{"id":17960,"date":"2010-02-17T03:32:35","date_gmt":"2010-02-17T03:32:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/127.0.0.1\/site\/2017\/2\/1985\/tennessean-freedom_from_religion_foundation_files_suit_to_end_tax_break_fo\/"},"modified":"2010-02-17T03:32:35","modified_gmt":"2010-02-17T03:32:35","slug":"tennessean-freedom_from_religion_foundation_files_suit_to_end_tax_break_fo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=17960","title":{"rendered":"Tennessean&#8211;Freedom from Religion Foundation files suit to end tax break for ministers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A nationwide atheist group is asking religious leaders to take Jesus&#8217; advice and render unto Caesar what is Caesar&#8217;s &#8212; especially when it comes to taking the federal tax break on their housing.<\/p>\n<p>The Wisconsin-based Freedom from Religion Foundation says the housing exemption gives churches an unfair advantage because they can compensate their leaders with tax-free housing. Other nonprofits, such as the foundation, can&#8217;t do that. So it&#8217;s suing the federal government to outlaw the housing allowance.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We think the law is rotten at the core,&#8221; said co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor. &#8220;It is not constitutional, it is not fair, and it is not necessary.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But the exemption&#8217;s supporters point to a similar court dispute in 2002 that went nowhere after Congress almost unanimously rushed to save the housing break.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.tennessean.com\/article\/20100216\/NEWS06\/2160338\/1023\/NEWS\">Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A nationwide atheist group is asking religious leaders to take Jesus&#8217; advice and render unto Caesar what is Caesar&#8217;s &#8212; especially when it comes to taking the federal tax break on their housing. The Wisconsin-based Freedom from Religion Foundation says<span class=\"ellipsis\">&hellip;<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=17960\">Read more &#8250;<\/a><\/div>\n<p><!-- end of .read-more --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":794,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,39,40,579,149,114,435,184,108,587],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian-life-church-life","category-culture-watch","category-economics-politics","category-churchstate-matters","category-economy","category-law-legal-issues","category-ministry-of-the-ordained","category-parish-ministry","category-religion-culture","category-taxes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/794"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17960\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}