USA Today revisits the 7-month saga of “Pulpit Freedom Day,” the brainchild of ADF, the evangelical Christian legal group co-founded by Focus on the Family’s James Dobson and other far-right leaders. Thirty-three churches, though none in Colorado, either urged their flock to vote based on conservative political wedge issues or directly endorsed GOP presidential candidate John McCain.

It’s possible the IRS ignored the recent protest because it does not have an incentive to pursue the issue, said Robert Tuttle, a professor of law and religion at George Washington University.

“It would be expensive for them to fight, and it would give people all sorts of reasons to say the IRS is evil and irreligious,” Tuttle said. “It’s not like they’re going to recoup a lot of money. Their attitude is probably ‘why bother?”‘

Or, it could be too early to say. When similar violations occurred during previous presidential elections, the IRS took two or three years to introduce litigation to strip a church of its tax-exempt status, said John Witte Jr., director of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University.

“Even so, if the IRS wanted to pounce on this, I think it would have by now,” Witte said. Perhaps it did not consider an investigation a wise use of resources, he speculated, or maybe the agency is occupied with more pressing cases.

[Erik] Stanley, the ADF’s attorney, said the organization will continue its protests as long as necessary, holding annual Pulpit Freedom Sundays every year ahead of federal, state or local elections. If the IRS does not take action against future protests, he said, pastors will learn the regulation can be safely ignored.

To be sure, the Sept. 28 event wasn’t universally embraced by conservative theologians.

Richard Cizik, then-lobbyist for the National Association of Evangelicals until he was ousted after tangling with Dobson over gay marriage, said of the protest, “I do know it’s true the people in the pews get their cues from the pulpit, but I don’t think that we should endorse candidates. I don’t think that churches were created to be grist in the machinery of politics.”

Catholic Archbishop John Favalora of Miami was more direct in a church newsletter writing: “The role of the church is not to be like the ‘party boss’ who goes around telling people how to vote.”

As we noted in our report, Ambulance Chasing for Jesus, posted days before the pastors wielded their homiliy-inspired political cudgels, the ADF Web site displayed a disclaimer that as a tax-exempt, nonprofit organization it does not endorse or oppose political candidates.

Required qualifications include, among others, personal faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, agreement to and affirmation of the NAE Statement of Faith, and participation in an NAE affiliated congregation.

Lobbyists aren’t normally expected to believe in the causes they represent. In this industry, salvation comes by works alone.

Deep-seated moral beliefs can be a liability for a lobbyist, as the NAE found out last month. Former top NAE lobbyist Richard Cizik was forced to resign, after 28 years on the job, when his personal beliefs conflicted with NAE doctrine.

Cizick’s downfall was a Dec. 2 interview with National Public Radio’s Terry Gross. The lobbyist just couldn’t bring himself to repeat the party line on gay families:

In a short portion of the program, Gross asked him, “A couple of years ago when you were on our show, I asked you if you were changing your mind on that. And two years ago, you said you were still opposed to gay marriage. But now as you identify more with younger voters, would you say you have changed on gay marriage?”

Cizik responded, “I’m shifting, I have to admit. In other words, I would willingly say that I believe in civil unions. I don’t officially support redefining marriage from its traditional definition, I don’t think.”

James Dobson, the leader of Focus on the Family, also tried to get Cizik fired in 2006 for being an environmentalist.

Maybe the NAE should rethink that job description. When it comes to lobbying, true believers can be trouble.

“I’m shifting, I have to admit,” the Rev. Richard Cizik told NPR. “In other words, I would willingly say that I believe in civil unions. I don’t officially support redefining marriage from its traditional definition, I don’t think.”

Last year a roster of conservative evangelical leaders tried to oust Cizik, the vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals for 28 years, for what they termed a “relentless campaign” against global warming. Their preference was to keep the focus on social issues, like abortion, same-sex marriage and abstinence before marriage.

“For better or for worse, Rich became a great, polarizing figure,” said Charles Colson of Prison Fellowship. “He was gradually, over a period of time, separating himself from the mainstream of evangelical belief and conviction. So I’m not surprised. I’m sorry for him, but I’m not disappointed for the evangelical movement.”

Just this week Cizik, along with Colson, signed off on a full-page ad in the New York Times claiming that gays and lesbians have engaged in a pattern of mob violence against Mormons after the passage of Proposition 8 in California. The ad has sparked backlash from gays.

In a September interview with the Colorado Independent, Cizik weighed in with his thoughts about the presidential race, including a marked critique of the Republican candidate.

“I thought John McCain was a principled person,” Cizik said. “But John McCain has backed off, not just on climate change but on torture and a sensible tax policy — in other words, he’s not the John McCain of 2000. … He seems to be waffling on issue after issue.”

