Last week, I wrote about the dangers of someone such as Pastor Benny Hinn, who as a self-proclaimed faith healer has told thousands of sickly believers that they have been cured by God. In recent years, he regularly cautions people to check with a doctor to make sure the healing happened, but I’d imagine those warnings are routinely ignored. After all, Pastor Benny had said that God had healed them! Why turn to a lesser source?
In the vast majority of the Christian community, believers know exactly what Hinn is about. And many aren’t fooled either by his chief promoter, the leaders of Trinity Broadcasting Network. The Crouch family — TBN’s owners — and their handpicked pastors routinely promote the slimy Prosperity Gospel. It goes like this: Send us money and God will shower you with financial blessings and healings.
This anti-Jesus gospel preys on desperate people who are so poor, so down on their luck or so sick that they’re willing to put aside common sense and send whatever they have to TBN (not that the network needs the money; it has hundreds of millions of dollars in investments, is debt-free and turns an annual profit of about $60 million).
What TBN does — and the hyper-affluent lifestyles of its founders — isn’t a secret. They promote the Prosperity Gospel daily on the air, and many stories have been written about the Crouches’ lavish living.
So why do so many mainstream pastors continue to appear on TBN, giving the network, the Crouches and Hinn a tacit endorsement? These men of God include Joel Osteen, Jack Hayford, Billy Graham, Greg Laurie, Robert H. Schuller and Matthew and Tommy Barnett.
Is it possibly because appearing on TBN is a virtual goldmine for a ministry, providing a worldwide audience and fund-raising base? Is it possible that it’s easier to choose fame and money over Christian principles such as looking out for the “least among us”? (BTW, where is the Christian media in all this? Why so quiet? More on that later.)
TBN, the Crouches and Hinn will continue to thrive on the backs of the poor and desperate until some big-name Christian leaders stand up and put a stop to it. But I don’t see anyone stepping forward. In doing so, they would lose their time slot on the network.
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2 responses so far ↓
1 Tim Stroud // Aug 12, 2008 at 4:20 am
True, true and true.
I find prosperity gospel fascinating. And fascinatingly sleazy. It’s like a beautiful hooker.
Of course, hookers should retire at an early age and these people don’t. They are like the energizer bunny. They keep going and going.
And have plastic surgery.
Merge old-time religion and good old-fashioned American Captitalism and this is what you get. People happily giving up their hard earned dollars to spread the gospel, feed the poor and heal the infirm.
And if a few people take a salary from these donations for their time and hard work, well, a pastor’s gotta feed his family doesn’t he? And buy a nice house. With a pool. And slick suits (he is on tv) . And a car. A big car. Or two. Or three. And a vacation home. Or two. Or three.
Home ownership and consumerism is essential to the American Dream, and a healthy economy.
Mainstream pastors can’t argue with that. All churches accept donations. Some are just better at it than others.
And really, who is going to want to gum up the works of this money making machine? And, short of murder, or tax evasion, why should they?
What is so galling is the squandering, and the display, of wealth square in the face of the needy.
They really should keep their church’s wealth out of the spotlight.
Like the mainstream pastors do.
2 cls // Aug 12, 2008 at 4:44 am
Amen. Check out the “demo” on http://www.justinpeters.org and you will NOT be disappointed.
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