Pastor Michael Wilkerson of the New Millennium Life Restoration Fellowship in Spring City, Pennsylvania, preached the “prosperity gospel.” The basic idea is this: God wants his followers to be prosperous, and they can find the road to wealth in faith, positive thinking and contributions to the church.
This is what Wilkerson preached, and he followed up by inviting congregants to invest in his company, which was acquiring suburban mortgages. Last month, however, federal prosecutors accused Wilkerson and two others of conspiring in a $6.3 million mortgage fraud. The congregants have lost everything.
The whole story appeared in yesterday’s Philadelphia Inquirer. What I found really interesting about this article is that it put the pastor’s misdeeds in context—religion based affinity fraud is big business:
A 2006 study by the North American Securities Administrators Association estimated that losses from religion-based affinity fraud had reached $2 billion. Those rip-offs have only become more common since, said Ole Anthony, who helms the Dallas-based Trinity Foundation, a watchdog group that investigates the financial misdeeds of religious figures.
“In the past several years, I’ve seen more and more fraud in the name of God,” he said. “It remains a serious problem.”
It’s a problem that can be seen all over very-late-night television, which my husband sometimes watches if he can’t sleep. He considers the televangelists to be great theater. And they would be, if they weren’t so dangerous.
I imagine some of them are legitimate. But many of these TV preachers seem more interested in the money than the message. And to further their agendas, they engage in the worst type of manipulation, playing on people’s faith, hopes, dreams and fears.
Speaking in mesmerizing cadence, televangelists rhapsodize about the riches that God wants for us, the sleepless viewers. We can, they say with hypnotic certainty, achieve everything we ever wanted. All we have to do take the first step and plant a seed by sending the good pastor a contribution of $100, $1,000, or even more.
My guess is that the only one getting rich is the so-called preacher. Like the good Pastor Wilkerson. He owned a $1.7million home in the country, with a Lexus and an Escalade in the garage. Not bad for a guy with a long rap sheet, including drug trafficking and theft. But then, of course, he found religion, and the road to prosperity.
Read Church folk stuck when they gave pastor their faith and their money, on Philly.com.
I read the article – these types always have excuses for their misdeeds, never admitting to the truth. Pastor Wilkerson was arrested for check fraud (he wrote “a $110,000 bad check for a new Mercedes”), but according to him, ” the incident was nothing but a misunderstanding with his wife over shuffling money between accounts.” Yeh, right. Our spath wrote bad checks and he always had some lame excuses for writing them. Now, he’s finally in trouble for writing bad checks and rather than face the music, he’s on the run.
The new testament writes against the Pharisees making money out of people’s faith, and in the middle ages popes sold indulgences. Abusing faith to fill their own pockets was one of the reasons protestantism arose. It’s very low to use people’s hopes and despair in such a way.
How else but by God’s grace could this guy achieve so much? Poor followers. They couldn’t see that it wasn’t grace at all, it was their money.
No matter what the reason, when we throw logic out the window, and just start believing, we set ourselves up for abuse by someone who see’s our lack of reasoning as an opportunity.
The last spath I tangled with was a ‘shaman’. He’s really just a low-life exercise instructor, who has ripped off lots of new agey concepts and mashed them all together and sells his crazy workshops to people who think if they move around uninhibitedly, make strange noises, and pay him 200.00 they will be more of ‘who they were meant to be’. Oiy Vey!
His sock-puppet devotees, who he calls ‘goddesses’, have fund raisers for him so he can pay his bills, go to the dentist, and fly around saving people. He doesn’t own a thing. Has had two vehicles in his 50 years, and totalled them both. Now he ‘preaches’ mass transportation because he is so ‘concerned for the earth’. Really he just doesn’t have two dimes to rub together and cannot responsibly handle a car, and has to take mass transport. Plus, getting rides from his students and participants helps him run his con, cause he seems so humble and it gives him time to ‘connect’ with the drivers.
He lives like a disorganized pig, and parties like there’s no tomorrow.
These folks minds just work differently. They are ALWAYS on the make. If they are not sleeping, their minds are organizing their thoughts, actions, and speech to gain advantage. I don’t think their minds ‘give’ them downtime. More and more I am convince they will need some kind of brain adjustment to change. Not just will power over their ‘badness’.
Anywhoo….off topic, a bit.
Slim
These “televangelists” and “preachers” use religion to hide more than financial fraud….they use it to hide sexual perversions with children, multiple women, and their life styles all together.
I don’t usually read “the National Enquirer” but a while back I was standing in the long grocery line and bored and it was right before my face so I picked up one to read as I stood in line….and the story was the LAVISH HOMES OF THE TELEVANGELISTS….and the Inquirer had used helicopters to make photos of the lavish compounds of MULTIMILLION DOLLAR HOMES that every one of these folks owned, from Joyce Meyer on down. Remember Joyce Meyer’s security chief killed his wife so he could marry his GF. These lavish homes are tucked back inside large multi-acre compounds or located far from a street view and are only visible by helicopter or airplane. I notice too that they aren’t featured in House and Garden magazines, guess they wouldn’t want the old ladies who send them their social security checks to see how they live.
