David, it is awesome to see you are staying on track and going forward with this. The plan to take Jim’s seminar in May is perfect, that is something you really need.
In thinking about how you will implement this in Tanzania, it seems you have a choice between categorizing your activity as business or religion. If you go with business, then you are under the total jurisdiction of the government. They control economic activity through licensing and other laws. There is probably no way to argue you have a fundamental Constitutional right to be in a business selling MMS. So if the governmental authorities want to shut you down, for example because someone with influence orders them to, it is easier for them to do than if you had some fundamental constitutional right at stake.
On the other hand, you could try to fall within the protection of freedom of religion as Jim has been recommending. I did some quick research on your system of government there. You have a constitutional republic that looks similar to what we have in the US. Here is some key info I found at this site
www.africa.com/tanzania/report :
Freedom of religion is generally respected in Tanzania, and relations between the various faiths are mainly peaceful. .... The constitution guarantees freedoms of assembly and association.
So it seems you have freedom of religion there not unlike the rest of the free world. In creating the Genesis Church Jim was very wisely aware of the powerful legal protection available to churches because of the fundamental right to freedom of religion. I believe the Catholic Church may be largely responsible for the great protection offered to churches in the free world. It has been said the Catholic Church is more powerful than any single government on earth, and I wonder if they may step in whenever freedom of religion is at stake in such a way that it could create bad legal precedent for their own autonomy.
It seems to me, and I am only speculating because I do not have any private contact with Jim, this may be one of the benefits behind Jim’s efforts to establish Apostolic Succession in his church. From what I have read, shady characters who want legal protection as a “church” also go to the trouble and expense of obtaining Apostolic Succession for their activities. Is it because the Catholic Church steps in to defend whenever a church with “Apostolic Succession” is under legal attack because they can’t afford to have bad precedent?
Now Jim does not have anything to hide or any evil intentions, he is just seeking maximum protection for his church worldwide. When it comes to operating as a church in the US there are two ways to go about it. Most uninformed churches fall into the trap of seeking recognition as nonprofit corporations under the state and federal tax and other laws. Jim has advised everyone this is a mistake because you are voluntarily placing yourself under the jurisdiction of those laws when you do not need to. The wiser way to do this is to create a church as an unincorporated “association” and simply treat it as a church for tax purposes without seeking approval from the tax authorities. This is a proven legal method for obtaining all the same benefits of being a recognized church, but without voluntarily submitting to the laws and authorities.
If you do it the way Jim says, without obtaining licensing and nonprofit status, then the church is still protected directly under Constitutional authority. This appears to be the same approach used by the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is more sophisticated and seeks the greater autonomy available directly from the Constitution rather than all the voluntary licensing traps the other churches fall into.
If you run your operations based solely on donations, like Edwin is doing and like Jim recommends, then you strengthen your position that you are a church and not a business. If you sell your services or products then you are more likely to be categorized as a business activity that does not get the maximum protection that religion gets.
So if you take an approach like Jim recommends, then you probably do not want to get licenses and status as an NGO. I realize you probably are not aware of Jim’s advice in this area David, so that is why I wanted to try and explain it a little. Have you considered these things?
Let me know what your thoughts are. And even if you do not want to follow the path that Jim advises, please do keep us posted on your progress. I just want you to know I am willing to try and help you in figuring out what to do. I graduated from a good law school here in the US but I am not a practicing lawyer. I saw that you do have a Common Law based legal system like we have here in the US.
Your friend,
Michael