If you've taken even a little time to explore the biographical sections of this site or my page about Paul Brekus, you probably realize by now that much of my opinion on organized religion came from a misspent sojourn to Oral Roberts University. As evidenced above, Carlton Pearson and Kathie Lee Gifford (Epstein etc.,etc.) were among my classmates. It should be noted at this point that I do not put "Religion" or "Church" in the same context as anything related to the Bible. These are man-made concepts with man-made ideals. Time has not necessarily been overly kind to any of us and now it appears that yet another supposedly well intentioned operation has gone the same route as its notorious peers such as Jim Bakker, Rex Humbard, Robert Schuller, Jimmy Swaggart, Oral, Billy James Hargis and Bob Harrington as evidenced in this recent newspaper series:
Los Angeles Times-- Sunday Sept. 19, 2004
THE PROSPERITY
GOSPEL
Pastor's Empire Built on Acts
of Faith, and Cash
The top Christian broadcaster's steady plea
for money funds growth -- and a life of luxury for Paul Crouch
and his wife.
By William Lobdell, Times Staff Writer
Farrah (Jan) and Paul Crouch. Excepting facial, no real hair is
visible in this photo.
Pastor Paul Crouch looked into the camera and told his flock that Trinity Broadcasting Network needed $8 million to spread the Gospel throughout India and save 1 billion souls from damnation. Crouch, head of the world's largest Christian broadcasting network, said even viewers who couldn't afford a $1,000 pledge should take a "step of faith" and make one anyway. The Lord would repay them many times over, he said."Do you think God would have any trouble getting $1,000 extra to you somehow?" he asked during a "Praise-a-thon" broadcast from Trinity's studios in Costa Mesa.The network's "prayer partners" came through once again, phoning in enough pledges in one evening to put Christian programming on 8,700 television stations across India.TBN was not short on cash. In fact, it could have paid for the India expansion out of the interest on its investment portfolio. But at TBN, the appeals for money never stop. Nor does the flow of contributions.
Over the last 31 years, Crouch and
his wife, Jan, have parlayed their viewers' small expressions of
faith into a worldwide broadcasting empire and a life of
luxury. The network, little known outside fundamentalist
Christian circles, was buffeted by unwanted publicity last week,
when The Times reported that Crouch had paid a former employee
$425,000 to keep silent about an alleged homosexual tryst. But
millions of people needed no introduction to TBN. Its
24-hour-a-day menu of sermons, faith healing, inspirational
movies and Christian talk shows reaches viewers around the globe
via satellite, cable and broadcast stations. Its programs are
dubbed in 11 different languages. In the U.S. alone, TBN is
watched by more than 5 million households each week, more than
its three main competitors combined. Its signature offering,
"Praise the Lord," has as many prime-time viewers as
Chris Matthews' "Hardball" on MSNBC remarkable
for a faith network. Televangelists who once dominated the field,
such as Pat Robertson, now air their shows on TBN.
Much as Ted Turner did for TV news, the Crouches have created a
global infrastructure for religious broadcasting. But that is
just one element in their success. Another is a doctrine called
the "prosperity gospel," which promises worshipers that
God will shower them with material blessings if they sacrifice to
spread His word. This theme that viewers will be rewarded,
even enriched, for donating pervades TBN programming.
"When you give to God," Crouch said during a typical
appeal for funds, "you're simply loaning to the Lord and He
gives it right on back."
Though it carries no advertising, the network generates more than
$170 million a year in revenue, tax filings show. Viewer
contributions account for two-thirds of that money. Lower-income,
rural Americans in the South are among TBN's most faithful
donors. The network says that 70% of its contributions are in
amounts less than $50. Those small gifts underwrite a lifestyle
that most of the ministry's supporters can only dream about.
Paul, 70, collects a $403,700 salary as TBN's chairman and
president. Jan, 67, is paid $361,000 as vice president and
director of programming. Those are the highest salaries paid by
any of the 12 major religious nonprofits whose finances are
tracked by the Chronicle of Philanthropy. TBN's "prayer
partners" pay for a variety of perquisites as well. The
Crouches travel the world in a $7.2-million, 19-seat Canadair
Turbojet owned by TBN. They drive luxury cars. They have charged
expensive dinners and furniture to TBN credit cards. Thirty
ministry-owned homes are at their disposal including a
pair of Newport Beach mansions, a mountain retreat near Lake
Arrowhead and a ranch in Texas. The Crouches' family members
share in the benefits. Their oldest son, Paul Jr., earns $90,800
a year as TBN's vice president for administration. Another son,
Matthew, has received $32 million from the network since 1999 to
produce Christian-themed movies such as "The Omega
Code."
Overseeing these expenditures is a board of directors that
consists of Paul Crouch, Jan Crouch and Paul's 74-year-old
sister, Ruth Brown. Control resides primarily with Paul. In a
2001 legal deposition, Jan said she did not know she was a
corporate officer and could not recall the last board meeting she
attended. TBN's declared mission as a tax-exempt Christian
charity is to produce and broadcast television shows and movies
"for the purpose of spreading the Gospel to the world."
Supporters' tax-deductible donations fund the ministry's
worldwide television network and keep it growing.
Expansion is an overriding goal. Televised appeals seek money for
new transmitters, more satellite time and fresh cable deals to
bring God's word to an ever-larger audience.
