In residents began refusing to pay taxes to the Israeli occupiers.
Tax money should go for roads, health and local services, they said.
But the occupiers were supplying none of these services.
Instead they used taxes to fund the military occupation.
Residents adopted the slogan “No taxation without representation.”
The authorities responded with nightly curfews, mass arrests and a strong troop presence in the town.
But residents still did not pay their taxes.
For six weeks in , Israeli troops sealed off the town.
They seized property and belongings from businessmen and families who had not paid taxes.
Tax officials went from house to house humiliating and beating people, according to a account in the Jerusalem Post.
Israeli tax officials confiscated without trial several million dollars worth of property.
The tax siege has now been lifted, but Beit Sahour residents still refuse to pay taxes.
I recently attended a meeting that focused on the question of paying the military portion (about 50 percent) of our [U.S.] federal income taxes.
I left the meeting troubled, not because there were varying viewpoints but because many people appeared unconcerned about the issue and failed to address what I believe are key questions on the matter.
The question for me is not whether we should honor our government or whether a government has the right to collect taxes.
The crux of the matter is to determine when Caesar’s demands conflict with our obedience to God.
I fear that if I were to give Caesar all that he demands in war taxes, I would fail to honor God in four important ways.
I fear that by paying the military portion of my income taxes I fail to trust God alone for my security.
Throughout history nations have tried to secure their well-being and safety through military solutions.
Again and again in the Bible God asks us to resist such solutions and to trust him instead:
War horses are useless for victory; their great strength cannot save.
The Lord watches over those who have reverence for him, those who trust in his constant love.
He saves them from death… We put our hope in the Lord; he is our protector and our help (Psalm 33:17–20).
If I work several months each year to pay my nation’s military dues, am I not giving legitimacy to the military establishment’s answers for my security?
If I am willing to invest so much of my time and energy in a military solution, can I honestly say that God is my protector?
I fear that by paying my war taxes I fail to give my primary loyalty to Christ’s worldwide church.
My war taxes would purchase planes, bombs, guns and military training to be used in Third World settings.
Although our country is not involved in any declared war, our military might is felt keenly in Central America, the Philippines and the Middle East.
In fact, in recent years the United States has adopted a policy of promoting “low-intensity conflict” in countries that threaten to move out from under our sphere of influence.
This means keeping warfare away from the American public eye and avoiding the involvement of American soldiers in the fighting.
Yet our brothers and sisters in Christ do die in the struggle.
Can I say that my first loyalty is to the worldwide kingdom of God if I comply with structures that do violence to my neighbors around the world?
I fear that by paying my war taxes I fail to follow Christ as he calls me to love all people, even my enemies.
In Matthew 5 Jesus no doubt surprised his listeners by challenging them to love not only their friends but all people, just as God does.
This has not been an easy teaching for the church.
Peter struggled with it when he was called to go to Cornelius, a gentile, and Paul reminded the early church often that the gospel was not only for Jews but also for gentiles.
Ephesians 2:14
points this out: “For Christ himself has brought us peace by making Jews and gentiles one people.
With his own body he broke down the wall that separated them and kept them enemies.”
Do we believe that this can also apply to Americans and Soviets, rich and poor, capitalist and communist?
Can I believe this and at the same time contribute to the forces that are designed to destroy these very people whom Christ called me to love?
I fear that by paying my war taxes I fail to respect God’s creation.
In today’s world, militarism not only threatens people but all of creation as well.
While militarism is not the only way we dishonor God’s creation, it is through nuclear weapons that we dare to threaten all that God has made.
Can I claim to truly honor God if I continue to help pay for such weapons?
I think these questions have special poignancy for us as Mennonites.
We claim to be conscientious objectors to war.
Yet in a low-intensity conflict or in a nuclear war it is almost irrelevant to say that we will not serve in the military.
These kinds of wars do not demand our bodies but our dollars and our consent.
Thus we cannot ignore this issue of war taxes.
I recognize that sincere people differ on this issue.
Some encourage elected leaders to reorder our nation’s priorities.
Some give away more of their income so that they owe less income tax.
