$190,000 was initially unreported, probably because the break down of those sorts of expenses fell into categories that the church leaders in those various rolls commonly incur anyway — travel expenses, etc. etc. for activities typically unrelated to Proposal 8. Where does the $190,000 figure come from, the accusator or the defendant organization? Once the church had been pointed out that various expenses hadn’t been counted in their report, they responded with a corrected report.

I would guess that the reported expenses are more substantial than the omitted expenses, but I doubt the church’s direct contribution in terms of its own campaigning would be over $1 million… Probably short of half a million more likely. But even if it were a full million in direct expenses the church incurred, that would still only be 1million/13billion = .0000769 % of their total bottom line. I am quite certain the IRS would not consider this to be a substantial concern.

But even if they did, the church’s position on gay marriage is so important to its core beliefs that I believe the church would be willing to give up its tax exempt status and actually be willing to pay taxes if it absolutely had to in order to continue its fight on gay marriage.

And for the record, I’m gay, and I’m mormon… and I see nothing wrong with the church for its position on proposal 8, although it may not be the same as my own. It has a purpose in what it is, just as I have a purpose in who I am.

http://www.bankingonheaven.com/

Shame on the Mormons!!!

You didn’t read it correctly. The amount you mention is only the UNREPORTED amount recently disclosed. THAT simply adds to the strengh of the lawsuit against the Mormons.

Later it reads:

“At their leaders’ behest, Mormon contributions made up about half Prop 8’s budget of $40 million.” So they spent $20 MILLION!

That brings it to .0015% Still doesn’t seem like much, but is substantially larger. And no where does anything state that to calculate substantial activity, you have to compare the amount donated to a single issue to the organizations total net worth.

The court would have to consider that in this case, they donated a full 50% of a very large budget. Making their activities VERY substantial for this highly charged issue. It should be enough to knock them around a bit, if laws were fairly enforced. But I’m sure that the Reich-Wing will jump to the defense of the ones responsible for beating down one of their favorite whipping posts.

Bush tried to yank the nonprofit status of a church in Pasadena in 2004 because a pastor gave one (1) antiwar sermon. The Mormons planned and executed part of a $40 million political campaign in their Salt Lake City headquarters.

However, you are right that nothing whatsoever will come from this.

May their thro*ts be slit from e*r to e*r!

“holdings said to be worth at least $13 billion”

“$20,575 for use of facilities and equipment at the church’s Salt Lake City headquarters and a $96,849 charge for “compensated staff time”

117,000/13,000,000,000 = .0009%

“An IRC section 501(c)(3) organization may engage in some lobbying, but too much lobbying activity risks loss of tax-exempt status.”

I have a hard time believing this qualifies as anybodies definition of substantial. They probably broke the law by not reporting it. That was stupid on their part. They’ll probably be fined as that’s the easy way to deal with a first time minor infraction. If there is more to this though, this opinion will change based on the magnitude of the infraction.