A group of pastors have decided to defy IRS rules against endorsing or speaking against candidates.
While an argument could be made that the IRS is not stifling free speech, because they are only saying that a church cannot maintain a tax exempt status if they engage in political speech, it is clearly trying to affect a form of both free speech, and religious exercise.
We can have the dabate as to whether a church should enjoy tax exempt status (I think they should,) but to tie a group’s tax-exempt status to their speech is infringement.
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The danger is that if churches start being political entities outside of their walls, then you’ll see a lot more churches created for the purpose of political activism.
I have no problem with a minister personally endorsing one candidate or another outside of church, and I have no problem with them endorsing a candidate from the pulpit. But I would have a problem with a church becoming directly involved with political activism in a way similar to the NRA or MoveOn.org.
If a church start mobilizing its parish to work toward political goals, then it has lost what its true focus ought to be and should no longer even be considered a church.