(Photo/goatopolis, Flickr)

Egged on by the conservative Alliance Defense Fund legal firm, 33 church leaders across the country have vowed to break federal law during their sermons this Sunday, Sept. 28. The so-called “Pulpit Freedom Day” action is a call for pastors to flaunt federal law and deliver full-on endorsements of political candidates.

But some religious leaders — including Richard Cizik of the 30-million-member National Association of Evangelicals, and Catholic Archbishop John Favalora of Miami — have warned pastors not to risk losing the benefits that come from tax-exempt status.

“The role of the church is not to be like the ‘party boss’ who goes around telling people how to vote,” Favalora wrote in a Sept. 17 newsletter.

In a recent interview, Cizik opined, “I do know it’s true the people in the pews get their cues from the pulpit, but I don’t think that we should endorse candidates. I don’t think that churches were created to be grist in the machinery of politics.”

“I tell people to resist the political temptation to endorse candidates,” continued Cizik, who oversees national government affairs for the nation’s largest organized group of evangelical Christians. “I don’t think that attempting to yank the IRS’s chain is prudent, nor do I think it’s particularly ethical.”

Cizik says he has advised pastors who feel compelled to share their views about candidates and upcoming elections to step down from their pulpits for those discussions — rather than addressing the congregation as the embodiment of the church. In an extensive interview with the Colorado Independent this week, Cizik, speaking for himself, criticized John McCain for a lack of principle, but stopped short of endorsing Barack Obama.

“My general counsel is what is legal and not legal in order to show respect for the law,” Cizik said.

But lawyers for the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based legal firm that was founded by Focus on the Family CEO James Dobson and other far right evangelical Christian leaders, argue that “pastors have a right to speak freely.”

“We believe the law is unconstitutional,” said ADF legal counsel Dale Schowengerdt.

ADL attorneys hope that Sunday’s action will set off a chain of events that result in a lawsuit challenging the federal government over the rule. Their effort has already resulted in a complaint by three former IRS chiefs that the conservative law firm — itself a nonprofit — is organizing a “mass action” designed to encourage other nonprofits to break the law.

But even while it is encouraging others to break the law, the ADF has placed a disclaimer on its own web site noting that as a tax-exempt organization it does not endorse or oppose political candidates. Schowengerdt declined to identify any churches whose pastors plan to endorse from the pulpit on Sunday. He did say that none of the 33 churches that lined up for the test case this Sunday are in Colorado.

“We’re not releasing names beforehand — we’ve had concerns about people going to disrupt services, and so we’re keeping the [participating churches] confidential until afterward,” he said.

Rob Boston of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, dismisses Schowengerdt’s claims outright.

“Having a tax exemption is a benefit, not a constitutional right,” Boston said. Federal law, he notes, prohibits churches, which benefit from not having to pay taxes, from using its resources for blatant political purposes.

Boston underscored another, more nuanced point.

“People go to church to get close to God, not to be told who to vote for or against,” he said. “Increasingly people of faith are saying they want the religious community to step back from politicking in church, or in their houses of worship.”

Church leaders, of course, already have the ability to speak about their political views as individuals.

For example, Ted Haggard, the former pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, often spoke passionately about his conservative political convictions — but stopped short of offering up actual endorsements from the pulpit. Speaking as a private individual in 2006, Haggard issued a letter endorsing Kyle Fisk, a Republican running for the Colorado state House, two months before he was fired amid a meth- and gay-sex scandal.

And Denver Archbishop Charles Chaput has generated past controversy, telling Catholics that, in his view, voting for politicians who are pro-choice is a sin.

This week Focus on the Family spokesman Gary Schneeberger did not return phone calls to clarify whether Dobson’s massive Colorado Springs ministry and media empire is supporting the ADF’s “Pulpit Freedom Day” call to endorse. Focus on the Family has been targeted in recent years, unsuccessfully, by groups that have accused Dobson, who has made a name for himself as a Republican presidential kingmaker, of blurring the lines between politicking and evangelizing.

In an e-mail, Haggard’s replacement, Pastor Brady Boyd, described the planned action as “not a position that I feel strongly about right now.”

“We are focusing on helping people, and meeting the needs of our community.”

That said, Boyd continued, “I respect my fellow pastors who are participating. America has always been a country where people could voice their opinions or disapprovals about the law and protest for change. This is the essence of democracy.”

While the ADL has refused to identify any participating churches, two news organizations have found pastors in Bethlehem, Ga., and in Warroad, Minn., who say they plan to defy the IRS.

“As a pastor, I have the right to speak biblical truth without being punished for it,” the Rev. Jody Hice, pastor of Bethlehem First Baptist Church in Georgia was quoted in the Wall Street Journal, saying he plans to endorse Sen. John McCain for president on Sunday. “The IRS does not have the role of censoring speech from the pulpit.”

