Religious Intelligence Faith, Power, and the Public Square

Religious Intelligence

Faith, Power, and the Public Square

Latest Articles

Open Books, Closed Doors: Why the Government Is Coming for Church Finances
Law & Policy

Open Books, Closed Doors: Why the Government Is Coming for Church Finances

A growing wave of state and federal audits is placing religious organizations under unprecedented financial scrutiny, challenging long-held assumptions about the boundaries of tax-exempt status. As regulators probe spending practices at churches and faith-based nonprofits, institutions accustomed to operating with minimal oversight are now confronting difficult questions about transparency and governance. The reckoning may permanently alter how Americans donate, how congregations govern themselv
Steeples and Strip Malls: How Megachurches Are Quietly Becoming the Most Powerful Landowners in American Cities
Law & Policy

Steeples and Strip Malls: How Megachurches Are Quietly Becoming the Most Powerful Landowners in American Cities

Across the United States, megachurches and large religious organizations have moved well beyond the sanctuary, assembling sprawling commercial real estate portfolios that include apartment complexes, office parks, and retail developments. As these institutions accumulate land and property, they are increasingly reshaping municipal politics, zoning ordinances, and community development agendas in ways that blur the traditional boundary between faith and governance.
From the Offering Plate to the PAC: How Elite Donors Are Rewiring the Financial Architecture of American Faith
Elections & Advocacy

From the Offering Plate to the PAC: How Elite Donors Are Rewiring the Financial Architecture of American Faith

A quiet but consequential financial migration is underway among America's wealthiest faith communities. High-net-worth evangelical and Catholic donors are redirecting millions away from institutional church budgets and toward politically-aligned super PACs and dark money foundations — a shift that is simultaneously straining congregational finances and supercharging faith-inflected electoral machinery.
Neither Left Nor Right: How a New Generation of Evangelicals Is Forging Independent Political Movements on Their Own Terms
Elections & Advocacy

Neither Left Nor Right: How a New Generation of Evangelicals Is Forging Independent Political Movements on Their Own Terms

Younger evangelical Christians, disenchanted with both the progressive mainline establishment and the Republican-aligned politics of their parents' congregations, are constructing decentralized faith communities organized around discrete policy causes. From climate justice to criminal justice reform, these emergent networks are fragmenting long-stable religious coalitions and compelling both major parties to rethink how they court faith-based voters. Religious Intelligence examines the movement

Pews Against the Pulpit: How Congregants Are Turning Financial Transparency Into a Tool of Institutional Reckoning
Law & Policy

Pews Against the Pulpit: How Congregants Are Turning Financial Transparency Into a Tool of Institutional Reckoning

Across the United States, a growing number of church members are deploying public records requests, leaked internal documents, and coordinated social media campaigns to scrutinize how their institutions manage money. The movement is redefining the boundaries of congregational authority and exposing deep tensions between ecclesiastical leadership and the laity it claims to serve. Religious Intelligence examines what happens when the faithful decide they have seen enough.
Between the Pews and the Press: The Enduring Power of the Church Newspaper in American Public Life
Law & Policy

Between the Pews and the Press: The Enduring Power of the Church Newspaper in American Public Life

For generations, the church newspaper has served as a primary conduit between religious institutions and their congregants — shaping opinion, mobilizing voters, and defining the boundaries of acceptable political discourse within faith communities. As digital media fragments the information landscape, these publications are adapting, and their political influence is anything but diminished. A closer look at this understudied institution reveals a press corps with outsized reach and a complex rel
Contested Collections: The Political War Being Waged Over Where Faithful Americans Send Their Money
Elections & Advocacy

Contested Collections: The Political War Being Waged Over Where Faithful Americans Send Their Money

A new class of politically motivated donor networks is actively competing with traditional denominational structures for control of religious Americans' charitable dollars. From evangelical megadonor consortiums to progressive faith-based giving circles, the battle over the tithe has become a proxy war for the soul of American religious life. The consequences for both congregations and the causes they once quietly sustained are proving significant.
Hired Hands in the Sanctuary: When Political Operatives Set the Agenda for Faith-Based Advocacy
Elections & Advocacy

Hired Hands in the Sanctuary: When Political Operatives Set the Agenda for Faith-Based Advocacy

A growing number of secular political consultants have embedded themselves at the heart of America's most influential religious advocacy campaigns, raising pointed questions about who truly speaks for faith communities in the public square. As these operatives shape messaging, frame policy priorities, and deploy data-driven tactics once foreign to denominational life, religious leaders are divided over whether the arrangement strengthens their reach or quietly hollows out their witness.
Common Cause, Uncommon Allies: The Rise of Interfaith Lobbying in the American Capital
Elections & Advocacy

Common Cause, Uncommon Allies: The Rise of Interfaith Lobbying in the American Capital

Across Washington's corridors of power, an unlikely convergence is underway—evangelical Christians, Catholic bishops, Jewish federations, and Muslim advocacy organizations are discovering shared political ground on a growing range of policy questions. These interfaith coalitions are reshaping how religious communities engage federal lawmakers, but questions persist about whether such partnerships reflect genuine theological alignment or calculated strategic positioning.
Charity on Paper, Politics in Practice: How Religious Nonprofits Exploit Tax Law to Bankroll Partisan Agendas
Law & Policy

Charity on Paper, Politics in Practice: How Religious Nonprofits Exploit Tax Law to Bankroll Partisan Agendas

A growing body of evidence suggests that major faith-based 501(c)(3) organizations are channeling tax-deductible donations through layers of ostensibly charitable programming to achieve decidedly partisan political outcomes. Tax attorneys, former nonprofit administrators, and campaign finance researchers describe a system that is technically lawful yet fundamentally at odds with the public subsidy its beneficiaries receive. The result is an architecture that allows religious institutions to wage
Sowing Seeds, Reaping Influence: The Prosperity Gospel's Quiet Transformation Into a Political Fundraising Machine
Elections & Advocacy

