- [Blair] Hello everybody, and
welcome back to the channel. My name is Blair or The Illuminaughtii. And in today's video, we're going to be talking
about something a bit different than our usual deep dive. Instead of MLMs, pyramid
schemes and shady non-profits, we're going to be talking
about televangelists. And what could be on this
topic, you might ask? Well, one notable televangelist, Rodney Howard-Browne was
recently arrested in Florida because he claimed a spiritual and constitutional immunity from laws put into effect to protect
people from 'The Beer.' And I can't say the actual term. So know that if you hear 'The Beer' or the sickness that shall
not be named or Voldemort, that I'm talking about the obvious event happening in our world today. Anyway, ever since this
televangelist actions came to life, I wanted to take a look at what the other guys have been up to. I'm sure that many of you had
got a bad taste in your mouth the moment I said televangelists, as some are pretty infamous. But why? What is it about this profession that makes people so cringey or flock to it for guidance. Today, we're going to be discussing what televangelism is about and dig deep into the cases where hundreds and thousands
of people have been scammed into believing the words
of their preachers. So without any further ado, let's get right into the team. In case you don't know already, televangelism is in essence, a Christian minister
broadcasting their message or sermon to the public. It started on the radio in the 1920s until eventually pastors
took to the televisions. After World War II, televangelism was well established as a religious aspect of popular culture. This alone, isn't a bad thing. Just spreading a religious message to those who might not be
able to hear it otherwise. Even though I'm not personally religious, I'm not about to sit here and say, all churches are bad and money hungry. Although, I mean, people
have their own opinions. Many of them are pillars
in their community and offer to help the
elderly, sick, homeless and other people in need. So please just don't see this
as an attack on Christianity, on church's preaching and blanket every single
televangelist into the same box. This is about asking
questions and wondering where that money hungry
televangelists stereotype came from. So when did it start to
become all about the money? According to an article by Jeffrey Hadden called "The Rise and Fall
of American Televangelism," this was as early as the sixties. At first getting
donations was a necessity. He says the following, "evangelicals like automobile and personal hygiene manufacturers
have a product to sell and the airwaves are a
marketing instrument. The evangelicals product is Jesus Christ and his gift of eternal salvation for all those who will accept. In commerce, a proportion of
the cost of doing business is advertising." What distinguishes
evangelical broadcasters from the hucksters of all
sorts of other products is the point at which the
cost of advertising is paid. Evangelicals ask satisfied
customers to pay for the airtime. If viewers feel spiritually enriched or committed to helping
this particular program in its quest to win others to Christ, they are asked to help
pay for the broadcast. The structure for paying
for religious broadcasting, thus is a little precarious. It is hard to imagine General
Motors asking its customers to send in a cheque to
cover the advertising after they have purchased
a new automobile. Given this comparison, it is not surprising to note
that television preachers do occasionally have to
lean on their viewers to send in donations. From what I gather reading all of this, televangelism wasn't money
hungry in these early days. It seems like pastors simply
wanted to get their message out and asked for money to pay for airtime. And that's fair. I mean, it's similar to patreons nowadays. If you want your favorite
YouTuber to make more content, you help by giving a donation, understanding that it goes
to pay for their expenses, their time, the cameras,
the software used, etc. For televangelists, it was airtime. However, as we know things
didn't exactly stay this way. Hadden describes how things
became more competitive. And that by the 1960s, evangelicals were buying lots of airtime. The gradual disappearance
of sustaining time left evangelicals with
virtually no competition, except between themselves. This competition and greed brought out the worst in televangelists and scandals began to arise. Hadden says that this
is only more troubling because they, the televangelists see themselves as having
a heavenly mandate to spread the gospel. For many broadcasters, there is a sense that their
personal calling is unique and involved a special relationship with their heavenly father. Given this special relationship, neither government nor peer
regulation seems appropriate. How could either discern
the mission and agenda that God has set for them personally. This is actually a really important point, and think about it. If you have a pastor that
is competing for airtime and needs money to stay on the air, of course, you're going to have a problem. But add in the element, that some of these men believing
that they are sent from God and are unaccountable to anyone else, that's something entirely different. I'm not saying every
pastor thinks this way, but even if you have one that does, it's a recipe for serious disaster. The first notable disaster
came along in 1987 with PTL. PTL stands for People That
Love or Praise The Lord. Jim Baker born, James Orson Baker and his wife at the
time, Tammy Faye Bakker were evangelicals hosting the PTL Club. They started in 1974 and became celebrities in
the televangelist world. In the mid seventies, they were household names. And in the mid eighties, they had built a
multi-million dollar empire. And that's exactly what it
was, an empire, a business. The Bakkers bought 2300 acres of land to build their Christian
version of Disneyland. And Bakker began asking followers to give a thousand dollars
