It Didn’t Take Long

For people to figure out how to use “Religious Freedom” to push bigotry, a group of TERF lesbians have formed a church.

Lesbians Want A Church Of Their Own And IRS Approves
Forbes
By Peter J Reilly
August 3, 2018

Pussy Church of Modern Witchcraft might strike you as something you would find in the Onion, rather than here on a Forbes tax blog, but it is a real deal.  You can find it on Charity Navigator and Guidestar.  The IRS recognized it as a 501(c)(3)  organization and went the extra step of recognizing PCMW as a church, the most enviable of all tax statuses. exempt not only from income tax but also from the transparency that filing Form 990 creates.  A church does not have to apply for exempt status, but it is a prudent step particularly for an innovative organization like PCMW.  My source indicated that the approval process was reasonably quick and there was no push-back from the IRS.

The Controversy
To understand what is going on with PCMW, you need to be aware of a conflict that is going on between some radical feminists and the transgender community. It is long running.  A recent manifestation occurred during the London Pride parade.

Anti-trans protestors, mostly made up of trans exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs) invaded this weekend's London pride celebrations, disrupting and eventually being allowed to lead the parade by officials.

The article by Rose Dommu takes the transgender side of the controversy in her report on the incident.  That is what seems to be close to the consensus in progressive circles framing the issue as one of discrimination against an oppressed minority.

Ground zero of the controversy was probably the Michigan Womyn's Festival.   Michelle Goldberg's article in The New Yorker - What Is A Woman? might be a good place to start if this forty years war is news to you.   If you want to dig into the radfem side there is a collection of essays Female Erasure: What You Need To Know About Gender Politics War On Women, the Female Sex and Human Rights.

This is a tax blog, so that's enough on the underlying controversy.  By the way, some people consider TERF to be a slur.  I don't know if there is a satisfactory substitute.  I did see "gender critical" suggested.  It took me a long time to come up with "not conventionally tax compliant" as a neutral way of describing "tax protesters", but that term has not taken off, so I hesitate to even make an attempt with TERF.  I will try GCRF for a start, but it probably won't come up that often.

This is only the tip of the iceberg. I can foresee “The Church of the KKK” and other hate groups forming churches.

Can you imagine people kicking out blacks from their restaurants because it is against my religion, “I’m a member of the Church of the KKK and we don’t believe in mixing the races.” and there will be nothing you can do about it.

Attorney General Sessions in his abhorrence of anything LGBT has created what can become a haven for bigotry. They will be exempt from all discrimination laws!

This administration is using religion as a sword to drive its white supremacy/xenophobia/Islamophobia agenda, they are using the evangelical Christian zeal to back their bigotry.

The Church of Hate would only need to prove…

Here is what the IRS says about whether an organization is a church.
Certain characteristics are generally attributed to churches.  These attributes of a church have been developed by the IRS and by court decisions.  They include:

• Distinct legal existence
• Recognized creed and form of worship
• Definite and distinct ecclesiastical government
• Formal code of doctrine and discipline
• Distinct religious history
• Membership not associated with any other church or denomination
• Organization of ordained ministers
• Ordained ministers selected after completing prescribed courses of study
• Literature of its own
• Established places of worship
• Regular congregations
• Regular religious services
• Sunday schools for the religious instruction of the young
• Schools for the preparation of its members

The IRS generally uses a combination of these characteristics, together with other facts and circumstances, to determine whether an organization is considered a church for federal tax purposes.

You can almost starting going point by point comparing the PCMW articles to the requirements.  They don't have an established place of worship yet, but they are working on it.