This is ridiculous
No other group on earth wants to “have its cake and eat it too” more than religious groups. Mega churches across the nation stockpile enough money to buy private jets for their pastors, yet they cry separation of church and state when the tax man comes. At the same time, they get involved in political issues, which should automatically remove their tax-exempt status. If you want to be involved in the world, then you need to be part of the world, and that includes paying taxes. If, on the other hand, you want to maintain your autonomy, then stay out of things that have nothing to do with spirituality, and stop asking people to fund your institutions, including private Christian schools. A case is sitting at the Supreme Court awaiting argument that will take this fight to another level.
Slate magazine reported on Carson v. Makin, a case that may well allow these institutions to continue having things both ways. Any school that teaches its students to hate should not benefit from tax dollars. Unfortunately, the Court has already ruled in favor of such a school in the case of Espinoza v. Montana. In that case, SCOTUS ruled that Montana had “infringed on the Free Exercise Clause” by providing funds to private secular schools while withholding them from private religious schools. Obviously, the justices have never read any of the Christian textbooks, like the ones that teach that slaves “immigrated” to America, that Malcolm X was a “Black supremacist,” or that Nelson Mandela pushed “radical affirmative action.” Yet, these same people keep whining about “critical race theory.” Apparently, they need a bit of that themselves so that they will stop pushing this nonsense on their children.
These are the same people who teach their children to look down their noses at LGBTQ people, women, and other minorities. Yet, they want our money to keep teaching their hateful beliefs. What happened to unconditional love? Does the Bible not teach us to love one another? Does it put qualifications on that love? They must be reading a different Bible. Instead, they teach that hate and division are okay. As Slate said, these teachings make critical race theory “look like Blue’s Clues.” It is amazing how so many people want to have their proverbial cake and eat it too. You cannot set out to teach hate and then turn to the very people you despise for money. LGBTQ, Blacks, and all other minorities pay taxes. You will not accept them, but you will certainly accept their money. This flies in the face of what Christianity is supposed to be and what it is supposed to teach, and it is wrong.
Unfortunately, “president” Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell gave us this court, and there is not one damned thing we can do about it. They are obliterating decades of progress, and for what? To please a small, closed-minded segment of the population. By all means, let us finance continued hatred in this country and continue to bury our past so that people cannot learn and grow.
Shirley is a former entertainment writer and has worked in the legal field for over 25 years