In 1954, Senator, Lyndon B Johnson proposed an amendment to the tax-code. This amendment required that all charities abstain from endorsing or opposing any candidate for public office.
If charities do not abstain, they could lose their tax exempt status.
Why does this matter? Losing this status would adversely affect charitable donation income.
For example, if a person made $100,000, they would be taxed on $100,000. But if they gave $10,000 of that money to a 501c3 charity, the donor could deduct $10,000 and then only be taxed on $90,000. That would result in about a $4000 savings on ones tax bill, depending on the tax rates of the particular state.
The higher a person’s income and the more one donates, the greater the tax savings. This is a motivator for charitable givers.
So any church who wants to keep this donation incentive must censor itself from talking about candidates for public office.
Why should that be? Churches are advocates for causes and issues. But the church can’t talk about politicians whose leadership will affect those causes and issues? That doesn’t make any sense.
The 501c3 provision prevents churches from warning parishioners about politicians who will negatively affect the causes and issues they care about.
Most often those destructive candidates are Democrats. But as this chart shows, when Christians, Catholics and Jews are combined into one category, the voting results are about a 50/50 split between Republican and Democrat:
How could this be? When the entire Democratic platform is against biblical values and is detrimental to the country?
Because church-goers aren’t hearing about the cause and effect of Democrat candidates and their policies. Parishioners are directionless on which political party lines up with the bible and which party helps the country.
Some parishioners interpret this lack of emphasis on political candidates as if there is no difference between the Republican and Democratic platforms. It is reflected in this somewhat common sentiment: “Jesus is not Republican or Democrat”
Sounds nice and spiritual. But is it accurate? Did Jesus have no opinion about the direction of a group of people? Of course he did. I’m confident Jesus would advocate for choosing the best direction possible for the welfare of 320 million people. The loving thing is to participate and advocate for what is right and best. Not to recuse oneself from positively influencing the situation.
But that’s what the church has effectively done. Or virtually forced to do.
The truth is that Republican leadership will take the country in a vastly different direction than Democratic leadership. Which direction is best? The bible is clear about many subjects that Republicans and Democrats disagree about. Republicans align more closely with the bible. It’s not even very close:
1. Abortion.
The bible is clear about the sanctity of life (abortion) “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.” Psalms 139:13. “Thou shalt not murder” Exodus 20:13
60 million babies have been aborted in American since 1973. This would not have happened if Christians would have voted for pro-life candidates (Republicans).
But the media, school system and Hollywood play on people’s emotions to consider only the Mother’s plight.
A simple logic test will clarify the situation: When the baby is 1 day old, is it ok to terminate the baby? “Of course not, how could you suggest that?” Then why is it ok 1 day earlier? Because of the location of the baby? That doesn’t make any sense.
But there are no clergy people pointing that out. Or if they are, they are not connecting abortion to democratic candidates in clear ways. Because they are not allowed to. So people are fooled by the media, school system and Hollywood about abortion or to support Democratic candidates who support abortion. Resulting in a 5x worse travesty than the holocaust in America’s abortion mills.
Yes, the stakes are huge right? This is why the church needs to be unmuzzled, because poor voting decisions has opened the doors for the destruction of almost 60 million innocent lives.
Stay with me. I know this may be hard to take in for anyone realizing this for first time.
2. Gay marriage
The bible is clear that homosexuality is a sin. Anyone reading their bible knows that.
But the media, school system and Hollywood (again, those 3), try to play on people’s emotions and falsely equate homosexuality with race.
A. Another test: No black person was ever black, then white. No white person was black, then white. Because race is who someone is.
Plenty of people have been homosexual, then straight. Or straight, then homosexual. Because it is not who they are, it is a lifestyle choice. Is it easy to change that lifestyle choice? For some people yes, some people no.
But does morality change depending on a person’s desire level to act immorally?
B. Test that: Is murder acceptable if someone strongly desires to murder someone else? Certainly not. The desire level for a behavior is irrelevant towards whether a behavior is immoral or not. Same with homosexual desires.
