There is nothing in the constitution that says that religious organizations (or other kinds of organizations for that matter) should be tax exempt.

These rules come from the US Code § 501 (c), https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501

> (3) [...] religious, charitable, scientific, testing for public safety, literary, or educational purposes, or to foster national or international amateur sports competition (but only if no part of its activities involve the provision of athletic facilities or equipment), or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals [...]

You're right. The congress doesn't have the authority to tax (or legislate) them in the first place; not being subject to tax laws at all, they cannot be then exempted from tax liabilities under them.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

I am not a constitutional scholar, nor am I even American, but that doesn't say to me that religions can't be taxed, so long as it's applied equally across all religious organisations. If they are taxed like businesses, they are still allowed to be practised, surely? And there is no 'establishment' of an official church or religion by taxing all equally.

> You can apply building and safety and occupancy codes to the structure, you can apply income tax to the attendees, et c, but it says right on the tin: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion".

Arguably, that just means you can't pass laws that are directed towards / against religion. Not that religion is above the law. See Lemon Test: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_v._Kurtzman#Lemon_test

According to this interpretation, church taxes (like the ones still present in some European countries) are unlawful, as is denying churches ability to gather their own donations. But churches still should pay same taxes that apply to other NGOs.

It's not that religious establishments are above the law, it's that congress (the source of laws) does not have the authority to make any laws that apply to religious establishments.

It's a subtle difference. Churchgoers don't get a free pass to break the law. The establishment simply is immune to regulation of any kind attempted to be placed upon the organization itself by congress.

> congress (the source of laws) does not have the authority to make any laws that apply to religious establishments

It's not obvious that this is what was meant by 1st amendment. Other interpretation is that congress simply can't make laws that apply exclusively to religious establishments.

EDIT: I must add that the interpretation you mentioned is undoubtedly the "canonical" one in public's mind, so the situation is unlikely to change soon.

Quite the opposite. I think the layperson view is to read "respect" as in "Congress is not allowed to make laws favoring one religion over another".

This interpretation would be compatible with taxing churches (as long as they are all taxed equally).

It was certainly my view before I studied the topic.

It turns out that congress is not allowed to legislate religious establishments at all.

If you studied the topic, then surely you're very familiar with what's written in the Wikipedia article on the Establishment Clause [0], which makes it very clear that its purpose is to prevent the government from establishing a state religion (including by favoring one religion over another), not to prevent it from making any laws that can affect religious institutions.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Establishment_Clause

Let´s say I had a religion that had a "Thou shalt sacrifice a non-believer being every Wednesday to appease Xantako the Moon God" clause.

Are you arguing that my congregation should be immune from any restrictions being placed on us for worshipping our god by slowly killing everyone around us who does not share our view , because we operate outside of the law ?

The parent explicitly pointed out that religious organizations don't operate outside the law. If they did, literally every corporation and political party in the US would also establish itself as a religion.

What Congress isn't allowed to do is pass a law stating "no religious organizations in the US are allowed to practice human sacrifice." But you still wouldn't be able to appease Xanakto the Moon God because Congress is still allowed to make murder illegal in general, just not exclusively in the context of religious practice.

But not paying taxes on your income is illegal "in general". So one could interpret that as "all organisations should pay taxes if they have income"...

As I understand it, religious organizations have tax exempt status as non-profits under laws which also include educational and scientific institutions.

And, ironically, the reason religious organizations are included at all is the belief that taxing them would provide a means by which governments could interfere with religion in violation of the First Amendment.

My understanding of the Establishment Clause is that its primary purpose, which is not obvious for a modern reader, was to prevent the government from "establishing" a state religion. [0]

So that means that the government is forbidden from making laws that favor a particular religion over others, not from making any laws that constrain or affect religious groups and institutions.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Establishment_Clause, from which, "The Establishment Clause is a limitation placed upon the United States Congress preventing it from passing legislation forcing an establishment of religion, broadly making it illegal for the government to promote theocracy or promote a specific religion with taxes."

You are correct. England has an established church, as does Scotland (but not the same one as England, interestingly). Wales used to have an established church, but it was "disestablished" in 1920. Other European countries have established churches as well.

Often this means that not only are they the official church, but that tax money is actually used to support them -- even tax money from people who don't belong to that church.

The Founders did not like paying taxes to churches they didn't belong to, and who can blame them for that?

Also interestingly, at the time the Constitution was enacted, some of the states did have established churches. The Constitution didn't do anything about that, as it only affected the Federal government.

The First Amendment has since been "incorporated" (by means of the Fourteenth Amendment) in such a way that states are also prohibited from establishing churches nowadays.

That is not correct. See this article [1] for a discussion of the leading case, Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U.S. 664 (1970), on this matter. See also some later cases that applied that one, such as Texas Monthly, Inc. v. Bullock, 489 U.S. 1 (1989), and Jimmy Swaggart Ministries v. California Bd. of Equalization, 493 U.S. 378 (1990), both of which are linked in that article.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/amendment-1/t...

I don't see how it would, here is the full text concerning religion.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" Part 2 would be the key aspect not part one. The question would be whether the free exercise is inhibited by tax on institutions or whether religion is intangible and separate from institutions and thus still free practice is available. I'm not sure how it would lean but a somewhat similar concept is tax on guns which is legal, though the wording is different.

I think an argument would be if a church did not pay its tax what would happen? If the church would be closed that would be in violation of the amendment.

However I thought that it is not just that religions are not taxed, but rather that non-profits are not taxed and religions are just a special type of non-profit.

on edit: wrote it's instead of its.

Using that argument, newspapers shouldn't have to pay taxes either. If a newspaper doesn't pay its taxes, it will be closed, which (according to this argument) would be a violation of the freedom of the press clause.

good point, didn't think of that. but the second part still stands, that they don't pay taxes because they are non-profits.

That's a bit like a German health minister answering the question "why is drug consumption forbidden?" with the words "because drugs are illegal".

Yeah sure, that's technically correct, but laws can be changed. Including the constitution, with the prime example being your source, the first amendment.

The first amendment does not require that churches be exempt from tax. Only that they be treated equally.

"respect" here means "on the matter of" (eg "in respect to the matter of") not "favored over another".

Actually it appears that that phrase is to do with making any particular religious organisation established like the Church of England, which is definitely a favoured status.

Doesn't that "no law" thing also mean "no special exemptions"?