United States tax law provides churches with extra benefits and robust protection from IRS enforcement actions. Churches and religious organizations are automatically exempt from the income tax without needing to apply to be so recognized and without needing to file a tax return. Beyond that,...

This paper discusses tax laws and federal court decisions relating to the taxation or exemption of religious non-profit organizations. In a democracy characterized by separation of church and state, what role does the federal government play in regulating the activities and financial...

For 188 independent countries in 2000, 72 had no state religion in the years 2000, 1970, and 1900; 58 had a state religion at all three dates; and 58 had some kind of transition. Among the 58 transitional countries, 12 had two transitions, 4 of which (former Soviet Republics in Asia) involved two...

Die religiöse Macht des Christentums und der Kirchen ist in Deutschland und Westeuropa im Schwinden begriffen. Als soziale Macht bleibt das Christliche aber ein relevanter gesellschaftlicher Faktor. Charismatische Persönlichkeiten haben im 19. Jahrhundert soziale Einrichtungen ins Leben...

Economic and political developments affect religiosity, and the extent of religious participation and beliefs influence economic performance and political institutions. We study these two directions of causation in a broad cross-country panel that includes survey information over the last 20...

Two important theories of religiosity are the secularization hypothesis and the religion-market model. According to the former theory, economic development reduces religious participation and beliefs. According to the latter theory, religiosity depends on the presence of a state religion,...

The article considers a lemmatiser that is developed specifically for Old Church Slavonic (OCS). The introduction underlines the problem of the lack of lemmatisers that might deal with different datasets of the OCS. The review gives a short description of previous attempts and current trends in...

This paper provides an empirical demonstration of high stakes incentives in relation to religious practice. It shows that, when both positive (carrot) and negative (stick) incentives are available, the former are more effective than the latter. Specifically, it is shown that beliefs in heaven...

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the many changes in the present socio-cultural context point to the importance of innovation in churches. A theoretical framework for understanding innovation in churches is presented, featuring 6 key elements. These elements include the cultural context...

Although freedom of religion seems, prima facie, to have little relevance to taxation, church taxes raise many interesting legal questions in relation to this human right. In this contribution, the authors identify potential issues linked to the levying of church taxes when taxpayers are...

The Christian Church is going through an extremely critical period, highlighted, on the one hand, by the church members’ lack of preoccupation for new spiritual ideals and, on the other hand, by the disinterest of those who do not belong to any religious spheres in any church proposal. The...

This research aims to determine the impact of transparency and accountability of the church's financial reporting on the interest of the congregation to donate to the church. However, the transparency and accountability of church finance reporting is something that absolutely must be done to...

Recent developments in law enforcement and the judiciary reveal the ongoing interconnections between religion, crime, and punishment. In recent months, federal investigators have taken an interest in the Catholic Church in Pennsylvania and have launched an investigation into whether evidence...

Conflict is a common part of every human existence on earth. it usually results when our desires, expectations, fears or wants collide with the desires, expectations, fears or wants of others. in simple sentence, conflict is the difference in opinion or purpose that frustrates an individual's or...

In the eighth century, Charles Martel confiscated Church property to make distributions of benefices and precaria to his vassals. This project was an investment in state capacity and secularizations of Church property were continued under Charles' son Pippin III. Many scholars have characterized...

In my new book, One Nation Undecided: Clear Thinking About Five Hard Issues That Divide Us (Princeton UP, 2017), I first analyze the factors that make "hard" issues hard, explore the quality of public debate about them, and explain what the title means by "clear thinking." Chapters 2 through 6...

This paper highlights the role of kin-networks for the functioning of modern societies: countries with strong extended families as characterized by a high level of cousin marriages exhibit a weak rule of law and are more likely autocratic. To assess causality, I exploit a quasi-natural...

We analyze the joint dynamics of religious beliefs, scientific progress and coalitional politics along both religious and economic lines. History offers many examples of the recurring tensions between science and organized religion, but as part of the paper's motivating evidence we also uncover...

We analyze the joint dynamics of religious beliefs, scientific progress and coalitional politics along both religious and economic lines. History offers many examples of the recurring tensions between science and organized religion, but as part of the paper's motivating evidence we also uncover...