IRS Targets Liberal California Church

From the Los Angeles Times:

Stepping up its probe of allegedly improper campaigning by churches, the Internal Revenue Service on Friday ordered a liberal Pasadena parish to turn over all the documents and e-mails it produced during the 2004 election year with references to political candidates.

All Saints Episcopal Church and its rector, the Rev. Ed Bacon, have until Sept. 29 to present the sermons, newsletters and electronic communications.

The IRS investigation was triggered by an antiwar sermon delivered by its former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, at the church two days before the 2004 presidential election. The summons even requests utility bills to establish costs associated with hosting Regas' speech. Bacon was ordered to testify before IRS officials Oct. 11.

The tax code bars nonprofits, including churches, from endorsing or campaigning against candidates in an election.

Facing the possible loss of his church's tax-exempt status, Bacon said he plans to inform his roughly 3,500 active congregants about the investigation during Sunday's services. Then he plans to seek their advice on whether to comply.

"There is a lot at stake here," Bacon said in an interview. "If the IRS prevails, it will have a chilling effect on the practice of religion in America."

The congregants will have two choices: consent to the IRS request, or decline, which could result in the matter being referred to the Department of Justice and, possibly, U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, All Saints' lead attorney Marcus Owens said.

"The congregation's decision will be clear on Sunday or a few days after that," Owens said. "My guess is they will be unlikely to respond demurely and acquiesce in the government's request at this stage. The issues are too close to the quick of their fundamental religious beliefs."

Members of All Saints have a long history of social activism. The sermon that attracted the IRS' attention was delivered by Regas, who was well-known for opposing the Vietnam War, championing female clergy and supporting gays and lesbians in the church.

The medieval-looking church, just east of City Hall, seems to embody staid, moneyed Old Pasadena, but the liberal outlook goes back decades. During World War II, its rector spoke out against the internment of Japanese Americans. Regas headed the church for 28 years before retiring in 1995.

Exactly how the congregants will make their feelings known on the IRS issue is yet to be decided.

"It may come via e-mail, or as a yea or nay on Sunday, or some other means," said Keith Holeman, a spokesman for the church.

IRS spokesman Frank Fotinatos declined to comment on the matter saying, "We can't confirm or deny any ongoing investigation."

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank), who unsuccessfully tried to launch a Government Accountability Office investigation into the IRS' probes of churches nationwide last year, called the summons "a very disturbing escalation" of the agency's scrutiny of All Saints.

"I don't want religious organizations to become arms of campaigns," he said. "But they should be able to talk about issues of war and peace without fear of losing tax-exempt status. If they can't, they'll have little to say from the pulpit."

The view was echoed by the Rev. Bob Edgar, an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church and general secretary of the National Council of Churches USA. "I'm outraged," he said. "Preachers ought to have the liberty to speak truth to power."

"There is a lot more to be done about this, and it may include some actions of nonviolent civil disobedience," Edgar said. "Since 9/11, the IRS, like the FBI, has been moving back to the 1950s and 1960s when a great deal of such activity was propagated against church leaders like Martin Luther King."

I'll have to see if I can find a copy of the sermon that got the church in trouble; I read it two years ago and remember it as being standard biblicly-based prophetic speech questioning the President on his decision to take the country into war. The kind of message I and countless other pastors spoke then, and would do again. But this is an administration that sees all dissent as treason.