And in Warroad, Minn., Pastor Gus Booth of the 150-member Warroad Community Church told Christianity Today that he also expects to endorse John McCain. Booth was a Minnesota delegate to the Republican National Convention.

“If we can tell you what to do in the bedroom, we can certainly tell you what to do in the voting booth,” Booth said.

New York Times bestselling author Don Miller is the latest nationally known evangelical Christian to head into what is considered by many the heart of conservative evangelism — Colorado Springs — to deliver the message that Christians should expand their focus beyond hot-button social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage.

Miller, the author of “Blue Like Jazz” and who delivered the benediction at the Democratic National Convention in August, is speaking at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs tonight. In an interview today with the Colorado Independent, he said that his appearance in Colorado Springs is designed to help convince evangelicals that Barack Obama, who has spoken extensively of the role of faith in public life, is “probably the most evangelical candidate of all the candidates.”

“One of the reasons we’re here in Colorado is that it is up for grabs and the opportunity arose,” Miller said. “We have no desire to go into the heart of the evangelical movement and dismantle it, but here’s the message: A lot of people don’t know that the culture war is a cultural Vietnam, and we’re at an impasse. This is a chance for us, and a lot of evangelicals are finding themselves endeared to Barack Obama.”

As an evangelical stump-man for the Democratic candidate, however, Miller knows the odds are challenging at best. Citing current polls, he says only 15 percent of the most conservative evangelical people of faith plan to vote for Obama.

Miller’s visit to Colorado’s second largest city, which is home to national and international headquarters of dozens of high profile Christian nonprofits, follows an appearances last week by Richard Cizik, the vice president for governmental affairs of the 30-million member National Association of Evangelicals.

Cizik is the nation’s leading high-profile evangelical promoting the need for Christians to address climate change and protect God’s planet — and he has withstood hardball efforts from old-style evangelicals like Springs-based Focus on the Family CEO James Dobson to get him fired. Dobson, along with others, would prefer Christian evangelicals focus on social issues like abortion and same sex marriage.

In an interview with the Colorado Independent, after two public appearances in the Springs, Cizik took issue with Republican John McCain, terming the Republican as unprincipled for backing away from former positions articulating the need to address climate change, as well as torture and a sensible tax policy — and in effect, becoming more like George Bush than the John McCain of the past. Despite his condemnation of McCain’s positions, however, Cizik stopped short of saying he plans to vote for Obama.

Miller, who says he does not know Cizik, also underscored his desire that Christian evangelicals move beyond the divisive issues of abortion and gay marriage — which many of the younger generation have already done.

“Certainly many more evangelicals, and younger evangelicals, are figuring out that globalization and trade are incredibly important — responsible fatherhood is incredibly important,” Miller said. In addition, he termed the current administration’s accounting practices “unbiblical.”

“Our taxes have gone up and we have a 40 percent larger government … we can no longer say as evangelicals we have one party,” he said.

For more on evangelical Christian leaders on the intersection of politics, faith and the 2008 presidential campaigns, read Evangelical leader smacks McCain for lack of principle.

Richard Cizik, the chief lobbyist for the National Association of Evangelicals, was named one of TIME's 100 most influential people.

Richard Cizik is one of the country’s most powerful and outspoken Christian evangelical leaders. He happens to be a Republican, and he has known the GOP’s presidential nominee for many years. “I thought John McCain was a principled person,” Cizik says. “But John McCain has backed off, not just on climate change but on torture and a sensible tax policy — in other words, he’s not the John McCain of 2000. … He seems to be waffling on issue after issue.

“It’s not illogical for someone to conclude that John McCain is going to be more like George Bush than John McCain is going to be like John McCain in 2000.”

Characterizing the GOP’s presidential nominee as an unprincipled waffler is strong stuff from the man who oversees governmental affairs and is the chief lobbyist of the 30-million-member Washington, D.C.-based National Association of Evangelicals. But Cizik — named this year by TIME magazine one of the world’s 100 most influential people — is no stranger to controversies that come from strong convictions.

Over the past several years, Cizik, whose organization represents 45,000 churches from 59 denominations, has emerged as a passionate leader in the Creation Care movement — efforts by Christian evangelicals to respond to the perils of global change.

Focus on the Family founder and president James Dobson has long been critical of Richard Cizik's 'Creation Care' approach to global warming. (Photo/Focus on the Family)

Suffice to say, Cizik’s efforts have rocked much of his world — including the minds of Focus on the Family founder James Dobson and a phalanx of other old-guard evangelicals like Tony Perkins, Paul Weyrich and Gary Bauer who tried last year, unsuccessfully, to get Cizik fired from his job of 26 years for sounding the global warming alarm.