for lifetime partnerships that gave them three
night stays at the hotel. And you'd think no one
would be crazy enough to pay for this, but that's not the case. Accounting for inflation, he was asking for over
$3,000 by today's prices. And even some of Disney's rooms don't cost a thousand dollars per night, but people did pay. The Bakkers sold more than
66,000 lifetime partnerships, which accounts to $66 million. Accounting for inflation, that is closer to $200 million. Well, that's a lot of money, and a lot of money to do good with, right? I almost forgot, this was
supposed to be a church and spreading the word of God and love and helping others rather than cash. So surely after making tens of millions, they opened up some shelters
or help the homeless? Nah, $200,000 was used for hush money when in December of 1980, a woman came forward with allegations of sexual assault against Bakker. Things slowly devolved from there until in 1988, Jim Bakker was indicted on
eight counts of mail fraud, 15 counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy. But Bakker wasn't the only
corrupted televangelist at the time of course. Jerry Falwell was also a huge player in the televangelist game. And we're not focused on greed alone here. Falwell brought politics into the pulpit and launched an organization
called the Moral Majority. According to NPR, critics like to say it was neither, moral nor the money shorty that is. And the organization was responsible for creating the get
out of the vote drives that would become the
envy of many a politician. Falwell wanted to reverse
the nation's direction on feminism, abortion and gay rights. He even went so far to call
the September 11th attacks, "God's judgment on America's immortality." He later apologized for it, but we kind of know how these things work. People tend to apologize once they see the
backlash for their actions and realize they're losing money rather than actually being sorry. So I believe him or not? I just don't. Now in case this isn't obvious, there are so, so many things wrong with this guy's organization. I almost don't even know where to begin. I know not everyone is
going to agree with me, but I feel this needs to be said. There is a separation between
church and state for a reason. Not everyone has the same religion and that's perfectly fine. Some people don't even have a religion. We need to maintain a set of unbiased laws that everyone is held to rather than rules based
around one religious text. It's one thing to want laws
based on your own religion. I can't really criticize
Falwell for that alone because so many people have this view. And I don't really wanna turn this into a messy political discussion. But at least people, at least don't go around
calling horrific tragedies and terrorist attacks God's judgment or believe that converting
everyone to your way is how things it'd be done. Seriously, it's just not gonna work. So Jay Bakker, Jim Bakker's son, even came out and spoke out against this. He's a minister now, but thankfully not following
his father's footsteps. He is far more accepting
from everything I've read. He says in 2006, "when did the focus of Christianity shift from the unconditional love and acceptance preached by Christ to hate and condemnation spewed forth by certain groups today. Some say it was during the rise
of conservative Christianity in the early 1980s with
politician action groups like the Moral Majority." Regardless of your religious beliefs, if any televangelist
movement is being marked as the start of hatred and
division within that religion, you've got to wonder if they're
practicing what they preach. To me it feels like Jim
Baker and Jerry Falwell both lost the message of what televangelism was
even supposed to be about. They gained a huge following, thought far too highly of themselves and began enforcing
their beliefs on others. This aggressive nature, delusion and greed slowly became more and more of a theme song
among televangelists. Some of the tactics
televangelists have used today to get money are worse
than hateful though. There are downright lies,
scams and dangerous. I can't talk about televangelists without talking about a few
modern, insane examples. One of these is a man named Benny Hinn. I came across him in my research, an Israeli televangelists. And he's most well-known for
his violent faith healing. There's multiple videos of him slapping or hitting people with his hands and coat because I guess that's
how you get the devil out. I have no idea how that's
really supposed to work, but this doesn't look like it. In 2009, Hinn claimed to be making over $100 million for his ministry. Federal officials had raided his home and even Christian websites denounced him and go so far as to say
he practices necromancy for these radical methods. Another televangelist is Roy Moore who has had supporters rally around him despite accusations of being a pedophile. Apparently he pursued a 14
year old when he was 36, yet a right wing talk show host described the allegations as "a 32 year old district attorney, swashbuckling and handsome, hitting on some young
girls who were very pretty. Yes, because there's nothing better than normalizing a predator
who has a public platform. That's fucking disgusting. Then there's the infamous
recognizable Joel Osteen who's had a volunteer, sexually abuse a disabled
child in his church. A member of his church
staff harmed an infant all while he consciously
flaunts his lavish wealth, his mega church which
seats over 16,000 people, took its time opening its
doors to displaced families during Hurricane Harvey in 2017 as well. Between the crimes, lies and
simply infuriating behavior, it's no wonder televangelists rub so many people the wrong
way, myself included. It's not that there aren't
any good ones out there, but it's the fact that
this kind of position is bound to attract some
really slimy people. Televangelists have
essentially limitless audiences and they're put on a pedestal