Some live in community so that they can live on lower incomes.
Some withhold a symbolic amount of all of their military taxes.
Some support legislative efforts that would allow conscientious objectors to designate the military portion of their federal taxes to a peace tax fund.
What is important is not so much that we all agree but that we agonize together on these questions.
Let us pray for wisdom as we wrestle with what this issue means for our faith in God, our witness as a Christian church, our faithfulness to Christ and our reverence for God’s creation.
This was accompanied by a sidebar invitation for people to redirect their taxes through “the Taxes for Peace fund.”
It added that “In , $5750 in Taxes for Peace funds were divided between the National Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund and Christian Peacemaker Teams; 1990 contributions will be divided the same way.”
Members of St. Louis Mennonite Fellowship recently passed a proposal to faithfully resist payments of the U.S. federal phone tax applied monthly to the fellowship’s phone bill.
The revenues will be redirected to Mennonite Central Committee.
“We wish to respect the convictions of our members and Anabaptist forebears and to be disciplined followers of Jesus Christ,” said Scott Neufeld, coordinator of St. Louis Mennonite Peace Witness.
Federal phone tax revenues, first collected in , contribute directly to the U.S. Armed Forces and other systems of war, Neufeld said.
Looking at our Anabaptist heritage and looking at our Scriptures in light of contemporary political realities, we do not have to be pressed to pray for peace while paying for war.
Our spiritual authority in Jesus Christ, as expressed by apostles and Anabaptist forebears, allows and empowers us to make the difficult decision to withhold war taxes.
Balthasar Hubmaier, writing about taxes paid to an unjust government, states, “…to come to the point, God will excuse us for nothing on the account of unjust superiors…” (Anabaptism in Outline, Klassen, p. 246).
The U.S. government has become unjust, and when a government is unjust, it has forfeited the right to expect my taxes.
As Christians and Anabaptists, we have a rich tradition of conscience.
In some ways we even have a tradition of anarchy.
Anarchy in the eyes of the world, that is, for we may claim a greater authority — God.…
The early Anabaptists — Menno Simons, Balthasar Hubmaier, Jacob Hutter and Peter Rideman — all spoke out on the proper attitude of a Christian toward government, on paying taxes used for war and on the production of weapons of violence.
For Anabaptist Christians the issue to pay or not to pay war taxes has a significant history.
Jacob Hutter wrote, “For how can we be innocent before our God if we do not go to war ourselves but give the money that others may go in our place?
We will not become partakers of the sin of others and dishonor and despise God” (“Plots and Excuses,” Klassen p. 252).
While this may refer to the practice of paying one’s way out of military service by supplying a replacement, it still holds true that aiding the carrying out of violence indirectly indicts the taxpayer as a participant in the violence enacted.
Similarly Peter Rideman asserts that one has a responsibility not only for what one produces but also for how those products are used by others.
Rideman states that Christians cannot build weapons of violence, even if they do not use those products themselves.
The one who produces weapons is responsible for the violence inflicted.
But the issue of our history as Christians and as Anabaptists concerning the issue of war tax resistance is made more difficult because of our reading of the biblical texts relating to government, particularly Matthew 22:21 (and other texts referring to government, e.g. Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2:14).
In any discussion of war tax resistance among Christians, the words of Jesus are almost always quoted, “…render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” However, if we look closely at the political and historical context of these biblical texts, we have to ask ourselves how we can apply Jesus’ response in Matthew 22:21 to ourselves in our political and historical situation.
Trick question: Ancient Palestine, in the time of Jesus, was a territory held captive under Roman rule.
Foreign powers hostile to Judaism had occupied Palestine, installed a puppet ruler, King Herod, and sought to form alliances with certain Jewish factions.
The Pharisees, on the other hand, reflected the thoughts and feelings of the majority of the poor and middle-class Jews, feelings of resentment and anger.
The Pharisees, who had been plotting to do away with Jesus on any grounds possible, were seeking to trick Jesus.
On the chance that Jesus might make some incriminating statements, the Pharisees sent their disciples to Jesus along with representatives from Herod.
