Good lobbyists.

I hate to say it but it was a way of promoting Christian doctrine in the US, as long as the church does not use it's facilities in promoting a political doctrine, (Johnson rule in the 1960's).

Because 'God is on their side'

Glory be to gaaawwwwd!

Thanks to the Freedom from Religion Foundation that may soon be history:

[ffrf.org]

Also, there is a distinction between a 'non-profit' and a 'not-for-profit' enterprise in the way our tax codes are written. Exactly what and where that distinction is I'm not entirely certain, but I would wager that at least some part of it is rooted in keeping Christian religious enterprise untaxable while allowing the government to tax other, secular charitable enterprises. Ideally it would be ALL religious institutions or none of them, or even better all charitable and not-for-profit enterprise, but a lot of people engage in these enterprises as tax dodges, much like American companies listing their corporate headquarters in foreign countries so they can hold their profits untaxably in tax shelter countries where the US government can't even access the records to investigate fraud.

Because Jesus (and the politicians) love them.

Because Gawd does NOT provide so the government has to?

Because of the taxation laws allowing Churches to be untaxable. This goes back at least as far as pre-revolution France, when the aristocracy (First Estate) were bolstering the power base of their political allies in the Church (Second Estate) and Media (Fourth Estate) to keep the common citizenry (Third Estate) powerless and divided and disenfranchised.

Odds are good it's even older than that, because the inertia of cultural tradition over hundreds of years violently indoctrinated people to the idea that the Bible was the only Truth and a supernatural conspiracy run by the Devil was behind any statement to the contrary. People like Galileo were imprisoned for espousing scientific theories about the Earth revolving around the Sun, that the universe was not centered around our planet...these things were crimes that bore life sentences or deaths for blasphemy and heresy. Because it's God's money the government can't touch it?

One hand washes the other and no one tells.