---
title: "The Worship Tax - How your church's worship profits secular investors via CCLI"
source: "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb0mY6U3i3o"
author:
  - "[[Selling Jesus]]"
published: 2025-01-09
created: 2025-01-23
description: "The Christian music industry commercializes the worship of God. A copyright cartel maintains control of sacred songs and even sells them to secular investors. While churches have a legal exemption to"
tags:
  - "clippings"
---
![](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb0mY6U3i3o)  

The Christian music industry commercializes the worship of God. A copyright cartel maintains control of sacred songs and even sells them to secular investors. While churches have a legal exemption to perform copyrighted music during services, copying lyrics for digital presentations isn't covered. This legal gap has led to the rise of Christian Copyright Licensing International (CCLI), which charges churches annual fees for various permissions to use songs. This system financially burdens congregations and primarily benefits a select group of artists and organizations, some with questionable practices or theology. It also serves to make sincere worshipers in other countries into lawbreakers.  
  
Read the unabridged version of this article with sources at https://sellingjesus.org/articles/worship-tax  
Related video on the humorous side: https://youtu.be/Ib5nCKdU0Wg  
Related profile essay: https://sellingjesus.org/learn/profiles#james-the-worship-composer  
  
Bible passages mentioned:  
Jesus' command to freely give: https://sellingjesus.org/articles/freely-give  
Jesus cleansing temple: https://sellingjesus.org/articles/temple-cleansing  
  
LEARN MORE  
https://sellingjesus.org  
https://thedoreanprinciple.org  
https://copy.church  
  
SECTIONS  
0:00 Introduction  
1:37 The Worship Music Industry  
4:03 The Business Facilitator - CCLI  
7:53 Secular Investors  
10:28 The Sanctity of Worship  
12:04 An Outdated Exemption  
13:14 Exploiting the Legal Gap  
14:58 Reform  
  
See any ads? YouTube imposes them, not us. This channel is not monetized and never will be. See https://lets.church/channel/sellingjesus for an ad-free alternative.  
  
CREDITS  
Boyce Worship Collective: https://youtu.be/3-Tp8HPutZM , https://youtu.be/5wvTKCuqpQU  
Chris Tomlin: https://youtu.be/KKo3T0j9qqo  
Kari Jobe: https://youtu.be/huFra1mnIVE  
Elevation Worship: https://youtu.be/TE1Jke5KPtc  
Ever Be: https://youtu.be/byEUIzfVLAs  
Lion and the Lamb: https://youtu.be/SBrrWPw5bW4  
Oceans: https://youtu.be/OP-00EwLdiU  
First two piano parts: Jeremy Kirles  
Ending piano: John Barnts https://youtu.be/18nyRz5r6gE

---