I dislike Johnathon Oliver. What the is flogged to the US as humour is basic pub whining. However, he sometimes is painfully correct in his analysis. As Son two says: the only place at present on TV to get news is on comedy shows.
I’d add that Oliver is on a standard antichristian rant, looking at a bunch heretics and using them as a wedge issue to get at most churches.
Private jets, giant mansions and extravagant lifestyles. No, we’re not talking about Donald Trump. Plenty of televangelists have created vast empires just by preaching and working up a religious fervor on their weekly programs. On Sunday’s episode of HBO’s “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver,” the host took a closer look at some of these high-flying preachers and examined how tax laws have helped them keep large sums of money.
Oliver started the segment with a look at Creflo Dollar, founder and pastor of the nondenominational World Changers Church International, based outside Atlanta. The pastor made news in May when he urged followers to help him raise $65 million so he could purchase a Gulfstream jet. Dollar said he needed a new jet because his current private plane was getting too old and unsafe. The plane was in addition to Dollar’s multiple residences — including a $2.1 million home in New York.
Dollar isn’t the only televangelist living in luxury, Oliver said, adding that TV preachers have made it a habit to flaunt their wealth.
But the pastors argue that private jets, while lavish, are often necessary to help them spread their ministries — they tend to have many speaking engagements and appearances around the world. However, some — like Kenneth Copeland, leader of the Kenneth Copeland Ministries in Texas — have used them for private trips as well.
Oliver also explored how these pastors can earn so much money by teaching the “prosperity gospel,” meaning the more money followers give to the church, the more money they’ll probably make in the future — at least that’s the pastors’ theory. But for some individuals, too much giving can lead to personal debt or an inability to pay for potentially life-saving medical treatment, Oliver noted.
Much of the money generated by these churches — through donations and other means — is tax-exempt, Oliver observed. That’s because the IRS has very loose standards regarding religious-oriented nonprofit organizations or churches. As the IRS sees it, practically any opinion or belief — as long as it’s not illegal — can be a religion, Oliver argued. The agency audited just one church in 2014, and just two in 2013, he noted.
I don’t know how many times I have said that the prosperity gospel is wrong. I don’t know how many times I have explained why this site does not have a donate box. But today we have some scripture which is applicable.
And as Jesus taught in the temple, he said, “How can the scribes say that the Christ is the son of David? David himself, in the Holy Spirit, declared, “‘The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet.”’ David himself calls him Lord. So how is he his son?” And the great throng heard him gladly.
And in his teaching he said, “Beware of the scribes, who like to walk around in long robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and have the best seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at feasts, who devour widows’ houses and for a pretense make long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation.”
And he sat down opposite the treasury and watched the people putting money into the offering box. Many rich people put in large sums. And a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which make a penny. And he called his disciples to him and said to them, “Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.”
Now the first part is used as the Mormons as a proof text on human divinity, while I see it as David being prophetic about the Christ. Let’s leave that alone and consider the Pharisees loving money and status, and praising the widow who gave all to the temple.
The woman who was praised to the third heaven was poor. She would be condemned by the prosperity gospel heretics. For our righteousness is not measured in dollars or toys, but in lives bought back to God.
The prosperity gospel is a deep heresy. We need to condemn it. For if we do not, then we firstly do not teach the gospel, we compromise with the world be seeking the toys therof, and we spend money as fools, not wise.
I have to travel in my job. A fair bit. And I use scheduled flights unless there is a compelling reason (manly that there are no scheduled flights to where I’m being sent) to charter one. I’ve seen these gulf streams: there is a cross-leased one parked at Dunedin airport this week while some millionaire plays in our skifields, and I feel the same was as I do about exotic cars: wonderful engineering, bur not merely un-needed in NZ, but given our low speed limits foolish. If I drove a sports car as it should be, I would be well over 40 Kn/h above the rural speed limit, which is instant confiscation of licence territory.
Finally, this allows the Olivers of this world in. For they see a lack of taxes going into the promotion of far worse things.
Americans broadly support providing federal funding for free women’s health exams, screenings and contraception services, a Reuters/Ipsos poll has found, suggesting risks for Republicans criticizing Planned Parenthood as part of the 2016 campaigns.
Support for federal funding of Planned Parenthood itself to provide those services was even stronger, according to the Reuters/Ipsos released on Wednesday.
The non-profit’s image has taken a hit, the poll found, after an anti-abortion group earlier this year began releasing videos purporting to show Planned Parenthood officials negotiating prices for aborted fetal tissue.
Still, the strong support for federal funds to help Planned Parenthood provide pregnancy tests and other services indicates Republican presidential candidates should tread carefully.
Planned Parenthood — that scabrous abortion factory and supplier of stem cells — is not merely non profit (and thus tax free, John Oliver) it gets federal funding. The correlation of PP offices in majority black districts would be called racism by the SJW if they did not also sacrifice to Molech.
So John Oliver, I put this to you and your truefans: if you really support PP PAY FOR IT. I consider Televangelists fools, frauds and hereitcs. But the government does not pay for what they do. The liberals demand my tax money, which is taken from me by force, to perpetuate evil.
And such a suciety will not remain long in this world.
