After receiving a letter announcing the closing of a two-year old Internal Revenue Service (IRS) examination, All Saints Church, Pasadena, California, announced September 23 that it has referred what it called "the numerous procedural and legal errors of the exam" to the agency's commissioner and demanded more information about its decision.
The parish received an IRS letter September 10 saying the federal tax-collection agency had closed its examination without challenging the parish's tax-exempt status and without a threatened audit ever taking place, according to a news release posted on the parish's website.
However, the letter said without explanation that the IRS had concluded that a sermon preached in October 2004 constituted intervention in the 2004 presidential election.
"While we are pleased that the IRS examination is finally over, the IRS has failed to explain its conclusion regarding the single sermon at issue," the Rev. J. Edwin Bacon Jr., All Saints' rector, said in the release. "Synagogues, mosques, and churches across America have no more guidance about the IRS rules now than when we started this process over two long years ago. The impact of this letter leaves a chilling effect cast over the freedom of America's pulpits to preach core moral values. We have no choice but to demand clarification on this matter with the IRS."
Read the full ENS story.
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