Preacher Comes to Town, Leaves with Gold

In the endless quest to answer the perennial question, Just how gullible are our fellow citizens? I present Preacher Benny Hinn. Who? If you google his name you get these hits: “World’s Greatest Scammer,” “Heckled at Airport,” “Benny Hinn Sued,” “Exposed by NBC Dateline,” Pleads for $2.5 million to get hi out of debt…”

Wikipedia says this about Hinn:  At Hinn’s Miracle Crusades, he has allegedly healed attendees of blindness, deafness, cancer, AIDS,^[18] and severe physical injuries. However, investigative reports by the Los Angeles Times,NBC‘s Dateline, the CBC‘s The Fifth Estate, and the Nine Network‘s 60 Minutes have called these claims into question. Hinn is notable for his mistaken prophecies relating to the end times, including the destruction of homosexuals in the USA, the death of Fidel Castro in the 1990s, and the end of the world in 1992 and 1999.

But don’t let all of that blind you to emptying your pockets during the collection. The Blade reported that Hill drew a crowd of 3000 souls to one of his performances last evening. Yes, 3000.  They came to be healed and to ‘give until it hurts.’ Hinn told the audience:

It’s not the money; I don’t need faith for $50 but I need faith for $1,000 because you spend $50 or $100 on food, candies, and chocolate, but when God says give $1,000, everything in you has to believe. So it’s all about faith.

Not about the money?  But don’t bother with $50, I want $1000!

Duped.  Bamboozled. Fooled.

In March 2005, Ministry Watch issued a Donor Alert against the ministry. Benny Hinn Ministries is not a member of the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability. Surprise, surprise!

I have an unproven theory of which I have spoken often on this blog. It is my conjecture that there is  group of people whose brain is very susceptible to charlatans and propagandists. Further, a great majority are found in churches on Sunday. They are ripe for the plucking and, sadly, they are plucked, hoodwinked and scammed. It is extra pitiful when the fraud is perpetrated in the name of God or Jesus. Yet, they don’t get it.  It is as if they suspend reality hoping that ‘it’ might be true. The click your ruby slippers syndrome.

They show up at the polls too, often in great numbers. They cast their ballots exactly as they have been pre-programmed by the ‘authority figures’ in their lives. All of this in a democracy.

There is no hope for this set of people; none whatsoever. Only a very few ever ‘catch on’ to the tricksters in their lives. Only a precious few.