And I absolutely agree with you. But it should be stolen as you say for public benefit? Since education "steals" money from the system for public benefit?
So it comes down to whether Churches, actually religious beliefs are benefitical to society? And i think they are and you think they dont.
It's pretty hard to justify taking other people's money to use on something that is not strictly essential to saving someone's life i.e. food, shelter, fuel, healthcare.
If people's money wasn't taken away from them to be spent on churches by the government, they would spend it on things that they themselves perceived would offer the greatest benefit to their lives, which is obviously going to more efficient than the government trying to organize the same thing.
If they choose to spend it on funding churches great! But if they think other things will do more to increase their happiness, you have to ask, how essential was that church to their lives?