How a vow of poverty produced a $3.6 million mansion

Channel 7 news in Detroit did a story about a church that purchased a parsonage worth $3,600,000.00.

A few thoughts:

1. I'm pretty sure Ray Sayah (the reproter of this story) has a bit of a vendetta against preachers, or maybe just against the ones who make money. I once saw him interview Rob Bell. The tease for the story led me to beleive the story would be about what Rob teaches. So, I was a little bit disappointed to find that that Ray focused mostly on Rob's passion for skateboarding, and the idea that a preacher would where sneakers (during the sit down interview, the camera kept panning to his shoes). And then at the end of the interview, he pulled this doozy out of the blue, "What kind of car do you drive?" So, when Iheard there was going to be an exposee about a multi-million dollar parsonage, I figured it would be Ray. I pray that God would surround him with Christian leaders who are the real deal, so that his suspicions would melt.

2. A church can give clergy a house or money for a house and not count it as income. The reason for this, histoprically speaking, is that Catholic priests take vows of poverty. If you tried to tax them on the value of the home that the church supplied, he would have nothing to give. Because they did not want to discriminate against Catholic churches, all clergy get that break.

To think that a church took that bit of mercy from the government and turns it into this is disgusting. nobody needs a home this lavish. And the local government (schools, police, fire dept., etc...) lose out on tens of thousands of dollars in property taxes every year on this home. All in the name of protecting people who were giving their lives to poverty to serve the community.

3. I benefit greatly from that provision. But if they wanted to take it away, I wouldn't fight it. It does not seem fair, especially when you have people abusing it like this. I accept it as mercy, but I wouldn't demand it as justice.

4. In Channel 7's online poll, 75% of people siad they thought it was okay for a church to give multi-million dollar homes to their pastors. How many of those supporters, do you suppose, are members of that church?