As more people hear the Crouches' message, more are inspired to
send donations. That pays for further expansion, which brings
more viewers and more donations. The formula has proved
extraordinarily successful. While other religious broadcasters
have struggled, TBN has posted surpluses averaging nearly $60
million a year since 1997. Its balance sheet for 2002, the most
recent available, lists net assets of $583 million, including
$238 million in Treasury bonds and other government securities
and $31 million in cash. It has 400 employees across the country.
Such figures have prompted questions about why the network
continues to plead for contributions. Wall Watchers, a nonprofit
group in Charlotte, N.C., that monitors religious ministries, has
urged Christian donors to stop writing checks to TBN. "They
have more money than they need," said Wall Watchers chairman
Howard "Rusty" Leonard, a former investment manager for
the Templeton mutual fund group. "There's nothing like this.
It's over the top."
The Crouches declined to be interviewed for this article. Through
TBN officials, they said the ministry keeps raising money so it
can avoid going into debt as it pays for TV stations, satellite
time and other ways to spread the Gospel. Regarding the Crouches'
salaries, the ministry said that during the network's first 21
years, Paul was paid less than $40,000 a year on average and Jan
less than $35,000. The couple accepted higher compensation only
in the last decade, as they approached retirement, officials
said. Their current salaries were determined by independent
compensation experts hired by the ministry's accounting firm, TBN
said. Devoted viewers say the Crouches have nothing to apologize
for. Indeed, the ministry's material success is part of its
appeal to believers proof that the Crouches enjoy God's
favor.
"The fruit of God is on their life," said Tennille
Lowe, a computer analyst in Phoenix City, Ala., who is in her 20s
and watches the network every day. "If they weren't
prospering, I'd say, 'Wait a minute. I don't see any evidence [of
God's blessing] in their life.' "The most visible evidence
of the Crouches' success is Trinity Christian City International
in Costa Mesa, a striking white wedding cake of a building
surrounded by reflecting pools, sculptures and neoclassical
colonnades. Visitors to the complex, alongside the San Diego
Freeway, can attend live studio broadcasts, buy TBN-branded
clothing and stroll down a re-creation of Via Dolorosa, the
street in Jerusalem where Jesus walked to his crucifixion. In a
high-tech 50-seat theater, people watch biblical movies in seats
that tremble during the quakes, storms and other disasters
recounted in the Scriptures. The ministry owns a similar complex
near Dallas and a Christian entertainment center outside
Nashville.
Trinity Christian City, Costa Mesa and The Nashville Amusement
Park
But most TBN devotees will never
visit those places. They connect with the network through its
television programs, which provide a spiritual lifeline for
millions. Many of these viewers worship in their living rooms.
TBN preachers are their pastors.
"I don't go to church
. I turn the TV on and it's right
there," said Sherry Peters, a bookkeeper in Mississippi.
"Sometimes I will watch it for weeks on end, every
day."
Olivia Foster, 52, of Westminster, sends the network $70 a month
out of her $820 disability check. "Without TBN, I wouldn't
be here," said Foster, who lives alone and suffers from
AIDS. "That's the Gospel truth. It gave me purpose that God
could use me. I watch it 18 hours a day."
A Ham-Radio Start
Paul Crouch is the son of Pentacostal missionaries. Raised in
Missouri, he took an interest in broadcasting at 12, when a
friend introduced him to ham radio. By 15, he was a licensed
operator. In a high school essay, he wrote that he "would
one day use this invention of shortwave radio to send the Gospel
around the world," according to his autobiography,
"Hello World!"
At the Central Bible Institute in Springfield, Mo., Crouch and
fellow students wired the campus for low-wattage radio and
broadcast Gospel messages. After graduation, Crouch stayed in
Springfield and went to work for the Assemblies of God, a branch
of Pentacostalism whose rituals include faith healing and
speaking in tongues. His job was to maintain a film library. At
the time the early 1950s many Protestant
denominations were experimenting with movies and television as
tools to win converts and teach the faithful.
During a visit to Rapid City, S.D., in 1956, Crouch was smitten
by "a slight 98-pound angel" in a red dress, he later
recalled. This was Jan Bethany, daughter of a leading Assemblies
of God pastor. The two married a year later and eventually
settled in Rapid City, where Crouch became an associate pastor of
his brother-in-law's church. In 1961, the Crouches left to run
the Assemblies of God's new broadcast production facility in
Burbank.
Twelve years later, the Crouches went out on their own, renting
air time on KBSA-TV Channel 46 in Santa Ana. TBN's first studio
set included pieces of furniture from the Crouches' bedroom, with
a shower curtain as a backdrop. The televangelists Jim and Tammy
Faye Bakker, then friends of the couple, moved from Michigan to
help with the fledgling network and lived with the Crouches for a
time. The partnership didn't last long. In his autobiography,
Crouch says that Jim Bakker tried to take over the network, but
failed. The Bakkers then left for South Carolina and started
their own TV ministry, which was a huge success before it was
wrecked by scandal in 1987. Bakker admitted to an affair with a
secretary and was later convicted of defrauding followers who
invested in a religious retreat.
