That would make them delusional, not fraudulent. Not that being crazy is an improvement.
How about a slightly different take? Let’s assume they start off doing well, they want to build a ministry and bring people to God. They do well and have built a ministry which requires a huge amount of money to support. New believers tend to be quite generous in what they give. However, when money gets tight or they’ve heard the same sermon over and over, the money from new believers dries up. Thus, the televangelist is stuck begging for money to keep the ministry going at the same level.
I have no love lost for most televangelists. But, I could see the above scenario as a reason they got that way.
Perhaps a list should be compiled of the the top 50 televangelists going back 50 years, and their fraud status. It then might make for a very interesting debate.
Doesn’t every minister say that on and off TV? What minister has no connection to god? What minister doesn"t have a collection plate or asks you to tithe?
That’s probably not a very useful generalisation. Not by any means do all ministers of religion claim to have a special connection to God and that you need to pay them to access it, which is pretty much what we’re talking about here.
I’m inclined to believe that there are quite a number of sanctimonious ‘chosen ones’ hanging around - all it requires is a primitive belief in god and that common trait of people looking down on the materially less well off.
I’ve met plenty of smug self satisfied gits, Der Trihs is simply describing ‘Lady Bountiful’.
That’s not a bad idea, but I don’t think it’s likely, for two reasons:
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I’m pretty sure that the televangelism business doesn’t work that way. At least not that I’ve heard of. They seem to rely on a dedicated group of viewers who will regularly contribute. Those people tend to like hearing the same thing over and over, or they like what the televangelist will have to say in general.
Isn’t that how other things like PBS and NPR work as well? They have fanbases to help them keep going. -
Just the nature of televangelism makes it hard for me to believe that most of them will start out honest, and for those that do that it won’t corrupt them. It’s hard to be successful in television if you stay honest.
Yes. These categories also hold for psychics and others who balance faith with obviously unethical behavior. In essence, if it’s moral (or holy) it can’t be unethical, by definition. In that mental space a tremendous amount of double-think can freely take place. I would add a fifth category as well:
Sorry but Saved
This sort knows he’s doing wrong, but truly believes, so receives God’s forgiveness for his sins and tries to fight them, but continues anyway.
The question, though, was do they believe in God and Jesus, and sure, why not? Any number of murderers, liars, thieves and rapists do, just as any number of schoolteachers and firefighters do. Sometimes good people do bad things, and t’other way 'round; sometimes bad people believe in good principles, and so on. This is Humanity 101.
On second read, after reviewing your response, Der Trihs, perhaps I should amend my post to the following.
‘They’re all fraudulent. It’s just that some of them won’t admit it, even to themselves.’
I don’t believe for one second that these folks are oblivious to the blatant manipulation, preying on the desires of the unwitting (not to mention the witless), subliminal suggestion, fear-mongering, and group-think promotion they employ during their {ahem} sermons. Whether their ends-justifying-the-means methods are designed to bring more people into the glorious fold of Christianity, or to line their slimey pockets, it’s all duplicitous, phoney-baloney and yes, fraudulent.
I’ve had this argument with my SO a hundered times. He says they’re a buch of filthy liers. I say they are a bunch of filthy liers who have convinced themselves of their own lies. Because it’s so much more comfortable. To get the limo and the rightiousness as well. People want to think well of themselves.
AFAIK, they don’t generally start out as televangelists; their ministry branches out into that medium from somewhere else such as services, seminars and conferences; now it may be the case that by the time they go on air, the majority of them are corrupt beyond repair, but there’s certainly the possibility that they ‘started out honest’ before they hit the big time.
I saw this fraud on TV-he is back in business! After being exposed by Randi, he served time in jail-now running the same racket! He sell vials of magical holy water to the credulous-and is making over $20 million/year!
The cynical, embittered, anarchist, hardline atheist in me says “kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out”. But that would be wrong, at least by the rules of this board, if not necessarily in God’s eyes…
But the athiest in you doesn’t believe in… <head asplodes>
That’s sardony for you. Speaking of cranial meltdowns, televangelism is one of those things that has that effect on me. (That, and drawing up a Desert Island Top 10 album list.) 