Think of all the people we could feed and house and provide medical care for if churches had to pay taxes. They sneak their political opinions in anyway, so I say tax 'em.

That is an excellent question. One that I ponder a few times a year.
Do I create my own invisible magical man in the sky to have a religion of my own and be taxe free? Make everyone believe that there is a great catastrophy comming and that they need to repent their lowly and tainted soul or forever be tormented in a place where only the most vile of the vile are found.
And my invisible man in the sky will be good, gentle, caring, forgiving, butterfly and bees and flowers and kitten and puppy everywhere.
But behold if you anger my invisible man in the sky. Because my forgiving, caring, gentle, good, omniscient, omnipotent deity will stike you down with rightousness and defile your putrid body with some sort of hellish creature that will come to eat your intestins everyday for eternity +1 day.
I don't remember who said it, but: Religion was created when the first con man meet the first fool.
And another one: Christianism. when the story to hide an affair went WAY out of control.

Because the Christian lobby has convinced people to let them have it both ways. They lobby for religiously motivated laws, for religious monuments on public grounds, and against the rights of others, but claim that having to pay taxes would infringe on their freedom of religion.
It's an enormous racket that should be brought down.

In the U.S. it is actually written into tyhe tax code that churches are only tax exempt if they stay our of politics. Many churches have broken that code and shoudl be taxed by law.

However, most politicians know that if they seek to enforce the tax code nd tax churches they will most likely lose the next election.... which is why the churches are not taxed.

His is.

I'm more concerned about why is the NRA a tax exempt organization.

It's vestigial and there are too many theocratic sympathisers in our society. There was a question on here "Are athiest becoming stronger". The lack of atheists in political power is what urges me to disagree with the statement. We need the west to be a paragon of secular just democracy. We have the foundations to do it but we are fighting against self interested nutjobs with power.

Why are most large corporations still paying no tax and recently received a huge tax cut besides? Deficit funding by GOP hypocites to appease billionaire buddies. Pay your taxes and shut up.

Worldwide? Corrupt religious influence in governments.

Because ultimately Congress (? I think? Correct me if I'm wrong) has the power to change that, but they don't want to. It's not about lobbyists, or money, or whatever. The PIC (people in charge) of making that decision may take money from groups and may listen to what people say, but at the end of the day they make decisions to do or not do for whatever reason. At least that's how I see it.

Churches have enormous influence over their members. Politicians see them as large voting bodies. It is in the best interest of the government to continue to favor religions with tax exemptions in exchange for the voting power they hold.

Historically religion has permitted governments the freedom to subjugate, prejudice, and discriminate against minorities and women which in turn gave politicians and big business advantages and power. Religion is a tool that the wealthy and the powerful have used to control the public for their own gain. In my opinion, they all know it is a scam, the biggest con on this planet.

Poolitics.

Because the bulk of America is religious and they think their Church would never misuse their tithing

Power

The same reason christian lobbyists are directly responsible for the suppression of medical research thereby directly causing the death and suffering of 100s of millions of people across the globe. And that reason is because they have the absolute, most incredibly conceived, bullshit story in the history of mankind. And they arent afraid to exploit each and every person ignorant enough to hear their bullshit, and think, "sounds good." The irony of all these errogant do-gooders is that the joke, is obviously, on them.

I think it's a straightforward answer. Through tax advantages the state subsidizes religion. Through donations to political campaigns, the church guarantees it will remain so.

Follow the money. The big churches give too much in campaign contributions. The time is coming though. It needs to be dependant on the size of the church and what-not, but it's coming I think.

I ask myself all the time, every time I drive past one.

Because they are not worth the foundation they are built on

I think this article goes thru the reasons pretty well.

[focusonthefamily.com]

tlr

1. they have always been that way.
2. it would be a violation of the establishment clause Walz v. Tax Commission
3. charity is usually exempt
4. smaller ones would close

you or I may disagree but you wanted the reasons that is the reasons.

Money is power.

Because politicians have no balls. Power means more to them than the Constitution.

Taxation is theft.

If they made churches pay taxes it would make their "shananigans" transparent. Just tax them something insignificant. for example, .01%.

For the same reason, politicians are robbing thieving lying self-serving twats. they have a very similar way of dealing with the masses while filling their own pockets.