•
• This current law even restricts the
discussions on
issues within the church. Congressman Walter Jones who represents North Carolina
says that “[T]he churches in many places, in my opinion the priests, the rabbis and the clerics,
have not had the freedom
to speak about the moral and political issues of the day. And many times the
moral issues become
political issues, and the political issues moral issues, and we all know that.”[4] The problem is that moral issues cannot
be discussed in
a church if they are also political issues. For example, a pastor’s church can be
penalized if he states
his position on abortion during a campaign season.[5] Walter Jones says that churches are
“so chilled
[by this law] that they refuse to make important moral, ethical or
scriptural statements that may touch on current political
campaigns.”[6]
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