Yes, it came as a surprise to me, too, but here it is in black-and-white (bullsh*t registration required) in the Dallas Star-Telegram:

According to the office of Texas Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, a Denison Unitarian church isn’t really a religious organization — at least for tax purposes. Its reasoning: the organization "does not have one system of belief."

Never before — not in this state or any other — has a government agency denied Unitarians tax-exempt status because of the group’s religious philosophy, church officials say.

Fortunately, the Texas courts have ruled against Strayhorn, but . . .

Strayhorn vows to continue the legal fight to the U.S. Supreme Court, if necessary. "Otherwise, any wannabe cult who dresses up and parades down Sixth Street on Halloween will be applying for an exemption," she said in a April 23 news release.

That’s a very telling quote, especially when you consider that the Unitarian religion is very liberal. Which means it is (among other things) gay-friendly. Get it? "Dresses up and parades . . . on Halloween"?

But motives aside, it is distressing to learn I am in a cult. I’m sure this would come as alarming news to other Unitarians, including President John Adams, President John Quincy Adams, Abigail Adams, Ethan Allen, Thomas Paine, Paul Revere, Daniel Webster, William Cullen Bryant, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Nathanial Hawthorne, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Isaac Newton, Alexander Graham Bell, Susan B. Anthony, Albert Schweitzer, Beatrix Potter, Ray Bradbury, Frank Lloyd Wright, Clara Barton, and Superman (well, Christopher Reeve).

As for the claim that the UU church "does not have one system of belief", that’s true and not true. You be the judge. (I’m not trying to make converts here — in fact, if I were, that would be un-Unitarian of me).