That way, if Jesus said something self-incriminating to the religious people or to the political regime, he could be arrested.
As it was, neither truth nor justice were being sought by this group when they asked Jesus the question about paying the tax.
It was a trick question, and Jesus responded with a trick answer.
“And Jesus said to them, ‘Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.’ And they were greatly amazed at him” (Mark 12:17).
But what does his answer say to us?
What direction does it give to those who are not asking trick questions but whose motives are truth and justice?
We must take seriously that we do not live in a political situation anything like ancient Palestine.
We live in , has witnessed amazing revolutions of democratization.
Democracies seek to do away with the dichotomy between the government and the people.
In a democracy there is no Caesar.
Since we are not ruled by a monarch, we have no “caesar” over us.
If there is a caesar over us, so to speak, then we are caesar.
The U.S. Constitution begins by naming our caesar, “We the people.”…
We, as responsible citizens, are the political and moral authority of the United States.
If our nation blunders and falls, if it is unjust and violent, if it has misplaced priorities, then the blame is on us and not merely upon those we have elected to represent our concerns.
Living in a democracy, we actually pay taxes to ourselves.
We are responsible for setting the budgets.
We are responsible for policies.
One of our greatest problems is that we have surrendered democratic government to bureaucracy, allowing others to make decisions for us.
We are the caesar to whom we are to render our taxes, not some authority outside ourselves.
As such, it is up to us to decide what we will or will not render.
It is this freedom of conscience that makes democracy both attractive to those who live without it and a headache to those who must operate with it.
For this reason, Plato said, democracy is the best form of a bad government and the worst form of a good one.
A restraint of evil: Those of us who withhold a portion of our taxes are trying to reorient our national spending priorities by saying we will not pay for war or violence.
The portion we do not pay we give away to those who will use it for peace.
While we recognize that we are breaking a law of the people (willing to take responsibility and to be accountable for our actions), we are not breaking a law against caesar.
What we are trying to do is give ourselves what we need to function as a government, that is, to function as a restraint of evil and to be a supporter of good (1 Peter 2:14).
Menno Simons wrote that the task of government is to “do justice… to deliver the oppressed,… without tyranny… without force, violence and blood” (“Foundation of Christian Doctrine,” Complete Writings of Menno Simons, p. 193).
Government ceases to be legitimate when it ceases to be a force for order in both foreign and domestic realms, when it ceases to provide for the needs of all, and when it ceases to be a body of law for carrying out justice without violence and bloodshed.
Would we continue to give our tithes and offerings to a ministry that has been proven to be unethical, caught in scandalous dealings and clearly immoral?
If we held our government up to the same standards as we do televangelists and their ministries, the government would not be able to finance its bureaucracies.
Our government has been caught in one scandal after another, involved in or supporting one war after another.
And because we are caesar, we are responsible for this scandalous behavior.
Even though we have given away our democratic rights to bureaucratic powers, we still will bear God’s judgment.
The majority of our federal budget pays for the operations of the world’s largest military system, which prepares for war with scarce resources.
It finances low-intensity conflicts throughout the world by supplying and sponsoring surrogate armies.
It has yet to finish paying for past wars.
Thus we must come to terms with the reality that we are producing and indirectly using weapons of violence.
Living in a democracy, we are, as citizens, weapons producers by providing through our taxes the capital needed for the production of B1-Bs, MX “Peacekeepers,” Apache attack helicopters, bullets, rifles and on and on.
The Scriptures, which determine the right function of government, the witness of our Anabaptist forebears and our democratic freedoms force us to act in ways that affect the political process.
For many, tax resistance is a way to bring about a change in federal spending priorities.
But much more importantly, it is a way to make one’s life have integrity and to align one’s life with God’s gospel of shalom.
The edition announced a “Standing Up for Peace Contest” with $1,100 in prizes available to “young people ages 15–23” who “interview someone who has refused to fight in war, pay taxes for war, or build weapons for war and share the story through writing an essay or song, producing a video, or creating a work of art.”