I don’t have a problem in the world with ANY person who spends their life preaching their gospel (whatever religion it is) drawing a reasonable salary, but the LAVISH LIFESTYLES that these people have is beyond “a reasonable salary”—Even the Apostle Paul spoke to this subject about ministers being paid, and stated that he, as a full time minister had a RIGHT to be paid, but he said that because he didn’t want anyone to be able to say he was “in it for the money” he supported himself at his trade, which was as a tent maker.
Whether it is the Pope or any other “minister” living lavishly like a king, I think the very fact that they LIVE LAVISHLY when Jesus himself “didn’t have a place to lay his head” speaks to their sincerity in their gospel preaching. That is one reason I highly respect the SALVATION ARMY ministers, as they draw living expenses on a modest scale and actually get out and MINISTER TO THE NEEDY with the contributions of people who give money to their cause.
People like Mother Teresa and others who live on a modest scale and spend their time, energy and contributions helping others, those are the people I respect as “ministers” and “preachers,” not those who drive Bentleys or live in palaces.
Slimone,
your post said it all: They are ALWAYS on the make.
They will even use their flaws in their cons. Your exspath used mass transportation, mine used his inability to spell.
It works nicely in the pity ploy as an excuse for why he can’t get ANY pilot’s license but still is entitled to work as a commercial helicopter pilot.
Yes, their minds are always thinking…always turning, planning and thinking about the next con. You can see the glee in their eyes.
@....... Ox Drover
Your comment “These “televangelists” and “preachers” use religion to hide more than financial fraud”.they use it to hide sexual perversions with children, multiple women, and their life styles all together.” is SPOT ON!! I could not agree with you more!! My ex was a “pastor” and he is a registered sex offender (pedophile), con artist, fraud, liar, sex addict, cheater, narcissistic sociopath! He conned the church and he conned me. They will use whatever method works best with that particular person, for me is was the pity play…he painted an elaborate image of a man down on his luck, persecuted, misunderstood and working hard to make something of himself. He spent so much time with me as a friend having conversations about how to do church better and make things better for the outcasts of society and disenfranchised. I grew to trust him because of what he said and the amount of time that he spent with me without ever coming-on to me. He talked about God and love and ministry in a way that melted away my inhibitions. I fell in love with him over time. After about one year of conversations over coffee he told me he was attracted to me and we started dating. After we dated for about a year he told me that God told him to marry me. It was all fake. After we were married the mask came off. He never cared about me at all. He made up horrible stories about me and told everyone that would listen. He basically accused me of what he was doing to me (projecting, projecting, projecting!!), or sometimes he just made stuff up. You all know the story! Living in the Twilight Zone, waking up every morning to a freaking nightmare!!
I THANK GOD THAT DIABOLICAL MONSTER IS OUT OF MY LIFE!!!! AND I PRAY THAT HE WILL NOT BE SUCCESSFUL IN HURTING AND DECEIVING ANOTHER WOMAN!!!
There are good pastors out there and good churches, BUT I agree with Oxy…I have trust and respect for the ones that don’t live a lavish lifestyle because of the sacrificial tithes and offerings of their congregation! All church staff and ministry leaders need to be very good stewards with the money entrusted to them! I will be much more careful to only trust those believers that actually walk the talk. Show me the fruit (actions)!! There must be evidence (fruit) that they actually minister to the needy and spend their time, energy and money to help helping others!! TALK IS CHEAP!!
Hosanna:
UGGHHH…PROJECTION!!! I hate that and if I had only known more about it at the time…wow, the heartache I would have saved myself.
Dear Hosanna,
I’m glad you have “seen the light” as well! I wish that more people would realize that these creeps who live like “kings” on the offerings of others –Jim and Tammy Faye Baker were one of the first that were unmasked of the Televangelists–but the others that are on the tube now are for the most part living the life style of “kings” as well, and some of those in the larger “mega churches” as well as some like this guy in the article.
But….it has been like that from the “get go” in organized religion, and it was what Jesus himself preached against! The Pharisees who pretended to be so “holy” while in actual fact, they were doing the very things they preached against and only pretending to be “holy” and worship God.
I think one of the best of Jesus’ stories was about the publican (tax collector) and the Pharisee in the Temple praying. The publican threw himself on the ground on his face and prayed “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” The Pharisee stood there in his ARROGANCE and lifted up his face to God and said “Thank, you God that I am not a sinner like that publican.” LOL
There are so many examples in the Bible of the arrogance and narcissism of the “holier-than-thous” in the religious world. It doesn’t matter if it is Islam or Christianity or Any other religion, there are those who will posture and pretend to be “holy” and “good” when in fact, they are anything except “good.”
Oh my this one strikes a chord with me as well. Mine is currently searching for a faith to believe in. Or rather a new place with new faces, people who aren’t ‘on to him’ and his lines of crap, hidden in his great stories…
We will each find our own way in life and when you can give what you want to and can afford, it is nice knowing your money is going towards good. I just am not a fan of supporting someone who bellows about fire and brimstone, telling me I’m going to Hell, yet says their God is loving, all knowing and forgiving.
From the article
>>Pastor Wilkerson was arrested for check fraud, but according to him, ” the incident was nothing but a misunderstanding with his wife over shuffling money between accounts.”<<
THIS is exactly WHY I closed our joint account and opened my own. My money is now separated from his and I am not linked in any way to the financial mess of his account, his credit cards, his business or any 'shuffling of money' that is going on there. The overdraft charges alone were bad enough. I don't need Uncle Sam breathing down my neck for anybody elses misdoings.