A Florida church lost its tax-exempt status after hosting nude parties and slumber parties featuring the “sexiest ladies on the beach.”…. The Life Center: A Spiritual Community had been operating a party schedule as Amnesia: The Tabernacle seven days a week since Feb. 28, reported the Panama City News Herald. Police began investigating the church after it placed ATMs and a banner outside and determined its activities were a “blatant slap in the face” to taxpayers. The church, which is owned by Markus Q. Bishop, advertises that its events are drug- and alcohol-free, and promoters say it’s a church by day and youth ministry by night. But Club Amnesia’s since-deleted Facebook page advertised raves, pajama and lingerie “slumber” parties, and “anything but clothes” paint parties
I’ve always been opposed to the idea of churches being tax exempt; it seems to be the one universally accepted (and hypocritical) exception to the separation of Church and State. The amount of money churches get to keep- taxpayer subsidies that, if memory serves, amount to somewhere in the neighborhood of $85 billion- it makes a mockery of the separation of Church and State. Churches regularly flout the proscription on engaging in political advocacy from the pulpit…because too many “men of God” think that the “laws of God” supersede those of mere mortals. Of course, God’s a Conservative Republican, don’tchaknow? This means the vast majority of Churches which expect to be tax-exempt advocate for Conservative candidates and causes…’cuz God as a matter of course votes Republican.
The proscription against churches engaging in political advocacy is largely a joke, because the IRS knows that to investigate a church would invite immediate accusations of religious persecution. This is why I was so surprised to learn of Markus Q. Bishop’s church being stripped of its tax-exempt status. Sure, his “worship” may be unconventional, but how is it really any different from churches passing out voting guides during Sunday services? How is that not a “blatant slap in the face” to taxpayers? I’ll wait in case someone cares to parse that out for me.
It’s not that I’m advocating for Bishop or his “church,” but I find it interesting that the tax code is flouted every Sunday from coast to coast with impunity…and Bishop’s Church of the Everlasting Party is busted. How are his methods any less offensive than what Conservative preachers do every Sunday when they attempt to indoctrinate their parishioners against the evils of Liberalism? Never mind that the teachings of Jesus Christ would place him decidedly in the “bleeding heart Liberal” section of the political/ideological spectrum.
I don’t know the details of Bishop’s “ministry,” nor do I particularly care to. What I do know is that there seems to be a fair amount of hypocrisy at work. Are Bishop’s (clearly unconventional) methods any worse than what happens every Sunday in churches all across the country? Or do the good, God-fearing patriots of Panama City merely know sinfulness and licentiousness when they see it? Perhaps they’re just afraid that someone might actually be having fun as they worship God?
Interesting how one person’s worship can be another’s definition of sinfulness and debauchery, isn’t it?
