Group asks IRS to investigate Ark. pastor's sermon

[Joanne98]

ANDREW DeMILLO
AP News

Oct 17, 2008 15:50 EST

A group that advocates separation of church and state asked the Internal Revenue Service on Friday to investigate an Arkansas pastor who endorsed GOP presidential candidate John McCain from the pulpit this week.

Washington-based Americans United for Separation of Church and State complained that Bishop Robert Smith, pastor of the Word of Outreach Christian Center in Little Rock, violated federal tax law when he told worshippers during a sermon: "I will be voting for John McCain and Sarah Palin."

Smith's sermon was aimed at fighting an Internal Revenue Service policy that prohibits charities and churches from involvement in political campaigns. Smith even used the threat of losing the church's tax-exempt status as a fundraising tool before passing the offering basket Sunday.

"Bishop Smith knowingly and flagrantly violated the law and has even dared the IRS to investigate him for it," said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. "I hope the federal tax agency promptly takes him up on that."

Smith said previously that he didn't tell parishioners anything they didn't already know from conversations with him and that he planned to send a copy of the sermon to the IRS. On Friday, Smith said he had not yet sent the IRS a recording of his sermon, but said he was not worried about the complaint or the threat of losing his church's tax-exempt status.

"I'm not more concerned about that than I am about the church's freedoms in the days and weeks and months to come," Smith said.

Smith was one of 33 pastors who had planned to make sermons about political candidates, part of an effort led by the Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund to provoke a challenge to the federal laws and IRS rules on political speech by pastors.

The group has already filed complaints with the IRS against seven other churches that participated in the pulpit initiative last month.

Nancy Mathis, a spokeswoman for the IRS, declined to comment Friday on the complaint and said federal law prohibits the agency from talking about specific tax cases. Mathis earlier this week said the agency would monitor any allegations of political activity by churches.

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