as mouthpieces sent from God. They seem to have low accountability and of course, tons of cash. I think few people wouldn't be corrupted after all that really. And it's not so much
living the lavish lifestyle that bothers me about these guys or the stupidly insane
amounts of money they rake in. It's the hypocrisy. When you think of someone that wants to talk about God and love, you're not thinking of someone
with their handout saying, pay me for it, or at least you shouldn't be. But that's really how these televangelists come across to me. I could be wrong, but hey, if you support them, you do you, as long as it's
not hurting anyone, right? So that brings us to our highlight, the final mega church pastor of the day, that's caused headlines and crossed into dangerous
illegal territories, Rodney Howard-Browne. Now it turns out Rodney Browne has actually faced some
controversy before, although not as bad or as
public as of this, of course. He's apparently led happy hour services in which he called himself, 'the Holy ghost bartender' in the past. Thinking pretty highly of yourself there, aren't you, Browne? He's also been audited a number of times and accused of being nothing
but a stage hypnotist by Hank Hanegraaff, President of the Christian
Research Institute in Santa Margarita, California. Hank Hanegraaff adds, "what he, Browne, is
doing is not harmless. Rodney Howard-Browne is using socio-psychological
manipulation tactics to make people think
they've encountered God. Although I can't say for
certain how many people thought Browne's practices were
dangerous back then, the law has finally seen
them as dangerous now. Thanks to everything
going on with 'The Beer' or the Voldemort situation, there's been an executive
order to social distance as there should be, seriously. But in Browne's own statement, he claims the following, "the church took extra precautions to more than comply with
the executive order, which included the following: persons who were
concerned for their health or had physical symptoms of any kind were encouraged to stay home. Every person who entered the
church received hand sanitizer, all the staff wore gloves. The church enforced the six foot distance between family groups in the auditorium, as well as in the overflow rooms. In the farmer's market and
coffee shop in the lobby, the six foot distance was enforced with the floor specifically marked. The church spent over $100,000 on hospital grade purification systems set up throughout the church that provide continuous infectious
microbial reduction, CIMR that is rated to kill microbes included those in 'The Beer' family. The church sanctuary has movable chairs. The chairs were removed from the sanctuary so that the remaining chairs
were separated by six feet. Any small group that may have
been closer than six feet or family members that may have
come to the church together. This six foot separation was maintained throughout the church." If they were actually
separated by six feet, it wouldn't matter. You can't gather up that many people for a non-essential activity. Plus, I don't know what your
definition of six feet is, but this doesn't really
look like six feet to me. Rodney Browne was arrested
for unlawful assembling because of this. And it's left people with a few questions. The first is, how on
earth can he justify that? Now I tortured myself a bit here guys, just so you wouldn't have to. I went online to Rodney
Browne's YouTube page and found the entire
three hour long sermon and scoured through it. I found the section where
he justifies his actions at almost exactly one hour in. - Talk to these people because they're not looking for the truth. They're just trying to find an angle to shut the church down. And this is about the
gospel of Jesus Christ that He needs to be proclaimed
in America at this time. (congregation applauding) You know, somebody said, yeah, but you could just go online. You could go online, preach the gospel. But yeah, with Google's
algorithms and Facebook, they're limited only to Christians. So you're not preaching to sinners, you're just preaching the choir. So that's a misnomer. Somebody said, well,
we're gonna go online, we're gonna reach people with the gospel. The shoulder of straight
person coming on your side you're not going to be reaching anybody. So you smoking crack. - [Blair] So what he's
trying to say here is, I'm going to stay open because if I go online
people that aren't Christian won't be able to find me. Is it just me, or does that sound like hell backwards? I mean more people would
be able to find you online, people from all over the world, even. Hell, I just found an entire three-hour
long sermon on YouTube. What person that isn't a Christian would just walk into a mega church when there's a pandemic going on, because they feel like it. Someone, please explain to
me the logic behind those. 'Cause I don't get it. Oh wait, it's greed. After listing a bunch of stores that are open to prove
some kind of diluted point, Browne says that, "they say, well, people are going to come
to your church and die. Well, I can't control what they do six and a
half days of the week." But you can control if the church is open. You can control that half
day by shutting your doors. Saying that, oh, you think an
abortion clinic might be open, does not compare to the
giant crowd in that building. Besides, regardless of what
you think about abortions, they are a medical service. You cannot sit here and tell
me that the medical services in a controlled sterilized environment carry the same threat of spreading 'beer' as the church does right now. Browne tries to justify all of this because well, people are
probably catching 'beer' from shopping cards. But it's not about catching it. Many, many people are going to catch this. It's about as spreading
it as little as possible, going out as little as possible and listening to CDC guidelines. Browne then says that, "this thing just can't keep going on. It's impossible for our