Dobson and the others, you see, would prefer to keep the evangelical focus on what they call “the great moral issues of our time,” specifically abortion, man-woman-only marriage and “the teaching of sexual abstinence and morality to our children.”

They have disparaged Cizik for having a “preoccupation” with global warming and other related issues, including poverty and overpopulation. In 2006 Dobson even head-butted Cizik in the press for supporting international regulations of emissions, calling his views “anti-capitalistic and [having] an underlying hatred for America.”

Cizik, who takes the long view of winning converts to the global warming battle though biblical truths and employing what he describes as a “winsome, non-argumentative spirit,” was in Colorado Springs last week for a two day speaking tour with an unlikely partner in crime, the populist commentator Jim Hightower (who has detailed Cizik’s work in his latest book, “Swim Against the Current: Even a Dead Fish Can Go Against the Flow”).

The first night the two addressed a crowd of 500 congregants of the Vanguard Christian Church and the next spoke to a crowd of hundreds of Colorado College students and environmental activists. And yes, during his speech Cizik made a joking reference to “people” who say he should be fired. He also expressed hope that Colorado Springs — headquarters to Dobson’s ministry and media empire Focus on the Family — would become ground zero for a renewed “focus on the Earth.”

“We live in the same world, but some people see through different glasses,” Cizik said of critics. “We have to move them.”

In an extensive Colorado Independent interview shortly after his Colorado stop, Cizik spoke more specifically about his views of the presidential election,including his thoughts on McCain’s pick of Sarah Palin — who rejects the science of human induced climate change — as his running mate.

Cizik tells of an encounter he had with McCain a year ago, after the candidate had been the target of loathing from evangelical leaders — most notably from the very same James Dobson who has gone after Cizik. In McCain’s case, Dobson let it be known in no uncertain terms: “I would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances … he’s not in favor of traditional marriage and I pray that we don’t get stuck with him.”

McCain, says Cizik, wanted to know what to make of these declarations. Cizik’s response? Where else are people like Dobson really going to go? Ultimately, he says, the criticism may have given old-guard leaders like Dobson leverage over McCain’s vice presidential choice. And lo and behold, since Palin was picked, Dobson has been gushing over the ticket, indicating he will in all likelihood “pull the lever” for Palin, er, McCain.

“It is pretty obvious that the Palin nomination plays to identity politics and cultural war issues,” says Cizik. “Her selection is more than an acknowledgment that evangelicals are an important part of the Republican base, and everyone knows that John McCain is not that exciting to religious conservatives.”

Palin, Cizik says, has certainly excited the Republican base, and picking her was certainly a deft, if cynical, political move by McCain — at least in the short term. However, in the longer view, his running mate may do just as much to energize the opposition and prove a turn-off to independents.

“Not everyone in the evangelical movement is fawning over Sarah Palin,” Cizik says.

Let’s review the conflicting messages: Just as hurricanes like Katrina and Rita and Ike have laid devastating wakes, McCain has selected a doubter of human-caused global warming as a running mate. Palin’s record as a drill-baby-drill-for-oil advocate, including in Alaska’s National Wildlife Reserve; supporting shooting wolves from low-flying airplanes; and de-listing polar bears as an endangered species doesn’t exactly resonate among evangelical Christians who have embraced a commitment to caring for God’s creation.

And, sending perhaps the most important signal of all, McCain himself has chosen not to not to speak out on the issue of climate change, Cizik notes. His campaign instead has opted to play identity and culture-war politics.

“He’s playing that card, and many of us thought he didn’t need to do it — it just polarizes the country,” Cizik says. “The irony of it is that John McCain can’t speak with an evangelical voice of faith — let’s face it, it’s just not his thing — so I guess the substitute is this other [Palin]. I guess that’s pretty cynical, but maybe his actions are cynical.

“The consequences of going to identity and culture-war politics is that experience is denigrated, authority is questioned and ignorance is strength,” Cizik says.

That said, come Nov. 4 does Cizik plan to cast his vote for Barack Obama? He doesn’t know.

“Obama doesn’t have the experience all of us would like,” Cizik says. “I’m not in Washington to be an advocate for the Republican or the Democratic Party; that’s not my calling. I’m not an ideologue. I do wish Obama had 10 years experience in the Senate and Sarah Palin had [more experience].

“I am a Republican, but I’m not comfortable with giving the Republicans four more years. I don’t see John McCain differing enough from the incumbent, and yet Obama is a work in progress, pretty much, so we’d be taking some risk with him. It’s a conundrum.”

For more on evangelical Christian leaders on the intersection of politics, faith and the 2008 presidential campaigns, read Evangelical author rallies votes for Obama in Colorado Springs.