AFAIK, the difference would pretty much be that they actually have (pretty loose) limits on what they can spend money on, and on endorsing electoral candidates - and they'd have to publish information about their finances.

If you argued that religion was not an intrinsic social benefit then you might start saying that some of what they do is not non-profit work. That could get interesting.

> AFAIK, the difference would pretty much be that they actually have (pretty loose) limits on what they can spend money on, and on endorsing electoral candidates - and they'd have to publish information about their finances.

I'm not from the US, so I 100% expect those things from churches already. These sound like completely reasonable demands I would have on any public institution.

Theoretically churches are already legally forbidden to endorse candidates but in practice this is effectively bypassed with the fiction that priests/pastors/etc can say they are sharing their personal opinion, not an official church position.

https://ffrf.org/outreach/item/14005-churches-and-political-...