The Mennonite Church General Board, after years of study and discussion, brought the military tax question to a vote, then tabled it.
a majority of General Assembly delegates voted to “support” the efforts of church board employees who do not wish their taxes deducted so that they may deal with the government in regard to military taxes.
At the General Board meetings in Kalona, Iowa, members tabled a motion to honor requests of employees who ask that their income tax not be withheld.
Gary Jewell, a student at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminaries, Elkhart, Ind., handed out about $150 in $1 bills to passers-by in front of the downtown post office in Elkhart to express his opposition to U.S. military spending.
He gave away about half of what he and his wife, Jan Yoder, owe in federal income taxes.
The couple plans to give the rest to a charity like Mennonite Central Committee.
Stapled to each $1 bill was a statement by Jewell that read in part, “Today I choose to give my money away (call it a ‘peace dividend’) rather than to pay the remaining 60 percent of my federal income tax that goes toward present and past military expense.”
(The Elkhart Truth)
The edition included a sidebar with this quote:
“Until membership in the church means that a Christian chooses not to engage in violence for any reason and instead chooses to love, pray for, help and forgive all enemies; until membership in the church means that Christians may not be members of any military…; until membership in the church means that Christians cannot pay taxes for others to kill others; and until the church says these things in a fashion that the simplest soul can understand — until that time humanity can only look forward to more dark nights of slaughter on a scale unknown in history.
Unless the church unswervingly and unambiguously teaches what Jesus teaches on this matter, it will not be the divine leaven in the human dough that it was meant to be.”
―George Zabelka, who served as a Roman Catholic chaplain for those who dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on and
The General Boards of the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church issued their first joint statement as a merging body in .
It urged the U.S. to stand down from its Iraq war threats.
One of the seven points of the document calls congregations to confess “our own complicity and selfishness in utilizing more than our share of the world’s supply of oil and other resources… limited concern for longstanding injustices in the Middle East and… paying for the military buildup through our taxes.”
A regional report from the noted that in the Mennonite Conference of Eastern Canada, “A conference employee has requested that the conference not withhold his war taxes.
This issue will be brought to a future conference session.”
This is the thirtieth in a series of posts about war tax resistance as it was
reported in back issues of Gospel Herald, journal of
the (Old) Mennonite Church.
In the Mennonite Church General Assembly
would hold a long-overdue vote on whether or not to support war tax resistance
as an institution. You’ll have to scroll down to see how that turned out.
A Japanese court has ruled against 22 military tax resisters, including
Mennonite pastor Michio Ohno. The ruling by the Tokyo District Court came
recently after nearly eight years of litigation. The case had its origin after
the bank accounts of Ohno and another person were attached by the government
because they didn’t pay their taxes. For reasons of conscience, the 22 object
to paying the portion of their taxes that is used for military purposes. The
negative ruling does not discourage them, however. “We believe it is this type
of lawsuit which, repeated a thousand times, will open the way to legalize
conscientious objection to military taxation in Japan,” said Ohno.
A “Taxes for Peace” fund is again being set up by Mennonite Central Committee
U.S. Peace Section.
It is for people who withhold war taxes to give money for a peaceful purpose.
It is a symbolic action and not a legal alternative to paying the tax.
’s fund will be divided between National
Campaign for a Peace Tax Fund and Christian Peacemaker Teams. More information
about the fund is available from
MCC
U.S. Peace Section…
As the general assembly loomed, a series of letters to the editor concerning
war tax resistance hit the Gospel Herald pages in
:
Krabill felt that war tax resisters were twisting themselves in knots trying to explain away scriptural passages that on their clear facial reading counseled taxpaying.
Peachey explained why she thought war tax resistance was worth taking seriously (this is the same commentary as appeared in The Mennonite and that I excerpted here).
Nafziger thought that Krabill wasn’t discerning the clear obvious meaning of the bible so much as offering a distorted version of it in order to justify paying war taxes.