Sowing Seeds, Reaping Influence: The Prosperity Gospel's Quiet Transformation Into a Political Fundraising Machine

Prosperity gospel congregations, long associated with tithing as a spiritual discipline, are increasingly functioning as informal conduits for partisan political capital. An investigation into how wealth theology is being reframed to mobilize donor networks outside conventional campaign finance structures reveals a sophisticated — and largely unscrutinized — system of faith-based political giving.
Border Watchers: The Faith-Driven Networks Building Infrastructure to Intercept Medication Abortion Across State Lines
Law & Policy

Border Watchers: The Faith-Driven Networks Building Infrastructure to Intercept Medication Abortion Across State Lines

A growing constellation of religiously motivated organizations is constructing surveillance and legal frameworks designed to restrict medication abortion access beyond the boundaries of states where it remains legal. Religious Intelligence examines the data-sharing arrangements, community reporting mechanisms, and litigation strategies that form the backbone of what reproductive rights attorneys are calling an interstate enforcement architecture. The implications for civil liberties, federalism,
The Gospel According to the Consultant: How a Thriving Industry Packages Christian Identity as Republican Political Currency
Elections & Advocacy

The Gospel According to the Consultant: How a Thriving Industry Packages Christian Identity as Republican Political Currency

A specialized consulting industry has taken root inside Republican political circles, offering candidates and campaigns a systematic methodology for translating Christian theology and religious identity into electoral advantage. Religious Intelligence examines the firms, operatives, and strategic frameworks driving this business, and asks whether the commodification of faith as a political product serves or distorts the communities it claims to represent. The answers reveal as much about the cur
Faith Heals, But Who Pays? Religious Mental Health Programs Move From Pews to Policy Tables
Law & Policy

Faith Heals, But Who Pays? Religious Mental Health Programs Move From Pews to Policy Tables

As the federal government escalates its response to a national loneliness epidemic, faith-based organizations are no longer content to serve as quiet caregivers in the background. They are actively lobbying to shape mental health funding, therapy licensing standards, and insurance reimbursement policy—placing them in direct competition with secular providers for government legitimacy and public dollars.
Ordained for Office: Inside the Seminaries Grooming Faith Leaders for Political Combat
Elections & Advocacy

Ordained for Office: Inside the Seminaries Grooming Faith Leaders for Political Combat

A quiet transformation is underway inside America's theological schools. Seminaries, Bible colleges, and religiously affiliated universities are building formal programs in policy advocacy, electoral strategy, and legislative engagement—effectively creating a professional pipeline for faith leaders who intend to operate not only in pulpits but in the corridors of government. The funders, curricula, and graduates of these programs are reshaping how religious influence enters American political li
Shadow Giving: The Invisible Architecture of Megachurch Political Finance
Law & Policy

Shadow Giving: The Invisible Architecture of Megachurch Political Finance

Wealthy religious institutions have quietly constructed a sophisticated financial apparatus that channels millions of dollars into national policy battles while remaining largely invisible to public scrutiny. Through layered networks of 501(c)(4) organizations and faith-aligned political action committees, megachurches and their affiliated donors have learned to project enormous political influence without leaving a traceable paper trail. Understanding this architecture is essential to comprehen
The Other Religious Left: Progressive Faith Communities Build a Political Infrastructure to Rival the Right
Elections & Advocacy

The Other Religious Left: Progressive Faith Communities Build a Political Infrastructure to Rival the Right

A growing coalition of progressive religious organizations — spanning mainline Protestant denominations, reform Jewish movements, and interfaith social justice networks — is mounting an increasingly organized challenge to the decades-long dominance of conservative faith politics in America. These communities are leveraging pulpit authority, institutional resources, and moral language to mobilize voters and reshape policy debates on issues from immigration to economic equity. Whether their emergi
Blessed and Untaxed: Inside the Political Machinery Hiding Behind Church Exemptions
Law & Policy

Blessed and Untaxed: Inside the Political Machinery Hiding Behind Church Exemptions

Large religious institutions enjoy broad federal tax protections originally designed to shield houses of worship from government interference — but a growing body of evidence suggests those protections are being systematically exploited to finance political campaigns and ballot initiatives. Tax attorneys and campaign finance watchdogs say enforcement remains virtually nonexistent, leaving a multi-billion-dollar gray zone at the intersection of faith and electoral power. Religious Intelligence ex
The Congregation Speaks: Why Evangelical Voters Are Quietly Departing the Agenda Their Leaders Set
Elections & Advocacy

The Congregation Speaks: Why Evangelical Voters Are Quietly Departing the Agenda Their Leaders Set

Prominent evangelical leaders have long projected a unified political voice — but fresh polling data and on-the-ground reporting reveal deep fissures between the positions those leaders publicly champion and the actual preferences of people sitting in their pews. Younger evangelicals in particular are registering sharp disagreements with their churches' institutional stances on immigration, climate change, and economic policy. Religious Intelligence speaks with pastors, congregants, and research
The Ground Game of God: How Religious Networks Are Quietly Deciding Swing State Elections
Elections & Advocacy

The Ground Game of God: How Religious Networks Are Quietly Deciding Swing State Elections

Beneath the surface of 2024's most competitive electoral contests, religious institutions have been functioning as something far more structured than spiritual communities—they have become the organizing backbone of rival political mobilization campaigns. From mosque-based voter registration drives in Michigan to evangelical precinct networks in Georgia, the infrastructure of American faith is being deliberately mapped onto the infrastructure of American democracy. This investigation examines ho