As we are all mostly aware, religious organizations here in Canada get the same tax breaks other charities. As it is stated in our tax exemption legislation there are four ways an organization can qualify.
(i) the relief of poverty
(ii) the advancement of education
(iii) the advancement of religion
(iv) other purposes beneficial to the community that the courts have identified as charitable
The third qualifier in the list is the one that concerns me and other non-religious people the most. A religious organization has all the right to self promote but as a supposedly secular government, we should not be giving them a hand in the matter.
Should we not base tax exempt status on what the organization does but on how much revenue is used toward the other criteria? Should we assist the organization that spends millions of dollars on their own worship centers or should we assist the organization that is doing true charitable acts through volunteers and a limited paid staff.
The government and the services it supports are loosing out on lost tax revenue on organizations that use more money internally then spend on the community. In 2007 this was approximately 1.2 billion dollars. This could be much better used for our healthcare system. A system that we know helps people.
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