The sin against private conscience becomes the more glaring, when it is
considered that in the eyes of many individual citizens the creeds and
conduct of certain at least of the churches represent not merely error,
but positive evil. It is irrelevant to assert that these citizens are
wholly mistaken. None of us being infallible, their opinion is entitled
to the same consideration as that of anybody else. The exemption of
church property from taxation forces them, as citizens of a secular
state, to pay tribute to what their consciences condemn as organized
vice. The teachings of the Mormon church are anathema to many, so much
so that in more than one otherwise law-abiding community missionaries
of this faith are even denied a hearing and are subject to persecution,
which naturally strengthens them in the conviction that they are
suffering for righteousness' sake. Yet the Mormon church is a
beneficiary of tax exemption, no less than any other Christian sect;
and every citizen must pay a higher tax, in order to put money into
the treasury of this gigantic fraud and to enable it to carry on
its propaganda more fruitfully. The Roman Catholic confessional, its
celibate priesthood, its non-producing and parasitical monks and nuns,
are held in holy horror by many conscientious Protestants, who look
upon these features as conducive to vice and as reeking with immorality.
Every one of these Protestants, however, is forced by the state to
present the Roman Catholic church with a portion of his earnings, and
thus to provide it with the means of increasing its power for evil. In
like manner, the zealous Catholic, who is certain that Protestantism
is dragging millions of souls to hell, and who earnestly believes that
married pastors sin against God and lead others away on the road to
perdition, must help pay for the perpetuation of this ministry of Satan.
The liberal sects, which thunder against the villainy of creeds that
drive human beings mad with despair by visions of an imaginary hell and
fiery devils, cannot protect their adherents from being compelled to
enrich the purveyors of these hateful and injurious dogmas. Nor can the
orthodox denominations, on the other hand, escape from the outrageous
condition which requires their members to pay for the circulation of
Unitarian and Universalist teachings, which they regard as the most
hideous and soul-destroying blasphemy. In the logrolling attempt to
give every hog a chance at the trough, the only result is that nobody's
conscience is free from violation.