nation to be sustained." And of course the crowd claps as if he said something
amazing and groundbreaking. No, shit. Of course, no one wants this to happen. What's your point? If this is such a terrible
thing that needs to end, then why are you actively giving it an opportunity to spread. - For me as you pastor, I actually don't have a choice. Somebody said, what are you talking about? Well, I swore to defend the constitution. - [Crowd Member] Hallelujah. - [Crowd Member] Amen (congregation applauding) - I have no choice. For anybody else, you're free to go any church you want to, you're free not to come. If you're afraid that
you're gonna be infected, you can stay home, but you probably gonna get infected at some other place, not here. (congregation applauding) We have put the (mumbles) which I've been mocked about the machines, but these are legitimate machines, folks. You're not going to spend
a hundred thousand dollars on something that's fake. These are legitimate machines. There'll be a website up this next week, and we want to help make
thousands of churches what we call like a safety hub a place, for the body of Christ. - [Blair] And this is
where I start screaming because I know he can't hear me, but I'm gonna argue with him anyway now. Ordering people to protect
themselves and others by staying inside, is not taking away your freedom of speech. What irritates me so much watching this is how he talks as is
the government is trying to take away his constitutional right as if this is a personal attack. The executive order affects everybody. He's not the only pastor that can't gather in his congregation. And he sure isn't about to
suffer with his massive audience. I honestly don't know if this is Browne being extremely
diluted and infuriating, or if this is an excuse to be greedy and keep the church open
to line his pockets. I know the latter is what the televangelists
Copeland has done. Another multi-millionaire that's told his followers to keep tithing despite losing their jobs and fear for what the future holds. Why? Because your job is not your source, Jesus is your source. Whatever you do right now, you don't stop tithing. You don't stop sowing offerings. You get your tithe in that church if you have to go down
there and drop it off, stick it under the door or something. You get that tied in that church, you get that offering in that church and then you go home and do
what you're supposed to do. (laughs loudly) Yeah, following the word of God, alright? I guess luckily for his followers, 10% of zero is still zero. Seriously, you're a multimillionaire, but you're demanding money from a less fortunate congregation during these desperate times. And back to Browne, not only is he disobeying the
executive order to gather, but he's suggesting they make
every church a safe haven, with these magical machines of his, rather than hospitals or nursing homes. Neither of these churches
are about giving, it's only taking. Taking money from the congregation, taking advantage of
people that want answers about some of life's biggest questions and making themselves
richer in the process. I can't speak for everyone in attendance, but that's what the pastor is preaching and the ones who are supporting it. So it really doesn't give me
much hope for these places. So after this sermon, Browne was arrested and
announced on April 1st that he wouldn't be
holding another sermon. And don't worry, it wasn't an April Fools' joke. The building has been shut down. Browne says it's due to
the tyrannical government and because he fears for the
safety of his congregation. As of writing this, Browne is out on $500 bail, but he says, "I have not made any decision
about Easter Sunday." Well, he says he doesn't
want to be arrested again. So as long as that's the case, it looks like he'll be closed then too. I'm still fuming to be perfectly honest. Seeing businesses and nonprofits lie and deceive people, is disgusting. Seeing televangelists do it
while invoking the name of God, also disgusting. I don't want anyone religious,
Christian, or otherwise to think this is attacking your faith, God's word, the Bible or whatever it is that
you might believe in. I understand that not all
televangelists act this way. And the root of televangelism itself was a pretty worthwhile cause, a way to spread the church's message to people who couldn't be
there to hear it physically. Over the years, it feels like that's been twisted and contorted to be about who
has the biggest mega church, the largest audience, the expensive houses,
cars, lavish lifestyles, more than any kind of Christian message they originally claimed to support. I can't support any pastor that goes on television
during this time to say, to keep tithing, no matter
if you lost your job. Or one that puts his congregation at risk because he thinks he has a
constitutional right to do so. This is the time for
churches and communities to come together to
those who need it safely. Browne's sheer arrogance
really bothered me when I first saw it. And after hearing him speak
on his YouTube channel, it only made me more upset. Just because a church
has a large audience, doesn't make what they're saying true. And if your church cares more about helping themselves and others, well, I'm not sure they're
in the right business to say the least. (upbeat music) But anyway, guys, that's where I'm gonna
be ending today's video. And let me know your thoughts on this. Just general overview of televangelism in the comment section down below. And if you guys wanna
see more content from me, you can always click
in the description box. You're gonna find links to my collaboration channel with Sad Milk, second channel for my puppy, Casper, my Discord Server and of course all of
my social media links. Everything will be down below. So again, guys, thank you so much for
making it to another video. Hit that like button, subscribe if you're new and I'll see you guys in the next one. Bye. (upbeat music)
