re: #58 jcm

Admittedly I’m no expert on evangalism. But it seems to me if the preacher who claims to be a channel for God drives around in luxury vehicles, has multiple luxury homes, flies around like a rock star, and has a trophy fashion plate wife then you can almost bet that is nothing more than a business enterprise at best. Some of that money may be channelled to charities but it’s obvious that much of it is going to enriching the preacher’s lifestyle. And when it becomes that I think it’s no longer ethical to describe it as an organization solely to enable worship. But the preachers will often characterize it as having been blessed which is why they’re so rich and successful.

That’s what bugs me about it. Years ago I was in Amway because I was interested in the multi-level marketing. But at the Amway conventions many of the top successful folks were from evangelical traditions and the same techniques would be used to say you have to have Faith that your business will succeed and put your money there which also happened to enrich Amway and those very same top distributors giving the advice (it being multi-level). Although I agreed that it’s not foolish to invest in your own business if that advice comes from someone who stands to definitely benefit from it then there’s a vested and conflicted interest there.

Some evangelists and particularly the gaudy, weepy TV versions it seems are no different.