Conservative Churches Should Sacrifice Their Tax-Exempt Status

February 24, 2025 2:45 pm

For more than 70 years, the federal government has used a church’s tax-exempt status as a weapon to silence conservative Christians.

Now it’s time for those same conservative Christians to sacrifice that tax-exempt status arrangement and tell the feds what to go do with themselves.

This is a debate that conservative Christians need to have, and the sooner the better.

In 1954, then-Sen. Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) saw to it that charities and churches could no longer engage in political campaign activity.

“To the extent Congress has revisited the ban over the years, it has in fact strengthened the ban,” according to the IRS’ website.

“The most recent change came in 1987 when Congress amended the language to clarify that the prohibition also applies to statements opposing candidates.”

I personally believe that LBJ pushed for this law so that churches couldn’t influence elections. Years later, as president, his “War on Poverty” encouraged low-income fathers to abandon their children and created a larger political underclass to rely permanently on government. The man was diabolical. And we are still suffering from the consequences of LBJ’s policies to this day.

Those are merely the political and social consequences of church leaders agreeing to a tax-exempt status in exchange for shutting up about politics.

Now let’s talk about the consequences to the church.

Some people argue that churches that enjoy a tax-exempt status have gotten too big. The bigger the church, the more powerful the church. The more powerful the church, the more likely the church and its leaders are to cave to corruption.

That’s the same principle that conservatives want to apply to government. They ought to do the same to the church.

And, let’s be honest, plenty of churches have gotten too big for their britches.

I resigned from a mega-church 25 years ago because, instead of asking me to donate to the poor, church leadership asked me to donate to a fund for a new garage to park their rather-large and obscenely-priced bus. That church lost its focus.

Anybody who lived during the 1980s remembers Jim and Tammy Faye Baker. Does anybody remember a lunatic televangelist from the 1990s named Robert Tilton? Then there’s Kenneth Copeland, who said he flies in his own expensive aircraft with church funds because commercial airlines are “tubes full of demons.” They all enjoyed a generous tax-exempt status. And, even though they were not pastors, but still religious leaders, there are the shenanigans of Mr. and Mrs. Jerry Falwell Jr.

None of these people put Christianity in a good light, did they?

Power corrupts.

The statistics say that most pastors in America make no more than $65,000 to $75,000 a year, while pastors of large churches make six figures, which is way out of proportion to what most church members make. Church leadership will justify this on the grounds that their pastor works long hours….but so do most members of their congregations.

I would argue that a pastor who makes six figures or more is quite possibly vulnerable to losing touch with members of his flock. Am I wrong?

During my lifetime, I have seen plenty of pastors lose their way and get in some kind of trouble, whether it was through acts of arrogance, misusing church funds, or some sort of sex scandal. All of those men made six-figure salaries. I never saw pastors of any small churches fall to such temptation.

Is it time to time for conservative churches to sacrifice their tax-exempt status?

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We know perfectly well that liberal churches engage in political activities and never once attract the attention of the IRS.

A Chattanooga pastor recently warned his flock of “bloodshed” and cited (and misinterpreted) Scripture to justify violence against President Donald Trump and DOGE Chair Elon Musk.

Other liberal churches, meanwhile, encourage members to scam Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security and also take taxpayer money to take in illegal immigrants. For those churches, the IRS never comes knocking. That, of course, is due to the IRS’ blatant double standards.

I once heard a pastor say that Christianity historically prospers under the most challenging conditions.

Maybe it’s time for conservative churches to give up their tax-exempt status?

Maybe it’s time for mega-churches to downsize and spread out into several smaller ones?

Maybe that would make conservative Christians less susceptible to corruption and, for Christians in general, put Christianity in a much better light?

Maybe doing away with their tax-exempt status would permit conservative Christians to have a stronger voice in politics and, by extension, help heal our sick and morally compromised nation?

Ultimately, maybe renouncing that tax-exempt status is worth it just so we could dance over the grave of that rat LBJ?

Special thanks to Warhammer’s Wife for proofreading this story before publication to make certain there were no misspellings, grammatical errors or other embarrassing mistakes and/or typos. Follow Warhammer on X @Real_Warhammer. Read Warhammer’s stories on The Hayride by clicking here.