Returning to the 501(c)3 status I laid out last post, we come face to face with some shocking revelations. First, the 501(c)3 status requires the church leaders, when speaking as a formal representative of the church, to be apolitical. Second, why do churches opt to be 501(c)3s in the first place? Other non-profit designations would fit a church without being politically handcuffed. The 501(c)4 designation allows for political stances as does a 501(c)7, just to provide two examples. It isn’t insane either to suggest a church run as a standard for-profit business since its expenses will likely outweigh its income and therefore will be net negative on the net profit line. Those establishing churches will need to rethink business structure, but this is no hard task and we should continue to innovate in the church as well. I intend to show that the Church committing to being apolitical undermines its God-given directive to make disciples of all humankind.
Firstly, is it possible to be apolitical? Asking this is likewise to ask if humans can be utterly devoid of any beliefs, which is impossible. Political beliefs or policies are inextricably tied to morality, values, and vices. Humans cannot divest themselves of these things; even in the case of the raw darwinian acolyte, survival instinct as the only guiding behavior is a vice without the influence of other virtues to re-situate and control that survival instinct. Someone might object here that I am question begging a worldview of good vs. evil, which is partly true. The darwinian approach to ethical (or non-ethical) behavior already raises the meta-ethical question about whether or not humans should act like beasts. In other words, the darwinian approach already implies an answer on the good vs. evil framework. Simply, the darwinian acolyte presumes that it is better to assume the world is not a good vs. evil framework, which is why they promote the animalistic darwinian behavior pattern.
This approach, however, is not socially acceptable even if we allowed that the “good-vs-evil-framework” did not exist. Many animals mate based on a “show of strength,” which often is a violent battle among males. The outcome of this is the animal kingdom’s version of “the right” to copulate with the females because this victorious male showed himself to be the most fit to pass on his seed. If we put this into human terms, we end up with women being effectively sex-slaves for the most violent male, with the male having claim on the woman’s body to carry his seed to full term without her compliance–what we would call “rape.” The darwinian idea that “good-vs-evil” does not exist gets checked hard by trying to put animal rules into a human society.
At this point, we could go much deeper into the ideas of socially constructed morality and how that might affirm or deny objective morality, but that takes us far afield of our present task. I will merely state that God being Trinity already lays out an intrasubjective framework for morality that society mimics, but let’s move on. Politics, then, implies society because there are no politics without human society. Society then implies morality, however we want to understand the existence or construction of good-vs-evil. There are political rules–our laws that come from legislative political action–that legislate certain behaviors to be worthy of protection or punishment. Murder is immoral; a just society punishes this behavior. What our society morally allows or disallows will be expressed legislatively through the political process.
To summarize, society has moral norms that demarcate what is good from what is evil. These moral norms–through the American government system–are advocated for by electing representatives who commit to legislatively advancing those moral norms. When legislation is successful, society’s moral norms are fortified into society as laws. If this is accurate, why would the church voluntarily opt for a non-profit designation that requires them to be apolitical?
Reading from the IRS’ website, a 501(c)3 “may not be an action organization, i.e., it may not attempt to influence legislation as a substantial part of its activities and it may not participate in any campaign activity for or against political candidates.”
What good reason could a conscientious church leader commit to this? At first, I thought this was nothing more than church leaders wanting to get paid or make more money, but, sadly, this isn’t entirely the case. Monetarily, a church leader could make the same money under a different non-profit designation and not be committed to being apolitical. Furthermore, if a for-profit business’ expenses outpace its income, taxes are nullified as there is no profit to tax. Whether a 501(c)3 or different entity type, employee payroll taxes apply and are to be paid, so this provides no impetus for a church to be a 501(c)3. Ministers get a few fiscal perks from the 501(c)3 status in terms of their personal taxes. I hesitate to ask, but could it be that in exchange for a few bucks off a minister’s taxes, they would commit to being apolitical?
We should out the psyop at this point. Somehow society by-in-large and the church in particular has come to believe that being unbiased and being apolitical is more morally excellent than being biased or politically-leaning. I’ve written a lot on this: humans cannot be unbiased because they are limited, and no human will ever become unlimited–whatever that would mean? By extension, being apolitical is equally impossible, but concealing or self-censoring one’s bias or political-leaning is possible, and it is precisely what the 501(c)3 status demands.
Therefore, two psyops have claimed victory over the mind of the masses: (1) that non-bias is achievable and good and (2) censoring yourself and political views is desirable and morally better than making them known. Think of the colloquial adage that many take as a kind of common good law: “around the dinner table with general friends and family, you don’t talk about religion or politics.” You’re telling me that the two things that will frame our moral world in the form of America’s laws, we should make sure we don’t talk about? That is insane. Being biased is more morally excellent than trying-to-be-unbiased so long as your biases are known-to-yourself and so long as these biases are tempered with testing, knowing that they may need to be revised or discarded altogether. As moral agents, it is more morally excellent to be politically-leaning than not since morality is entailed in political platforms and policies. Church members, as self-attesting agents of the moral-living-God, should advance His character and morality in every way feasible, should they not? Someone might object that church members do influence people towards God but only through their private life, not through political action. In response to this, I would merely point out the bifurcating private life from public life (political life) is impossible: the two are interpenetrating and cannot be ultimately untangled. Secondly, why would we think that the church’s influence campaign to advance a God-centric-moral-worldview should be limited to only a private affair? The better if more frightening question here is, whose morality is fueling the “should be limited” in the last question? Jesus said to go out into the world and make disciples of all humankind, which is quite the opposite of “should be limited.”
We should not forget that the political parties are extremely divergent on the moral norms they value, and it has been that way for a long time. The Democrat party was the party of the slave-owners back in the 1850s. Slavery is no small moral issue! One party, Republicans, deemed slavery as evil and immoral, and they were willing to die in hordes to put an end to it. Another party, Democrats, deemed slavery as acceptable and moral, and they were willing to die in hordes to maintain it as a societal way of life. We must highlight the fundamental moral quality of politics and its legislative actions. The church is the so-called manifestation of the Judea0-Christian God in this present world, and this God is inherently moral and likely–according to many theologians–His character both defines morality and constitutes the standards against which all moral actions are judged. In America, the most direct way to enact God’s will on earth writ large–His moral character–is through the political process. 501(c)3 status is an infection and terminal disease to the church’s mission, and it should be cast overboard.
Prime Theologian