Questions for your Religious friends.

[no one]

Prayer should put the fire out. Maybe the faith they claim you just have to have to know their particular brand of wish granting magic sky pixie can put the fire out.

[johndoe122931]

Prayer should put the fire out. Maybe the faith they claim you just have to have to know their particular brand of wish granting magic sky pixie can put the fire out.

Did not know God was a genie. Thanks for the info!

[no one]

god is jin zero.

[brewer]

That crap about being hurt by removing in god we trust and under god in the pledge. Our currency (manufactured by the state) contains a religious belief added because of cold war fears. The cold war is over. Under god was also added due to the cold war. Those actions were not necessary for the 178 years prior. Keeping it is special privilege for the religious. But OMG, talk about removing those words and you go off.

Fire departments are primarily funded through local property taxes. Churches don't pay property taxes. Why should the church get a service that they don't help pay for? Again this should be viewed as special privilege.

Your religious false entitlement is showing. It's almost childish.

Edit, late addition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_privilege

Oh, you misunderstand, I can care less about the removal of that phrase from currency. 

The church is not the building, the church is the body of believers. The building is just a building where the church comes together to worship God. The individuals that all go to the building to worship God pay taxes. Most of us are business owners who have jobs and own homes. We pay our taxes and the property tax on our homes as well. But because an individual does not pay taxes or property tax does not mean they should be deprived of basic life-saving services. If I am being attacked should the cops not come to help me because I don't pay taxes that fund them? 

Do you think that if a church is on fire that the fire department should not come and put the fire out?

Apparently you can't 'care less' or you wouldn't bring up currency and the pledge.

No, I'm saying that is the church wants state funded services they need to support that service the same as other entities.

[johndoe122931]

Oh, you misunderstand, I can care less about the removal of that phrase from currency. 

The church is not the building, the church is the body of believers. The building is just a building where the church comes together to worship God. The individuals that all go to the building to worship God pay taxes. Most of us are business owners who have jobs and own homes. We pay our taxes and the property tax on our homes as well. But because an individual does not pay taxes or property tax does not mean they should be deprived of basic life-saving services. If I am being attacked should the cops not come to help me because I don't pay taxes that fund them? 

Do you think that if a church is on fire that the fire department should not come and put the fire out?

Apparently you can't 'care less' or you wouldn't bring up currency and the pledge.

No, I'm saying that is the church wants state funded services they need to support that service the same as other entities.

I'm going to guess that you didn't read my post carefully enough. I never said that I personally care about the motto on the dollar or pledge. Please stop taking my words out of context.

And again the church does support those services with tax dollars. You are misconstruing what the word church means. I am part of the church. I work and pay taxes, I own a home, and pay property tax. I give my money (which has already been taxed) to maintain a building and pay for services that the church(again all of the believers including myself) provides, such as feeding and clothing the homeless, helping people pay for the bills such as utilities and medical needs, visiting and helping people in hospitals and prisons, etc.

[brewer]

Apparently you can't 'care less' or you wouldn't bring up currency and the pledge.

No, I'm saying that is the church wants state funded services they need to support that service the same as other entities.

I'm going to guess that you didn't read my post carefully enough. I never said that I personally care about the motto on the dollar or pledge. Please stop taking my words out of context.

And again the church does support those services with tax dollars. You are misconstruing what the word church means.

Then you're just expressing general angst of christians but start the sentence with 'We', fine. Then they should stop whining.

Are your stating that your church, that sits on property pays property tax? Or are you just playing games with the definition of church and dodging with 'individual members pay taxes therefore..... church'. That's being less than honest.

[zwanzig]

It's not "you should be deprived of life saving services".

It's "why aren't you paying the same as everyone else?"

I pay taxes and I pay property taxes for my house and land. It's how taxes work based on the current rules. So why is church property exempt? How is that not privilege?

[johndoe122931]

I'm going to guess that you didn't read my post carefully enough. I never said that I personally care about the motto on the dollar or pledge. Please stop taking my words out of context.

And again the church does support those services with tax dollars. You are misconstruing what the word church means.

Then you're just expressing general angst of christians but start the sentence with 'We', fine. Then they should stop whining.

Are your stating that your church, that sits on property pays property tax? Or are you just playing games with the definition of church and dodging with 'individual members pay taxes therefore..... church'. That's being less than honest.

Before we built our church we bought a piece of property that was taxed before we paid for it. Then we built the building paying taxes on all the material that went into building the building and all the state permits. Then we pay for the utilities to keep the building maintained. We follow all the codes the state requires us to follow to keep the building up and open, a building that offers social services to ALL in need it regardless of age, race, or creed. We as church members pay taxes every year to the government including property taxes on our own homes and businesses...

Oh, I see, no, we don't pay the $600 or so dollars every year on the land that the building sits on. I'm sorry, I would actually love to pay it and have no problems with that except there is the weird idea out there call separation of church and state. I still really don't understand it, but again I'm just a stupid backwards Christian, my feeble little mind has a hard time grasping such concepts.

---

It's not "you should be deprived of life saving services".

It's "why aren't you paying the same as everyone else?"

I pay taxes and I pay property taxes for my house and land. It's how taxes work based on the current rules. So why is church property exempt? How is that not privilege?

Again, I do pay taxes, my fellow church members pay taxes my pastor who has a full-time job outside of church pays taxes AND property tax on his home. So, again we all pay taxes. Now from what it seems to me you all are upset that we don't pay property tax every year on the building? Wow, such a minuscule thing, but ok, as I said before I and most others don't have any issue with paying the $600 or so every year on our building, but for some reason, the government just won't take our check. Take it up with them, they told us something about separation of church and state, but who really knows.

[no one]

Admission is the first step.
Congratulations!

[brewer]

Then you're just expressing general angst of christians but start the sentence with 'We', fine. Then they should stop whining.

Are your stating that your church, that sits on property pays property tax? Or are you just playing games with the definition of church and dodging with 'individual members pay taxes therefore..... church'. That's being less than honest.

Before we built our church we bought a piece of property that was taxed before we paid for it. Then we built the building paying taxes on all the material that went into building the building and all the state permits. Then we pay for the utilities to keep the building maintained. We follow all the codes the state requires us to follow to keep the building up and open, a building that offers social services to ALL in need it regardless of age, race, or creed. We as church members pay taxes every year to the government including property taxes on our own homes and businesses...

Oh, I see, no, we don't pay the $600 or so dollars every year on the land that the building sits on. I'm sorry, I would actually love to pay it and have no problems with that except there is the weird idea out there call separation of church and state. I still really don't understand it, but again I'm just a stupid backwards Christian, my feeble little mind has a hard time grasping such concepts.

Great, dodge with 'we pay other taxes and stuff'. It's clear that you don't understand religion's special privilege, it's part of the reason that the nonbelievers have an issue with believers.

Do these 'social services' (a common religious claim that does not rise to the secular tax support issue) come with a helping of god thrown in? The monthly donations I make to our local homeless shelter don't come with a secondary agenda.