As a general rule, an employee must pay taxes on anything of value she receives from her employer. That includes employer-provided housing. In the early days of the modern federal income tax, the Treasury department determined that in some circumstances, employees could exclude employer-provided housing from their gross income. But it unequivocally determined that clergy did not qualify for tax-free housing. Congress objected and amended the tax law to allow clergy to live in parsonages tax-free. Decades later, to equalize the treatment of wealthier and poorer churches, Congress allowed churches to provide in-kind housing or to provide a housing stipend to clergy, all tax-free. This “parsonage allowance” has become perhaps the most controversial accommodation in the tax law, one with limited economic justification, but with even more limited recourse for challenge. The provision still exists, protected by Congress, in spite of attempts by courts, academics, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation to challenge it.