Posted: 11/30/2016 at 10:13am
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Ben Carson Has Big Ideas about How Trump Could Unlock the Church's
Prophetic Voice by Jessilyn Justice via Charisma News
"If we rescind the Johnson Amendment and people are not afraid of
losing their tax (status), then we will see Donald Trump be vigorous," and
Judeo-Christian values return to the American forefront.
JESSILYN JUSTICE
[Charisma
News] Though once rivals on the Republican circuit, Dr. Ben Carson now
serves President-elect Donald Trump as a godly counselor in an unofficial
capacity. (REUTERS/Las Vegas Sun/Steve Marcus/File Photo)
As Trump describes removing the Johnson amendment, Carson told a select group
of evangelicals exactly how the move would free pastors to help return America
to Judeo-Christian values.
"If we get the Johnson Amendment rescinded, pastors can have fiery
sermons and talk about what's right and what's wrong (again)," Carson
said as part of the Salt and Light Lecture conference call.
Officially, the Johnson Amendment prohibits those with 501(c)(3) tax
distinctions like churches and ministries from engaging in political commentary.
The amendment is often cited as to why pastors refrain from discussing
controversial sins, such as homosexuality, in their pulpits.
"Now we hear pleasant things and everybody sings "Kumbaya," and it's not an
accurate representation of the world we live in," Carson says of today's
churches. "If we rescind the Johnson Amendment and people are not afraid of
losing their tax (status), then we will see Donald Trump be vigorous," and
Judeo-Christian values return to the American forefront.
Trump isn't the only advocate to rescind the amendment.
Erik Stanley, Senior Legal Counsel and head of the Pulpit Initiative for the
Alliance Defense Fund, writes for the Los
Angeles Times:
The Johnson Amendment allows the government to determine when a pastor's
speech becomes too "political." That is an absurdly ridiculous standard. A
pastor's speech from the pulpit that talks about candidates from a Scriptural
point of view is religious speech. That speech doesn't become political any more
than a pastor's speech becomes commercial when he gives a Scripture-based
assessment of the current financial debacle on Wall Street. Allowing government
agents to make that determination is as absurd as asking a first-grader to
design and build NASA's next space shuttle.
The Johnson Amendment also allows the government to parse the content of
a pastor's sermon to determine whether it violates the law. That is called a
content-based restriction on speech, which the (First) Amendment's free-speech
clause prohibits unless the government has a compelling reason for
censorship.
Without the amendment, Carson says, America can once again receive conviction
from its pastors and become a godly nation once more.
But churches are, perhaps, not in as much danger as they might expect.
"The truth is, no church has ever lost its tax-exempt status for either
endorsing or opposing any political candidate or endorsing or opposing a local,
state or federal law," said Mat Staver, Founder and Chairman of Liberty Counsel.
"Voting is both a privilege and a duty. The future of America is at stake every
time we face a national election, and this past election was one of the most
important elections in recent history. To not vote is to vote. Silence is not an
option. I encourage pastors to remove the muzzle that secularists want to put on
them and exchange it for a megaphone to speak Biblical truths regarding social
and moral issues."
In 2008, a host of pastors made plans to give politically charged sermons to
protest the law.
According to a new Pew Research study, 64 percent of regular churchgoers said
they heard sermons on religious freedom, abortion, homosexuality, immigration,
environmental issues and more during the election season. (To Subscribe to the
Elijah List go here.)
News Source: Charisma
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