Taxation
"Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's" -- these words have framed the Christian notion of money and the state for years. Yet as our style of government has changed and as the nature of taxation has become more complex, we find this issue mired in many others. Should the church be a tax-exempt organization? What is the ethical way to tax citizens? Are we able to look at a democratic government as "Caesar" or does our theology of taxation need to change to address the responsibility we as citizens have in the actions of our government? Especially in the current economic environment, which asks the tax-payer to bail-out businesses with questionable ethic standards themselves, do we need to revisit our ideas of taxation as framed by the Lutheran perspective.