Do Mennonites need more time to study the tax withholding issue or more
courage? Will the Mennonite Church be known as a “historic peace church” 50
years from now? These and other questions came to mind as I read “General
Board Makes Cautious Preparation for Normal
”…
General Assembly actions in recent years have repeatedly affirmed tax
resistance, based on Christian conscience, as a valid part of our peace
witness. We see these actions not as liberal trends but rather a needed
return to New Testament teachings: to the life, nonviolent teachings, and
spirit of Jesus and to Anabaptist understandings of church and state
separation, roles, and loyalties.
Today military technologies are more important than personnel and therefore
the drafting of our dollars for war and preparation for war is a crucial
matter. The central issue in the earlier General Board recommendation, in my
perspective, was not tax resistance per se but whether the Mennonite Church
is ready to respect and support the consciences of those who request that
their taxes for military purposes not be withheld.
Recently, a young man named Jose was returning to his house in the
Philippines. Government soldiers, who later claimed Jose was out after
curfew, shot this defenseless youth, leaving him with a serious leg injury.
They refused him treatment for enough days that gangrene claimed his lower
leg. When we finally met Jose in the hospital, the lad needed to find blood
for his leg amputation.
Weekly, in our work with Mennonite Central Committee, we hear stories of
global brothers and sisters who are being maimed or killed with weapons of
war, many of them supplied by the American government. Therefore, when we
are faced with the turning over of our income to the Internal Revenue
Service for supplying these coffers of war, it feels to us that to do so
willingly would be the equivalent of signing the death warrant for innocent
friends.
We do not expect that everyone in the Mennonite Church will share these deep
convictions of ours. We believe that many Mennonites have wrestled with this
issue in honesty and prayer and have come to different conclusions from our
own.
Still, we are very saddened when we learn in Gospel
Herald that Mennonite Church General Board chose to back away from
recommending to General Assembly that the convictions of church
institutional employees who object to paying military taxes shall be honored
by their employers. The action leaves us feeling lonely.
What is the church telling us? Are our convictions out of place in our
church? Are we considered stubborn people who refuse to see the truth that
the church identifies? Is the church asking us to give up these deeply held
convictions? We don’t know. We sincerely value the counsel of the church
community. And yet somehow we can’t seem to shut off our (misguided?)
consciences on this matter.
Linda Peachey in “Agonizing Over War Taxes”… makes a good argument for
withholding war taxes. However, there is another angle from which to view
the issue of not paying war taxes. The primary Scripture cited in the debate
is Matthew 22:15–22 (and parallels). If we would apply a little historical
and political exegesis to this passage, we would have to ask ourselves how
we could apply Jesus’ response to ourselves.
For instance, we are not a nation or a people held captive under a foreign
ruler, such as Palestine was during the time of the Roman Empire. Also, we
are not presently ruled by a monarch; we realistically have no “caesar” over
us. If there is a caesar, so to speak, then we are caesar.
In the United States, our constitution begins by naming our caesar, “We the
people,” and Abraham Lincoln elaborated that phrase from our preamble by
claiming that our government essentially is and must remain a “government of
the people, by the people, for the people.”
In our form of democracy, we have no absolute authority set over us. What we
do have is public servants set under us. We, as responsible citizens, are
the authority of this nation. If our nation blunders and falls, the blame is
on us, not merely on those whom we have elected.
Those of us who withhold a portion of our tax are trying to re-orient our
national priorities. While what we do is considered to be illegal, we are
breaking a law of the people (willing to take responsibility for our
actions), but we are not breaking a law against caesar. What we are
trying to do is give to our government (ourselves) what it needs to function
as a force for order, a system for providing for the needs of all, and as a
body of law to carry out justice. (See Jacob Hutter’s and Menno Simons’
writings in Plots and Excuses and Foundations,
respectively.)
We do not all agree on the question of nonpayment of taxes for military
purposes… But shouldn’t we all be asking whether an agency of our church
should withhold taxes for employees who have a conscience against payment of
the military portion? Should a peace church agency side with the state
against the conscience of its own members? And is that consistent when the
church is on record supporting the conscientious action of its members in
nonpayment? It would seem appropriate for us to arrive at a plan whereby the
request of employees be respected and taxes for military purposes not be
withheld by church agencies.
