Wow. All this discussion, and nobody has mentioned the clear and explicit halachic status of shtadlonim, which has been established for over 2500 years, and the wide range of heterim available for them. Someone asked whether there could be a heter to eat chazir to please a king; the answer is no, there is not, but there is a heter for a shtadlan to drink the king’s wine, and to wear shatnez, and to have a hair style that is normally forbidden as chukos hagoyim. The heter for drinking stam yeinam goes all the way back to Nechemiah! The gemara says that the reason he is sometimes called Hatirshoso is because the Sanhedrin gave him a heter to drink stam yeinam. And that’s a lot worse than simply setting foot in a church.
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