TBN, meanwhile, was quietly broadening its reach with help
from the Almighty, by Crouch's account. During the network's
first day on the air, God moved a mountain so a clear broadcast
signal could reach an antenna atop Mt. Wilson, Crouch
wrote in his autobiography. "And we will ever know that it
was not just a spiritual mountain this was a real dirt,
rock and tree mountain!" In its early days, TBN delivered
programming through a web of UHF and low-power stations. Then, as
the cable industry developed, Crouch bought time on systems
across the country. One evening in 1975, he was inspired to
embrace a new technology. Crouch wrote that he was sitting in the
den of his Newport Beach home when God projected a map of the
U.S. on the ceiling. Beams of light struck major population
centers, then spread throughout the country. "I sat there
transfixed by what I was seeing as I cried out to God to show me
what all this meant," Crouch wrote. "As I waited upon
the Lord, He spoke a ringing, resounding word to my spirit
'Satellite!' "
While other televangelists concentrated on developing programs,
Crouch built an unmatched distribution system. TBN outlasted or
eclipsed its rivals and now leads all faith networks in revenue
and viewership. Today, the ministry and its subsidiaries own 23
full-power stations in the U.S. including KTBN Channel 40
in Santa Ana and 252 low-power stations serving rural
areas.
Overseas, the network owns interests in stations in El Salvador,
Spain and Kenya. Contracts with cable and satellite companies and
station owners further extend its reach.
All-told, TBN airs on more than 6,000 stations in 75 countries,
including places as remote as Rarotonga in the Cook Islands and
Mbabane, Swaziland. Its programs are also available over the
Internet. To serve this diverse audience, translators at the
network's International Production Center in Irving, Texas, dub
programs into Spanish, Afrikaans, Portuguese, Hebrew, French,
Italian, Russian, Arabic, Hindi and Chinese. A typical day of TBN
programming includes health and lifestyle shows, Bible study,
religious movies and late-night Christian rock videos.
Pentecostal pastors espouse the prosperity gospel and offer
prophecies about the Second Coming of Jesus.
Mainstream evangelists such as Roberts, Billy Graham and Robert
H. Schuller appear on the network. Some lease their air time.
Such payments bring in more than $35 million a year, nearly
one-fifth of TBN's revenue. So many preachers want air time that
the network keeps a waiting list. The most popular offering is
"Praise the Lord," a nightly, two-hour mix of talk,
prayer and music. The Crouches and a revolving cast of guest
hosts hold forth on a set decorated with stained-glass windows,
chandeliers, imitation French antiques and a gold-painted piano.
With his silver hair, mustache and bifocals, Paul Crouch comes
across as a grandfatherly sort. What he calls his "German
temper" can rise quickly, however. He often punctuates a
point by shaking a finger at the camera.
"Get out of God's way," he said once, referring to
TBN's detractors. "Quit blocking God's bridges or God is
going to shoot you, if I don't." Jan Crouch wears heavy
makeup, long false lashes and champagne-colored wigs piled high
on her head. She speaks in a sing-song voice and lets tears flow
freely, whether reading a viewer's letter or recalling how God
resurrected her pet chicken when she was a child.
She and Paul project the image of a happily married couple. But
off the air, they lead separate lives and rarely stay under the
same roof, according to former TBN employees and others who have
spent time with the couple. The Crouches also present themselves
as thrifty and budget-conscious. During one telethon, Paul said
his personal $50,000 donation to TBN had wiped out the family
checking account. He often says that he and his wife live in the
same Newport Beach tract house they bought 33 years ago for
$38,500.
But nowadays, neither of the Crouches uses that home much.
Whether in Southern California or on the road, they live in a
variety of other TBN-owned homes. In all, the network owns 30
residences in California, Texas, Tennessee and Ohio all
paid for in cash, property records show. These include two
Newport Beach mansions in a gated community overlooking the
Pacific. One of them was recently on the market for an asking
price of $8 million. A real estate advertisement said it featured
"11,000 square feet of opulent European luxury with
regulation tennis courts and a rambling terraced hillside orchard
with view of the blue Pacific." In Costa Mesa, the ministry
owns 11 homes in a gated development adjacent to Trinity
Christian City International. In Sky Forest, a resort community
in the San Bernardino National Forest, the network owns a
four-bedroom, five-bath home. TBN officials say the real estate
purchases were consistent with the network's charitable mission,
because the homes serve as venues for broadcasts and provide
lodging for the Crouches and fellow televangelists as they travel
across the country. The properties have also been good
investments, they said.
A Newport Beach Mansion up for sale. Surrounding
houses also belong to TBN
From 1994 to 1996, TBN spent $13.7 million to acquire Twitty
City, a tourist attraction on the former Nashville-area estate of
country singer Conway Twitty, along with some adjacent property.
After extensive renovations, the site reopened as Trinity Music
City USA, a Christian entertainment park with TV studios, a
church, a concert hall and a movie theater. The amenities include
a pair of condominiums for the Crouches. One is furnished in
Paul's taste, the other in Jan's, former employees said. In
Colleyville, Texas, near the network's International Production
Center, TBN owns nine homes on 66 acres along a country road, a
spread called Shiloh Ranch. Six horses graze in a pasture; TBN
officials say they were gifts from admirers. Paul
and Jan visit from time to time, and TBN occasionally broadcasts
specials from the ranch. Ministry officials say that a Christian
drug treatment program also uses the property, but former
employees say the program left years ago and Colleyville
officials say there is no permit for such an operation.
Kelly Whitmore
(Now doing the Jessica Hahn schtick)
A Passion for Antiques
Wherever they happen to be staying, the Crouches indulge
expensive tastes courtesy of TBN donors, former employees say.
Kelly Whitmore, a former personal assistant to Jan Crouch, said
in interviews with The Times that she used a TBN American Express
card to make numerous personal purchases for Jan and Paul,
including groceries, clothes, cosmetics, alcohol and a tanning
bed. Whitmore, 43, who lives outside Nashville, worked at TBN
from 1992 to 1997. On the air, Jan once called her "my right
arm." TBN officials now describe her as a disgruntled
ex-employee whose word cannot be trusted. Whitmore acknowledged
that she has hired an agent and hopes to sell her story to TV or
film producers.