We’ve known since childhood the stories of God’s people in the Old and New
Testaments who said to government and religious authorities, “I can’t do
that,” or “You can’t do that,” or “We can’t do that,” and then took the
awful consequences. Will we rouse from our easy “Christianity” and recognize
when the time has come for us to say such words — to obey God rather than
man and take the consequences?
As for the recommendation on military tax withholding, the board concluded
after consulting the district conferences that the recommendation had to be
rewritten. The sequence of events was as follows.
At Purdue , General Board was asked by General
Assembly to consult the church on the question of the conscientious objection
to the payment of military taxes, particularly the withholding of such taxes
by church institutions for persons who objected to paying them.
In , General Board approved a
statement for presentation to General Assembly at Normal
which included the recommendation that the
convictions of church institutional employees who object to paying military
taxes shall be honored by their employers.
During , district
conferences were contacted by General Board to seek their counsel on the
proposed statement. Responses were mixed. Three conferences supported the
proposal for presentation to General Assembly. Four conferences did not
support it. Eight supported the statement with modifications or cautions.
Executive Secretary James Lapp reported to the board that “I perceive in
general there is no broad consensus of support for the proposed stance of the
General Board.”
Accordingly the board saw it as necessary to prepare a drastically revised
proposal. Gone from this proposal was any reference to illegal action such as
a church institution refusing to collect military taxes from those
conscientiously opposed to paying them. Instead the statement which is to
appear in the “workbook” prepared for General Assembly delegates calls for
“study of the church/state issues raised by the collection of taxes by church
agencies” and for support of the Peace Tax Fund options being called for in
both the U.S. and
Canada.
Military taxes for church employees is a particularly difficult subject. This
issue has been knocking around for several years already. As I reported on
, the General Board at its last
meeting passed a much less decisive proposal than expected. This revision was
made after consultations with district conferences. If anyone wishes to press
for the church to take a radical position on this issue, it will be necessary
to make that point clear since the General Board received mixed signals in
consultations with the conferences.
The General Board had a last chance to tangle with the issue
:
The Mennonite Church General Board held a
prior to Normal
. No major issues were resolved in this brief
meeting. Much of the activity involved receiving reports and doing final work
on statements to be presented to General Assembly.
Among the reports being prepared for the assembly was one related to the
payment of war taxes. This followed an action of Purdue
which had called for the board to study this
issue and report to Normal . There had been a
change of stance after consultation with the district conferences.
In , the board had drafted a
proposal which included a recommendation to respect the consciences of
employees of church organizations who do not wish to have the military portion
of their income tax deducted from their paychecks. By
this proposal was withdrawn and the
emphasis was rather on study of the issue and support of the Peace Tax Fund.
On , the board made final revisions
on this statement for presentation to Normal .
And then the General Assembly met and pushed back against the Board’s
reluctance:
The conference delegations caucused several times during the debate about
war-tax resistance. Here Dave Miller makes a point to his fellow delegates
from Indiana-Michigan Conference.
Merger with a sister denomination and illegal support for war-tax resisters
became a distinct possibility following two crucial secret-ballot votes by the
Mennonite Church General Assembly delegates during Normal
. The merger vote was decisive — 86
percent — and there were no surprises. But the tax vote was close — 59
percent — and was the result of an unexpected turnaround on the General
Assembly floor.
Ruth Brunk Stoltzfus of Virginia Conference calls for more courage instead of
more study on the matter of tax-withholding.
The war-tax issue proved to be a much thornier and more complex matter. It all
started about 10 years ago when employees of Mennonite Church
agencies and schools began requesting that taxes not be
withheld from their paychecks so they could refuse to pay the
portion of their federal income taxes (about half) that is used by the
U.S.
government for military purposes. The
employees said they are conscientious objectors
to military taxes in the same way their fathers and
grandfathers were conscientious objectors to
military service in times of conscription.
The agencies and schools would break the law if they honored their employees’
request. Caught between their employees’ consciences and the government’s
requirements, the agencies and schools appealed to General Board for help.
What followed was years of study and discussion.
