Tax Exempt Church Turns Out To Be A Night Club

[Judi Lynn]

Tax Exempt Church Turns Out To Be A Night Club
3/14/2015 @ 7:03PM

A new ‘church’ recently opened in Panama City Beach, Florida. The Life Center: A Spiritual Community hosted a seven-day-a-week program service called ‘Amnesia: The Tabernacle.’ Turns out it was really just a big Spring Break party. At tax-time, a self-proclaimed church might sound pretty good considering the huge tax breaks. After all, there are plenty of offbeat religions and offbeat churches, so who’s to say what’s legit?

But this church wasn’t even close. It charged a $20 ‘suggested donation’ and had an ATM. Its website boasted ‘Anything But Clothes,’ lingerie and pajama events, ‘Wet n wild,’ twerking and naked paintball parties. The holy iconography featured oral sex and drinking. Maybe it was just bad timing, since it was supposed to be a youth ministry during the day.

Still, local officials stripped it of its tax-exempt status. Bay County Property Appraiser Dan Sowell rescinded the exemption that allowed The Life Center to avoid paying state property taxes. After all, it was clear that the property wasn’t used predominantly for religious purposes. It was pretty obvious there were more sacrilegious than holy activities going on.

A public Facebook posting questioned The Tabernacle’s status. Then the Spring Break Amnesia web site was taken down, and according to a News Herald report, the most explicit language was toned down when it came back. Still, all in all the interaction of taxes and religion is strange. Ever since our founding fathers, it’s hands-off for federal income taxes, property taxes and more.

More:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2015/03/14/tax-exempt-church-turns-out-to-be-a-night-club/

[Trillo]

1. That whole list of items seems completely geared toward Christian churches.

Perhaps this is what the right really means when they say, the U.S. is a Christian nation. If you want tax exempt status as a church, better be plain vanilla Christian.

Nice to see an article about this with information instead of just flames.

[malokvale77]

2. There are a lot of religious tax exempt...

organizations in my area that have little to nothing to do with religion.

When will this country get a clue.

It seems the only people required to pay taxes in this country are the working poor.

We are a disgusting nation. And that is being nice.