A group that promotes the views of atheists and others who don’t believe in organized religion is upset that an evangelical-led commission to investigate church finances and possible new federal regulation of congregations did not include people outside the evangelical world.

The complaint follows an announcement this week that the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability has formed a panel to determine whether churches and other religious groups should be held to the same financial standards that are required for other nonprofits.

Specifically, the commission is looking into whether religious groups should be required to file informational tax forms with the Internal Revenue Service. The group will also examine whether federal legislation is needed to clarify rules that allow clergy members to accept donations directly from congregation members.

Dan Busby, the council’s…

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My parents’ golden retriever Sophie was snoring by my feet in my parents’ living room in Miami Beach last month, when suddenly she sprang from her slumber at the sound of the doorbell.

The man outside was part of a growing cottage industry of Orthodox Jewish fund raisers whose job it is to travel door-to-door collecting money to benefit Jewish schools, seminaries, and families in the United States and in Israel. As my father opened the door, Sophie rushed to greet this “meshulach” (as they are known in Yiddish).  My father would not have been displeased if she had scared him away.

My parents are generous people, especially to Orthodox Jewish causes. But they have philosophical differences with the tactics of the “meshulach” industry. Yet my father walked outside to speak with him and several minutes later made a donation.

What compels my father–and others like him…

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