Whitmore and another former employee, who spoke on condition of
anonymity, said Jan Crouch's special passion was antiques. Credit
card receipts show that in December 1994, TBN bought about 40
items from Cool Springs Antiques in Brentwood, Tenn., including a
three-piece wine cabinet for $10,000, a $2,800 candelabrum, a
$350 birdbath and a seven-piece bedroom suite that cost $3,995.
At Harris Antiques and Imports in Forth Worth, Texas, TBN spent
$32,851 in a single day in 1995. The purchases included two
French chests for about $1,900 each, a $1,650 brass planter and a
$1,095 bronze urn. TBN officials said the items were
reproductions, not antiques, and were used to furnish studio sets
and network-owned houses. They said the tanning bed was used to
darken the skin of 25 actors cast in TBN stage productions set in
Biblical times.
Whitmore said she regularly used ministry money and a
network-owned van to stock the bars in Paul's and Jan's separate
condominiums at Trinity Music City. Whitmore said the Crouches
directed her to make the purchases at a store called Frugal
McDougal, hoping it would not be recognizable on credit-card
statements as a liquor store. Credit card receipts also offer a
glimpse of the Crouches' dining habits. In Nashville in the
mid-1990s, Paul Crouch hosted dinners with TBN employees in a
private room of Mario's, an upscale Italian restaurant, spending
$180 or more per person for parties of up to a dozen, the
receipts show. A former top TBN official described heavy
consumption of wine and liquor at a dozen such dinners. The
ex-official spoke on condition of anonymity, citing a fear of
retaliation. "I have no problem with people drinking,"
the former official said, "but I have a problem drinking
with [prayer] partners' money." In separate interviews,
Whitmore, the former TBN official and a third person who traveled
and socialized with ministry leaders said that at the end of a
dinner, Paul Crouch would sometimes hold up a TBN credit card and
say: "Thank you, little partners!" In a statement,
ministry officials said that if Crouch thanked donors, it was
"a sincere gesture and remembrance of true thanks."
They also said it was appropriate for TBN to pay for dinners at
which network business was conducted. When network credit cards
were used to pay for personal expenses or for alcohol, the
Crouches or other TBN officials reimbursed the ministry, they
said.
Unending Appeals
TBN never stops raising money. All that varies is the method.
The network appeals directly for cash during weeklong
"Praise-a-thons" held twice a year, in the spring and
fall. The approach is not subtle. The Crouches suggest that
"Praise the Lord" will go dark if viewers don't send
money. No mention is made of the ministry's flush finances.
"The question is: Shall we keep this great, live, prime-time
'Praise the Lord' program on the air for another year?" Paul
Crouch asked during last November's telethon. "It's really
up to you."
Jan, from a studio in Atlanta, added: "Oh, dear friends,
come on. We've got to keep 'Praise the Lord' on the air."
Viewers pledge a total of $90 million during a typical
"Praise-a-thon." TBN says it collects about half the
money promised. During the rest of the year, the ministry keeps
donations flowing by less intrusive means. Except during
"Praise-a-Thons," pastors appearing on the network can
solicit donations only during the last 30 seconds of a half-hour
show or the last 60 seconds of a one-hour show. TBN executives
call this "the 11th Commandment."
But the network's toll-free "prayer line" is always
visible at the bottom of the TV screen, bringing a steady stream
of calls from people troubled by debts, illnesses and other
problems. The calls are answered by paid and volunteer
"prayer warriors" in a cluster of drab two-story
buildings in a Tustin office park. The workers, Bibles at the
ready, write down callers' requests for healings,
financial relief, mended marriages, jobs and pray with
them on the phone. TBN officials say the prayer requests are then
taken to a chapel on the premises and prayed over. While they
have callers on the phone, the volunteers ask for their names and
addresses. Later, the information is entered into a direct-mail
database, one of Trinity's most powerful fundraising tools.
If the sumptuous Costa Mesa complex with its biblical murals and
reflecting pools is TBN's spiritual heart, the Tustin complex is
its financial nerve center. Workers there deal with a daily
avalanche of mail from around the world poems, prayers,
testimonials and donations in a variety of currencies. With
surveillance cameras overhead, employees process the mail in an
assembly-line-like operation, separating donations from prayer
requests. The Spartan décor and brisk pace suggest a bank
processing center. In an adjoining room, employees enter the
letter writers' names and addresses into the direct-mail
database, which has 1.2 million names. An in-house printing and
mailing operation generates thousands of letters a day asking the
faithful to give.
Sheryl Silva of Anaheim is among those who do. She says the
network has been a source of strength during difficult times,
including a period of homelessness. "I love to give whenever
I can at least $15 per month," said Silva, 46, who
has glaucoma and gets by on a monthly disability check of about
$900. "I give because I don't want them to go off the air.
They might be the only thing good on TV that day."
Three Days in Iraq
Just as the fundraising never ceases, TBN's efforts to widen
its audience are unending.
In recent years, the network has focused on winning viewers in
the former Soviet-bloc countries, the Middle East and Asia.
Crouch is negotiating with Chinese officials to make TBN
available in hotels, embassies, foreign residential compounds
and churches. Earlier this year, the network converted to a
digital signal, enabling it to deliver three spinoff channels
through the same pipeline that carries TBN. The Spanish-language
channel Enlace USA serves the growing evangelical audience in
Central and South America. JC-TV offers youth-oriented Christian
programs. The Church Channel broadcasts church services.
