How true, Peng.

>>If Christianity were really abandoned, trashed, discredited, forgotten, there won't have been any relentless and ferocious attack on the faith.<<

And if Christianity were really abandoned, trashed, discredited, forgotten, we wouldn't have to complain about it being supported by the taxpayer.

Since you are here, could you give us a cogent reason why everyone else should be required to pay for your chosen faith?

Let Caesar's be Caesar's; God's be God's.

I don't not believe the church should be any part of the worldly economic activity. If they choose to take part of the worldly economic activity, they should and must pay tax, as everyone of us does; if they are no part of the activity, no tax shall be imposed upon them. (In reality, many other non-religious organisations are exempted from paying taxes for various reasons.)

In a democracy, however, it is the right of the majority to decide whether it is appropriate to impose tax on the Christian church. You and I may have our own opinion, be it rational or not, in the end, it is the people who vote make the final decisions.

In terms of taxation and law, I am no expert; however, I understand there are more nuanced argument relating to the matter, apart from the issue of religion. For instance, does the separation of the state and church mean the church is independent of the state's revenue regime? What is the stand of the Constitution on the issue? etc, etc.

I have to leave it to the professionals to argue the case.

Pericles appears obsessed about public funds going to Church based activity. He seems to be quite a liberal in allowing us Christians to wallow in our insecurities and delusions and protecting us from attack from the likes of Daffy... But it is the money, the money.

The history of public funded education in the Colonies shows a battle not of separation of powers but the full force of sectarianism where one Christian denomination battled to keep any other getting an edge over the other. However it was settled well without the need of secularism being imposed to end the "religious wars".

The reality is that our social roots are Christian whose biblical narratives have served to implant in the national consciousness the call to service of "the other" and the ethos of honesty and integrity that comes with it. These are the foundations of our key institutions. They are priceless. As is the knowledge of man the Church carries in her wisdom - our propensity towards good and bad. Its scriptural message encourages the former and seeks to make good the latter.

The age of the great leveling in social theory has diminished us. Their godless utilitarian morality has seeped into the education of our youth and the personal moral laxity they cannot but encourage has seen the baby boomer generation become sloppy, passive and self serving.

Wallace's article is nonsense. But it is good to engage with Pericles.

Pericles, I wasn't obliged to provide any counter arguments, because all I was doing was merely showing that Mr Wallace's final position and conclusion had no substance- at least as far as he had developed it in this article.

But since you've asked, the topic of churches and government funding is a thorny one. Keeping in mind that this article was about New Zealand, I can only speak more broadly and also to the Australian situation. In Australia, the rules around charities and tax exemptions are complex. But on a broad scale, there is a divide between organisations with a social purpose and those with a profit making or commercial purpose. Clearly churches fall into the latter category and thus cannot be expected to pay tax, just as other community organisations should not either.