But people think that desires are who someone is and that if one has a desire they should be allowed to act on it. Why? Because the media, school system and Hollywood told them so. The church may or may not tell people the truth about it, but even if they do, they are not connecting the erroneous desire-self-image doctrine to democratic candidates harmful policies.
3. Taxes
This isn’t as obvious as the first 2. But it can be reasoned through in the same ways.
Some religious people are fooled into the idea that the loving thing to do is to vote for the candidate who says they will help people (through taxing and spending). That is what the media, school system and Hollywood tells people to think.
A. Test it: Is it ok to take money from your neighbor to pay for your child’s college tuition? “No, that would be theft.” That’s what Bernie Sanders and Hillary want to do. It doesn’t make it any less theft if the government does it rather than an individual thief.
The money for things like this does not come from nowhere.
So why would the bible want us to steal? It wouldn’t. But clergy people are not telling people that. So people are mixed up on what to think about tax and spend programs. And by extension, politicians who advocate for more tax and spend programs.
Besides the theft part which is morally wrong, large government doesn’t work very well in practice. All over the world communism and socialism have been tried with bad results. America has had the smallest government in history. It has helped America to achieve the greatest prosperity, most innovations, and increased the quality of life for more people on the planet than any other system. Even poor people in America live better than kings of the past.
So why would we change our system which has shown to be the most effective system in world history to be more like systems that produce far worse results?
That doesn’t make any sense. It’s not wise. But the media, school system and Hollywood tell people that bigger government is nice, loving, kind, etc.
Clergy-people are not informing people about it. Further, clergy-people are not connecting the unwise tax and spend theft policies to Democratic politicians.
Our founders knew the unintended consequences of large bureaucracies quite well. It’s one reason why they instituted a limited government:
The motive may be love. But wise action should follow a loving motive. Many Christians are not informed about what government arrangements have historically worked. That is partly because clergymen don’t talk about it much.
The clergy should be informing people how Democratic policy positions are 1. unbiblical. 2. not wise/don’t work very well.
I understand this may be hard for a person who may be thinking about these things for the first time. But that’s one of the problems: This should not be new. Your pastor, priest or rabbi should have been talking about these things, at least time to time. Instead the media, school system and Hollywood have been a surrogate for them. A very bad surrogate. Getting people that respect the bible to vote against the bible. That is some trickery on the part of Dems. The 501c3 muzzle has had it’s intended effect.
In 1952, Senator Lyndon B. Johnson was getting pushback from a religious leader in his area. So Senator Johnson created the 501c3 muzzle to silence this clergyman. This is the ugly underbelly of this law. How corrupt!
How many times has a clergyman been shut up in the same way about other politicians since? Probably thousands of times.
Donald Trump aims to put an end to this oppression of free speech rights. Trump recounted a conversation he had with a well-known pastor at a pastors meeting:
The pastor said: “Mr. Trump, we live in fear in our churches and our synagogues, we live in fear that we’re going to lose our tax-exempt status if we say anything even slightly political.”
Mr. Trump looked down out the window of his Trump tower at people walking down on the street and said: “they have the right to speak and you don’t, but that means they’re more powerful than you are. We have to do something about it.”
Trump continued: “…. we’re going to undo it (the 501c3), so that religious leaders in this country…. can again have a voice, because religion’s voice has been taken away. And we’re going to change that..”
This would be a great change for the country. Nobodies first amendment rights should be limited. Anyone from any group, charity or non-charity should be allowed to express their opinion about any policy or candidate. Without fear of financial repercussions from the government.
Politically, many Christians, Catholics and Jews are lost sheep. If Trump eliminated the corrupt 501c3, the shepherds could tend to their flocks about these important issues unimpeded. These clergymen could point out the wolves in sheep clothing that are in the democratic party (and a few republican ones). So that the sheep could be informed to avoid them and their destructive stewardship.
Some of our wise clergymen have been censored from talking about important issues for far too long. Let us stand behind Trump and regain the religious liberty our founders intended.
Source:
http://www.912communique.com/forum/topics/trump-to-repeal-501c3-clergy-muzzling-johnson-amendment#axzz4Gznr2Ksr