In March, Crouch made a three-day trip to Iraq, where his son
Matt filmed him giving a satellite receiver to an Iraqi pastor.
Crouch handed $10,000 in cash to another Iraqi clergyman to buy
receivers for churches and individuals who wanted to watch TBN.
In a fundraising letter, Crouch said that while he was in the war
zone, God granted him another miracle. "I honestly believe
that Matt and I, with our small group, were made invisible to the
barriers, checkpoints, armed guards, military infrastructure and
enemies all around us!" he wrote. "Supernatural favor
was our portion as we moved effortlessly through the war-torn and
suffering city of Baghdad."
Then he asked his followers for their support.
"Will you help us help them? I know you will!"
Los Angeles Times-- Monday Sept. 20, 2004
THE PROSPERITY
GOSPEL- Part II
Pastor's Empire Built on Acts of Faith, and
Cash
The top Christian broadcaster's steady plea
for money funds growth -- and a life of luxury for Paul Crouch
and his wife.
By William Lobdell, Times Staff Writer
Pastor Paul Crouch looked into the camera and told his flock that
Trinity Broadcasting Network needed $8 million to spread the
Gospel throughout India and save 1 billion souls from damnation.
Crouch, head of the world's largest Christian broadcasting
network, said even viewers who couldn't afford a $1,000 pledge
should take a "step of faith" and make one anyway. The
Lord would repay them many times over, he said. Being broke or in debt is no excuse not to write a
check. In fact, it's an ideal opportunity. For God is especially
generous to those who give when they can least afford it.
"He'll give you thousands, hundreds of thousands,"
Crouch told his viewers during a telethon last November.
"He'll give millions and billions of dollars."
Preachers who pass the hat while praising the Lord have long been
the stuff of ridicule in film and fiction. But for Crouch and his
Orange County-based television ministry, God's economy of giving
is no laughing matter. It brings a rich bounty, year after year.
Crouch has used a doctrine called the "prosperity
gospel" to underwrite a worldwide broadcasting network and a
life of luxury for himself and his family. For at least a
century, preachers have plied the notion that dropping money in
the collection plate will bring blessings from God
material as well as spiritual. But Crouch, through inspired
salesmanship and advanced telecommunications technology, has
converted this timeworn creed into a potent financial engine.
TBN collects more than $120 million a year from viewers of its
Christian programming more than any other TV ministry.
Those donations have fueled its rise from a rented studio in
Santa Ana to a global broadcasting system whose programs appear
on thousands of channels via satellite, cable and
over-the-air broadcasts in a dozen languages. The
network's donors also help fund generous salaries for Crouch
($403,700 a year) and his wife, Jan ($361,000), and an array of
perks, including a TBN-owned jet and 30 homes across the country,
among them a pair of Newport Beach mansions and a ranch in Texas.
The prosperity gospel is rooted in the idea that God wants
Christians to prosper and that believers have the right to ask
him for financial gifts. TBN has woven this notion into its
round-the-clock programming as well as the thousands of
fund-raising letters it mails every day. During one telethon,
Crouch, 70, told viewers that if they did their part to advance
the Kingdom of God such as by donating money to TBN
they should not be shy about asking God for a reward. "If my
heart really, honestly desires a nice Cadillac
would there
be something terribly wrong with me saying, 'Lord, it is the
desire of my heart to have a nice car
and I'll use it for
your glory?' " Crouch asked. "I think I could do that
and in time, as I walked in obedience with God, I believe I'd
have it."
Other preachers who appear on the network offer variations on the
theme that God appreciates wealth and likes to share it. One of
them, John Avanzini, once told viewers that Jesus, despite his
humble image, was a man of means. "John 19 tells us that
Jesus wore designer clothes," Avanzini said, referring to
the purple robe that Christ's tormentors wrapped around him
before the Crucifixion. "I mean, you didn't get the stuff he
wore off the rack
. No, this was custom stuff. It was the
kind of garment that kings and rich merchants wore."
TBN viewers are told that if they don't reap a windfall despite
their donations, they must be doing something to "block
God's blessing" most likely, not giving enough.
Crouch has particularly stern words for those who are not giving
at all. "If you have been healed or saved or blessed through
TBN and have not contributed
you are robbing God and will
lose your reward in heaven," he said during a 1997 telecast.
A central element of the prosperity gospel is that no one is too
poor or too indebted to donate. Bishop Clarence McClendon, a
preacher whose show "Take It By Force" appears on TBN,
told viewers in March that God had asked him to deliver a message
to those in financial difficulty: They should "sow a
seed" by using their credit cards to make donations. In
return, the Lord would see to it that the balances would be paid
off within 30 days. "Get Jesus on that credit card!"
McClendon said.
Ask and Receive
Proponents of the prosperity gospel also known as the
"name it and claim it" gospel and the "health and
wealth" gospel point to a verse in the Hebrew
Scriptures in which the Lord warns the faithful not to
"rob" him by withholding their tithes: " 'Test me
in this,' says the Lord Almighty, 'and see if I will not throw
open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that
you will not have room enough for it.' " E.W. Kenyon, an
evangelical pastor in the first half of the 20th century, was an
early and influential advocate of the idea that God would grant
material wishes. Kenyon wrote about the "power of
faith" to bring health and wealth. He depicted an Almighty
who not only protected his followers and forgave their sins, but
handed out gifts if asked. The important thing was to ask.
