped for more than 20 years.
Sen. Obama's campaign issued a statement saying that he has repeatedly stressed that personal attacks "have no place in this campaign or our politics, whether they're offered from a platform at a rally or the pulpit of a church." The statement also said he "does not think of the pastor of his church in political terms. Like a member of his family, there are things he says with which Senator Obama deeply disagrees.'' Mr. Wright declined to comment.
Trinity's national parent, the United Church of Christ, recently disclosed that it's being investigated by the Internal Revenue Service for a speech Sen. Obama gave to 10,000 people at a church conference in June in Hartford, Conn., in which he mentioned his candidacy and parts of his platform, namely health-care reform.
Scholars and attorneys say that a growing number of congregations are delving into issue advocacy and partisan politics, a trend dating back to the 1980s, when the religious right enlisted churches to fight abortion. An increasing number of complaints to the IRS over church politicking have triggered agency probes into both liberal and conservative religious groups. A Baptist church in California has acknowledged it's under IRS scrutiny after a watchdog group complained that the church backed Republican Mike Huckabee in his recently ended bid for the White House.
"There have never been more audits than in the last three or four years" involving churches, says Marcus Owens, an attorney who represents some congregations and is a former director of the IRS's exempt-organizations division. But while the agency has issued dozens of warning letters aimed at halting advocacy for political candidates, it has only twice revoked a church's tax-exempt status since the tax law was amended in 1954, a spokeswoman said.
Under the law that governs tax-exempt organizations, churches are allowed to support causes or ballot initiatives such as laws to ban same-sex marriage. They also can hold a candidates' night for all office-seekers in a race. But according to guidance provided on the IRS's Web site, churches are "absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office."
The prohibition is aimed at preventing government subsidies -- in the form of tax breaks -- from going to organizations that support political parties. Other types of nonprofits are permitted to engage in partisan political activity but have more limited tax protections. For instance, their financial supporters aren't allowed to claim tax deductions for their donations.
With 6,000 members, Trinity is the largest United Church of Christ congregation. The church is centered in a poor Chicago neighborhood, near public housing and down the road from Cut Rate Food & Liquors, which posts a sign reading "No drug dealing." A review by The Wall Street Journal of 13 sermons at Trinity seen live or through church-recorded DVDs since late December found nine instances of ministers at Trinity appearing to promote Sen. Obama's candidacy.
From the Pulpit
Some of the sermons mentioned Sen. Clinton or her husband in unflattering ways. During that Christmas morning sermon, Mr. Wright declared that Hillary Clinton "ain't had to work twice as hard just to get accepted by the rich white folk who run everything or to get a passing grade when you know you are smarter than that 'C' student sitting in the White House." On Jan. 13, Mr. Wright told the Trinity congregation that some people say, "'Hillary is married to Bill and Bill [has] been good to us.'" Mr. Wright continued, "No, he ain't!" Sen. Clinton's campaign didn't respond to requests for comment.
Ellen Aprill, an associate dean at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles and a former adviser to the Treasury Department on matters including nonprofit tax law, says she believes those sermons are "clearly a violation. They're naming names.''
Donald Tobin, an associate dean at Ohio State University law school, who formerly worked for the Justice Department on nonprofit tax matters, adds that nonprofits cannot make endorsements or engage in a "pattern and practice that is designed to support one candidate over another." After being read sections of the Trinity sermons by the Journal, he said, "There does seem to be a pattern of attempting to tip the scales in a way for Barack Obama. And churches shouldn't be doing that."
Allusions to Candidate
In some instances, the church's ministers alluded to Sen. Obama without naming him. During a Trinity sermon observed by a Journal reporter on March 2, the Rev. Otis Moss III, the pastor, preached, "There was a non-Babylonian, a young man who heard the word of God and said, 'I have the audacity to hope!' Now the whole nation says, 'Yes, we can! Yes, we can! Yes, we can!'"
"Because that phrase is so identified with Barack Obama and because he is a member of the congregation, it's possible that it could be interpreted as an implicit endorsement,'' Ms. Aprill says. Mr. Moss didn't return calls seeking comment.
Congregants are hearing more about politics during worship services than they did decades ago, scholars say. A 2006 poll of 3,000 churchgoers found that about a third of Roman Catholics and white evangelicals and 42% of black Protestants said politics and social issues had been discussed from the pulpit at least "once every month or two," according to David Campbell, a political science professor at the University of Notre Dame, who commissioned the survey for a book he is helping to write on churches' civic life.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a Washington, D.C., nonprofit, says it has filed 13 complaints with the IRS in the past year over alleged church politicking. They include allegations that churches made endorsements from the pulpit or on church stationery for Sen. Obama or Mr. Huckabee, says Rob Boston, a spokesman. One of those complaints involves First Southern Baptist Church in Buena Park, Calif., which has acknowledged that it's under federal investigation. The ministry endorsed Mr. Huckabee on its stationery and its Internet radio program, Americans United said.
*********************************************************
The above article is from the Wall Street Journal. I guess Mr. Wright's chances of being investigated or pretty good, seeing as how he preaches how EVIL America is, how that we DESERVED 9-11, where 3,000 innocent children in daycare, women, and men in offices, the Twin Towers of the world Trade Center, were the victims of a Sneak Attack on Civilians with NO warning, when NO War was declared, when Islamic Terrorists crashed two Jumbo-Jets into Civilian Office Buildings, causing 3,000 innocent children in daycare, women, and men to BURN TO DEATH, except for the ones who couldn't TAKE THE PAIN OF BURNING, so they JUMPED from thousands of feet, where they SPLATTERED ON THE SIDEWALK. That's what barack Obama's Pastor, his freind and Co-Writer, his Spiritual Guru, says we DESERVED, we HAD COMING. Oh, and so does his wife, she thinks America sucks, too. She was ASHAMED of our country, until BARACK started getting some Primary votes. NOW, that he will SAVE us, with his SPEECHES about "Hope", and "Change", she's SURE that all of our Home Foreclosures will stop, the Islamic Terrorists will REVERSE their policy of "Death to America!" "Death to All Jews!" And the fact that many families with kids have a hard time buying bread and milk? Well, Barack will fix THAT easy! He will just RAISE THEIR TAXES! That will help them a LOT!
