“Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….” – 1st Amendment of U.S. Constitution
As a legally constituted church denomination, Templar Church is a non-profit organization and all donations to Templar Church or it’s ministries are tax deductible. Templar Church is a denomination that currently owns two member churches, one in Connecticut and one in Texas. Membership includes Catholics, Protestants, and Orthodox. Templar Church works to spread the light of Christ in an increasingly dark world. Templar Church is incorporated in the state of New Hampshire with Business ID: 725359 which is viewable at: https://www.sos.nh.gov/corporate/soskb/Corp.asp?1259808.
Churches have broad constitutional protections designed to ensure the free exercise of religion and to prevent intrusion by the state into matters of doctrine and church autonomy. Churches enjoy substantial freedom under the U.S. Constitution to govern themselves as they see fit without fear of legal consequences. Courts “do not exercise jurisdiction over the internal affairs of religious organizations.”
The Supreme Court has recognized “a spirit of freedom for religious organizations, an independence from secular control or manipulation, in short, power to decide for themselves, free from state interference, matters of church government as well as those of faith and doctrine,” They have recognized that this freedom is rooted in the Free Exercise Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
The IRS recognizes that there is a separation between church and state in the Constitution and that government cannot legally tax or regulate the church. The United States government also has some prohibitions in defining what a church is legally is. The courts have upheld this prohibition repeatedly. The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America prohibits the federal government from legislating for or against religion. It says: “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….”.
Young Life (http://www.younglife.org/), is a nonprofit organization that the IRS officially recognized as a church following a July 2005 Ruling. Young Life does not have an established place of worship or church building per se, but it does have meetings at specific locations. In the end, although Young Life did not meet all federal criteria for religious entities, the IRS concluded that it did meet a sufficient number of them to qualify as a church. A second Christian organization with no buildings or regular services that qualifies as a church is CRU and found at http://www.cru.org/ (formerly known as Campus Crusade for Christ International).
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