Kenyon's ideas inspired what came to be known as the Word of
Faith movement. Many of the phrases Kenyon coined such as
"What I confess, I possess" are still used by
evangelists. After Kenyon's death in 1948, other pastors used
aspects of his teachings to draw an even more emphatic connection
between piety and prosperity. Pentecostalists such as Oral
Roberts were particularly ardent in espousing this doctrine.
In the 1960s, Pastor Kenneth Hagin, often described as the father
of the Word of Faith movement, raised the profile of the
prosperity gospel still further, promoting it on television and
in books with titles such as "Godliness Is Profitable"
and "How to Write Your Own Ticket with God." Hagin
preached a four-part formula that he said he received in a vision
from Jesus: Say it. Do it. Receive it. Tell it. First, believers
must ask God for what they want. Next, they must demonstrate
their faith through donations. Then they will tap into the
"powerhouse of heaven" and receive their gifts.
Finally, they must spread the news.
Most of today's leading televangelists preach some version of
this creed. Paul and Jan Crouch were brought up in the Assemblies
of God, a Pentecostal denomination where the prosperity gospel
flourishes. After working in ministries in South Dakota and
Michigan, the couple moved to Southern California in 1961 to run
an Assemblies of God TV production facility in Burbank. They
launched their own network in 1973. After two nights on the air
on KBSA-TV Channel 46 in Santa Ana, they were broke. So the next
night, they staged a telethon. The phones hardly rang. Then Paul
Crouch hit on an idea, he recalled in his autobiography,
"Hello World!" He told Jan to announce on the air that
an anonymous donor had promised to give $20,000 on
condition that viewers pledge the same amount that night. The
anonymous donor was Crouch, and the $20,000 was money the couple
had already lent the network. If viewers came through with
$20,000, they would forgo repayment of the loan. By evening's
end, viewers had phoned in $30,000 in pledges, enough to keep TBN
on the air. "Without really realizing it at the time, I had
put into motion one of God's most powerful laws the law of
giving and receiving, sowing and reaping," Crouch wrote.
"Thirty-, 60- and 100-fold blessing is, indeed, a glorious
truth and blessing for those who will simply obey the word of the
Lord!"
The prosperity gospel became the foundation of TBN fundraising.
The Crouches and TBN personalities such as faith healer Benny
Hinn present the doctrine with passion and a flair for the
dramatic. During fundraising "Praise-a-thons," the
Crouches read testimonials from donors whose debts supposedly
were miraculously forgiven or who inexplicably received
checks in the mail. They pray over donors' pledge cards. In 2000,
TBN televangelists told viewers that those who promised $2,000
would get the money back before the end of the year and
would find that their debts had been canceled. Later, donors were
invited to send in loan statements and other debt paperwork. The
documents were burned on a stone altar. During another pitch,
Crouch read on camera a letter he said was from a financially
strapped viewer who had pledged $4,000. According to Crouch, the
donor wrote: "Within 15 minutes of that time, I received a
check in the U.S. mail in the amount of $5,496.70. No
explanation
. I know it's not an income tax return. I don't
make enough money to file returns." That year, in a
fundraising letter to the network's "prayer partners,"
Crouch wrote: "Praise the Lord, the reports of awesome
miracles of debts canceled and God's people coming out of debt
continue to come in. God's economy of giving really works!"
What Windfall?
Most mainstream theologians and pastors say the prosperity gospel
is at best a doctrinal error and at worst a con game. They point
out that Jesus and his disciples abandoned their possessions in
order to live a spiritually rich life. "It is difficult to
fathom how anyone familiar with the abundance of biblical
teaching about the 'deceitfulness of riches' could have devised
the prosperity gospel," said William Martin, a sociology
professor at Rice University and author of a biography of Billy
Graham. "While the Bible does not condemn all wealth, it
surely points to its dangers in numerous passages." Critics
of TBN say that the promise of financial miracles besides
being a distraction from the core principles of Christianity
can cause real harm. Ole E. Anthony, founder of the
Trinity Foundation in Dallas, a televangelist watchdog, said he
knew people who had given the last of their savings to TV
preachers, hoping for a windfall that never came. "The
people on TBN are living the lifestyle of fabulous wealth on the
backs of the poorest and most desperate people in our
society," Anthony said. "People have lost their faith
in God because they believe they weren't worthy after not
receiving their financial blessing." Thomas D. Horne, of
Williford, Ark., a disabled Vietnam-era veteran, said that in
1994 he was swept away by the rhetoric of TBN pastors and donated
about $6,000 in disability benefits. Time went by and he did not
receive the promised surfeit of money. Last year, he found out
that TBN had purchased a Newport Beach mansion overlooking the
Pacific. He wrote to the network, asking for his money back.
"I want to recoup my hard-earned disability money I sent to
these despicable people," said Horne. He said he has
received no reply.
Philip McPeake is another donor for whom God's economy of giving
did not deliver. Out of work and out of luck in November 1998,
McPeake heard the Rev. R.W. Schambach make an impassioned plea
for donations on TBN's Kansas City television station, KTAJ.
Schambach promised that if viewers sent $200 as a down payment on
a $2,000 pledge, God would give them the rest within 90 days
with a bonus to follow. McPeake sent in his money and
waited for his luck to change. When it didn't, he complained to
the Missouri state attorney general's office and the Federal
Communications Commission. TBN refunded his donation.