Finally, in , General Board members
voted to recommend to General Assembly that church agencies and schools be
permitted to honor the requests of employees who want to resist war taxes. The
General Board action then went to district conferences for their response. The
response was mixed and generally cautious, so General Board watered down the
recommendation at its meeting. By
the time of its meeting the day before the start of Normal
, however, General Board put some teeth back
into the document, but it was still a weakened form of the original version.
When General Assembly took up the issue, several delegates jumped up to scold
General Board for its indecisiveness. “General Board has backed off on this
issue, and that makes me sad and angry,” said Bob Hartzler of Allegheny
Conference. “General Board must exercise leadership on this and not just
gather consensus.” He then asked that the original recommendation be restored.
After more debate and two time-outs for district conference caucuses, the
delegates agreed to vote separately on the three sections of the revised
recommendation and then on the “heart” of the original version, as requested
by Hartzler. The three sections were approved by unanimous or near-unanimous
hand votes.
The revised document calls for (1) further study of the war-tax issue, (2)
financial and other support for the peace-tax fund options being proposed in
the U.S. Congress
and the Canadian Parliament, and (3) moral and financial support for war-tax
resisters.
Action on the heart of the original version, giving agencies and schools
permission to not withhold taxes when requested, was tabled until later in the
week. When the issue came up again,
GC general
secretary Vern Preheim was present to report on his denomination’s experience
since it took a similar action in . Though
the U.S. Internal
Revenue Service contacted the
GC leaders
early on to confirm the action and warn them about the consequences, to date
IRS
has not moved against the
GC Church.
The district conferences then caucused, and when debate resumed, many of the
speakers reported on the general feelings of their conference delegations. “We
stand in a long line of saints who have faced decisions like this, starting
with the women who illegally hid baby Moses,” said Weldon Nisly of Ohio
Conference. Del Glick of Indiana-Michigan Conference reported that several
people in his delegation had changed their minds and were now prepared to vote
yes. “We want to take a stand,” he said. “It will probably take more courage
to face our congregations than to face the government!” Brent Foster then
announced the support of Afro-American Mennonite Association.
Ron Schertz, a lawyer who is a board member of Mennonite Board of Missions,
offered one of the few opposing comments. He warned that approval of the
document would get in the way of
MBM’s
main mission and jeopardize its tax-exempt status.
When the votes were counted, the resurrected war-tax recommendation passed
142-100. Moderator-Elect George Brunk Ⅲ commented that the vote is not a
decisive mandate for General Board but that it does represent “some momentum
on this question.” He said General Board “will have to move with due caution”
and that “we’ll have to see if a greater sense of consensus emerges in the
coming biennium.”
Robert Hartzler of Allegheny Conference introduces an amendment that put
teeth back into the war-tax recommendation.
Special-interest activities abounded. Vigorous
discussion marked a session entitled “Should the
Church Be Caesar’s Tax Collector?”
This was followed by the General
Board meeting, at which the probably somewhat shocked Board would
have to determine how (or whether) to put the Assembly’s
mandate into practice. It seemed to reach the conclusion that since
it could not identify any employees who were currently
requesting the Church to stop withholding war taxes from
their salaries, they could safely
kick the can down the road a few years further:
Another major agenda item for General Board was follow-up work on the military
tax action by General Assembly at Normal . After years of study and debate, the General Assembly delegates
voted to permit denominational agencies and schools to honor — illegally — the
request of employees who, for conscience’ sake, don’t want taxes withheld from
their paychecks. This is so they can refuse to pay the portion that is used
for the military.
The General Assembly vote was close (59 percent) and no employees are
currently requesting non-withholding, so the General Board members agreed to
proceed with caution. But they also agreed that regardless of what the
agencies and schools do and regardless of whether General Board itself has
employees who request non-withholding, they would take a clear stand on
military taxes and submit another recommendation to the next General Assembly
sessions in .
Meanwhile, General Board will plan a major consultation on military taxes for
and prepare a study guide to be
ready by then. Conferences and congregations will then be encouraged to study
the issue and report to General Board.