Carl Geisendorfer, who runs a low-power Christian television
station in Quincy, Ill., offered TBN programming for 19 years
until, he said, he grew disgusted by the televangelists'
financial appeals. He said he pulled TBN off the air in 2002
after watching a preacher tell viewers that they should pledge
$2,000 even if they didn't have it in order to
receive a financial miracle from God. "I should have
canceled TBN several years earlier, but I thought Paul Crouch
would finally see the light on how foolish and prideful that
false gospel is," said Geisendorfer, president of Believer's
Broadcasting Corp., a small media group. "I'm sorry I waited
as long as I did." Geisendorfer said donations to his
station dropped 25% after he dropped TBN's programs. He said Paul
Crouch called him and, during a 90-minute conversation, admitted
to struggling over how far to go in promising financial rewards
to donors. "He said, 'What's the difference if some believe
it or not. It works for many people. Why not?' "
Geisendorfer wrote in a newsletter sent to station supporters
last year. He quoted Crouch as saying: "The money comes in
and the world is being reached by the Gospel."
Crouch declined to be interviewed for this article. His son, Paul
Crouch Jr., a TBN executive, said critics of the prosperity
gospel overlook the fact that the network has used viewers'
contributions to bring God's word to millions of people. He said
it was unfortunate that "the prosperity gospel is a
lightning rod for the Body of Christ. It's not what drives
TBN." If TBN was interested only in money, the younger
Crouch said, it would sell advertisements instead of funding its
operations primarily with viewers' contributions. "We could
double our money tomorrow," he said. He added that appeals
for money make up a small part of TBN programming and are
prominent mainly during TBN's twice-yearly, weeklong
"Praise-a-thons." Those are the times when Rick
Johnston, a retired pastor who lives near Flagstaff, Ariz.,
swings into action. Johnston, 56, organizes groups of like-minded
Christians to try to jam TBN's phone lines during
"Praise-a-thons." The strategy is to stay on the line
as long as possible offering phony pledges. "I feel like a
little fly trying to knock down Goliath," Johnston said.
"But if I can stop somebody from being robbed of $100, I'm
going to do it. There are worse things in life I could be guilty
of doing."
Not all TBN donors are looking for a financial payback. Many say
they are more interested in the promise of salvation and in
helping spread the message of Jesus. Jeanne Fish, 87, a widow who
lives in a Tustin apartment, said she took solace from TBN when
her husband died nearly 20 years ago and has been a loyal viewer
ever since. "I get so much out of it," she said.
"It's almost like getting a theology degree. It's kind of
hard to turn off, in fact." Loyal viewers are dumbfounded
that TBN generates controversy within the evangelical community.
"I'm just so amazed and shocked that so many people don't
like [TBN] in the Christian world," said Arthur Robbins, an
artist who lives near Santa Cruz. "It's a huge undertaking
to promote the Gospel worldwide, and they're doing it." On
the air, Paul Crouch responds to criticism of the prosperity
gospel by invoking Satan. "If the devil can keep all of us
Christians poor, we won't have any disposable income to build
Christian television stations," Crouch said once. Michael
Giuliano, an expert in televangelism at Westmont College in Santa
Barbara, said this is an effective strategy. "It's very,
very powerful," he said. "In a world of uncertainty,
you know who the good guys in the white hats are and who the guys
in the black hats are. And giving money to TBN is a tangible way
to join the fight for the good guys."
`Get Jesus on that credit card!'
Pastor Paul Crouch and other evangelists appearing on Trinity
Broadcasting Network tell viewers that God will reward them many
times over for their donations. Examples:
Paul Crouch
'God spoke to me clearly and said, "Did I give my son Jesus
on the cross expecting nothing in return?" God bankrupted
heaven and gave the best gift he could give
. You can bring
God a gift fully expecting something in return. Get to the
phone!' 'Have you got something that you have been praying about
10, 15, 20 years? You have been praying for it and haven't gotten
it
. It could be that you haven't gotten it because you are
a tightwad and you haven't given your 10%.' 'People ask me
sometimes, "I have been asking from God and not receiving
anything." I have to ask them some hard questions: Are you
giving anything?'
Pastor Rod Parsley
'You're on the brink of a miracle. Go to the phone and give
$1,000, $5,000, $10,000 and $1 million. Go to the phone
.
God has a miracle waiting on your response.''God gave his best at
Calvary. He told me, "Don't you dare come before me if you
don't give your best!" ''To reap a perpetual harvest you
need to sow a perpetual seed. I got a need for seed.'
Bishop Clarence McClendon
'God spoke to me that there are 1,000 people that will give no
less than $100, I got this word! Get up! Get up! Get up! Go to
the phone
.The spirit of God promised me that he would bless
your seed! Go to the phone right now! If you're sowing $1,000, do
it now! If you're sowing $100, do it now! ''Some of you are
wrestling with debt that you cannot pay off. God told me this
morning to tell you to
sow a seed on the credit card that
you want God to pay off
. Get Jesus on that credit card!
Make a pledge on that credit card!'
Times staff writer Scott Martelle
contributed to this report.
Ex-Worker Accusing
TBN Pastor Says He Had Sex to Keep His Job
Ford believes a 1998 confidentiality deal
has been broken. TBN officials deny claims.
By William Lobdell, Times Staff Writer
A former Trinity Broadcasting
Network employee who was paid $425,000 to keep quiet about his
claims of a homosexual tryst with televangelist Paul Crouch has
disclosed details of his complaint, saying that he had felt
forced to engage in the alleged sexual acts to keep his job.
Enoch Lonnie Ford, 41, said he was going public with his story
because he believes TBN officials breached a confidentiality
agreement that was part of a 1998 settlement that provided the
payment to him. Network officials broke the agreement, he
contends, by issuing a statement last week responding to a news
account of the ministry's legal effort to silence him. TBN's
statement described the circumstances of the settlement and
highlighted Ford's criminal background. Crouch, 70, is president
and popular on-air personality of Orange County-based TBN, the
world's largest religious broadcaster.
Ministry officials have flatly denied Ford's allegations, which
are detailed in an unpublished memoir that is now sealed in court
files by a judge's order. "I'll take a lie-detector test on
national TV," Ford said in a telephone interview Monday.
"Paul Crouch needs to be exposed, and the truth needs to get
out." Ministry attorneys went to Orange County Superior
Court on Tuesday in an unsuccessful attempt to stop publication
of this story, claiming that a Times reporter "aided and
abetted" Ford in violating an April 2003 court order that
barred him from discussing his allegations. Judge John M. Watson
declined to issue a restraining order against The Times but
suggested Ford could later face a contempt-of-court hearing.
TBN issued the news release that angered Ford after a Sept. 12
article in The Times reported that the nonprofit organization has
waged a legal battle to keep the alleged 1996 sexual encounter
secret. TBN said the statement didn't break the confidentiality
agreement because it only responded to issues raised by the
article. In their statement, ministry officials said Ford was
reviving his allegations, despite the 1998 settlement, to extract
more money from Crouch. They also detailed Ford's felony
convictions in the 1990s for drug possession and engaging in sex
with a 17-year-old boy. Ford responded angrily to the ministry's
statement. "There were times that I didn't make the right
decisions," he said. "This is all true. But this man is
using my mistakes to get away with this."
Ford, a mortgage salesman who lives in Lake Forest, was hired in
1992 to work in TBN's telephone bank in Orange County. Crouch
took an interest in him and within four years, Ford said, he was
doing special assignments for the pastor. One such job, he said,
was to drive Crouch to Hollywood and take publicity photos for
TBN at a Christian nightclub. Ford said he and others in the
ministry were surprised at the assignment because he wasn't a
photographer. "They had to show me and I'm not
kidding how to work a camera," Ford said, adding that
Crouch told him not to worry about it. After visiting the
nightclub, Ford said Crouch took him to dinner at the Regent
Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills. Shortly after that, in
October 1996, Ford said he and Crouch spent two nights at the
same hotel in separate rooms. During that time, Ford said they
worked out together at the hotel gym and ate expensive meals with
bottles of wine and after-dinner drinks. "I knew what he was
doing," Ford said. "He was seducing me." After
checking out of the hotel, Ford said, Crouch took him to a
TBN-owned cabin near Lake Arrowhead. It was there, Ford said,
that Crouch first had sex with him. "I did it because I
didn't know if this man is going to throw me straight out of that
cabin," Ford said. "And I didn't want to lose my job. I
was going to be in trouble if I said no." The next morning,
Ford said, Crouch read a Bible passage to him in an attempt to
reassure him about the night before. The passage, Proverbs
6:16-19, details seven "detestable" attitudes and acts
in God's eyes. Ford said Crouch told him that because
homosexuality wasn't listed, the Lord wasn't worried about what
they had done. Still, Ford said, Crouch warned him to keep the
encounter quiet "because people wouldn't understand."
Ford said Crouch told him the ministry would pay his debts
about $17,000 and offered a rent-free apartment at TBN's
Tustin studios. Ford said he believed Crouch was trying to pay
him off.
Ford, an openly gay man, said he was sickened by the sexual
relationship he alleges occurred with his boss. "But at the
same time, I still looked up to him," Ford said. "He's
a very powerful man of the largest Christian network in the
world. I just put my blinders on." Ministry officials
confirmed that TBN paid at least some of Ford's debts around that
time. They said it was an act of Christian charity that TBN
performs regularly for employees. Within weeks of the alleged
Arrowhead encounter, Ford on probation for his previous
offenses tested positive for cocaine and marijuana and was
sent to jail. After he was released in early 1998, TBN officials
refused to rehire him. Ford threatened to file a lawsuit alleging
wrongful termination and sexual harassment but settled for
$425,000. In exchange he also promised not to reveal what a later
arbitrator's ruling described as "salacious"
allegations. TBN officials said Crouch reluctantly agreed to the
settlement after advisors urged him to avoid a costly and
sensational legal battle. Despite the agreement, Ford threatened
last year to publish a memoir that included the allegations,
prompting a flurry of legal maneuvers conducted in closed court
hearings that resulted in the judge's order barring Ford from
disclosing his allegations and private arbitration that ended in
a victory for TBN. In court filings, TBN depicted Ford as a
penniless drug addict and sexual predator who was trying to
extort $10 million from Crouch.
Ford and his attorney, Eugene V. Zech of Newport Beach, deny the
extortion claims. In June, a private arbitrator ruled that Ford
could not publish the manuscript without violating the 1998
settlement agreement. On Tuesday, TBN attorneys asked Judge
Watson to keep The Times from publishing this story. Ministry
lawyer John Casoria said it could cause "irreparable
harm." Watson agreed with The Times' attorney, Kelli L.
Sager, that the 1st Amendment prevents the court from barring
publication of an article. After the hearing, Casoria said TBN
may ask the judge to hold Ford in contempt of court for speaking
publicly about the case.
Times staff writer Claire Luna
contributed to this report.