S1E6 Miracles, Money & Manipulation

They promised healing. They delivered a show. In this episode, we dive into the dark underbelly of faith healing—where staged miracles, emotional exploitation, and spiritual manipulation rake in millions. From televangelist theatrics to tent revival cons, we expose how desperate people are preyed upon in the name of God. This isn't just deception—it's a system built on false hope and fat wallets.

We talk the grift, the guilt, and the god-complex behind miracle ministries—and why the truth is often buried under a mountain of money and microphones.

Big Bob Tilton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IzpRSKqW2M(Excerpt ) Peter Popoff exposed in Aron Ranen's Documentary Film "Television Believers"https://youtu.be/IwfGRHINJUA?si=5gbfAdZEeq7mX_66Marjo Documentaryhttps://youtu.be/s-NwKD9laZw?si=5eqpCK5qNacgMp8s🎵 Opening music by The Demigs: ⁠https://youtu.be/QrkyBlnwL-E?si=9Mzv6rq-mVSB543-⁠🎵 Closing music by The Demigs: ⁠https://youtu.be/pkh1ofF965w?si=6WiRBZxa0hKq2G6A

🌐 Resources:

⁠Adult Children of Alcoholics⁠ – for support, healing, and recovery

⁠Freedom From Religion ⁠

⁠⁠#BacksliderDiaries ⁠⁠⁠⁠#ChurchAbuse⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#ReligiousTrauma⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#Exvangelical⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#SpiritualAbuse⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#Deconstruction⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#FaithHealing⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#PurityCulture⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#AdultChildrenOfAbuse⁠⁠⁠⁠ #LeavingChurch⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#ExFundie⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#ToxicFaith⁠⁠ ⁠⁠#ReligiousDeconstruction ⁠⁠⁠⁠#RecoveringFromReligion ⁠⁠⁠⁠#FaithShouldntHurt ⁠⁠#ChurchHurt

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Welcome back to The Backslider Diaries, the podcast for the
faithful, the frustrated, and everyone caught somewhere
between a pulpit and a therapistcouch.
I'm team. I'm Jay, and we welcome you back
to this episode. Thank you guys so much for being
here with us. As we delve into all things
confusing and church bait. We do want to take a moment and

(00:22):
pause and thank you all so much for the amazing support and the
encouraging comments and feedback that you guys have
shared with us. We're new to this and the
comments just mean so much. It's not easy to sort of unpack
your life over a microphone and look at things that have have
caused a lot of feelings and trauma, honestly.

(00:42):
But we're happy to be on this journey with you and we're so
grateful that you allow us to behere as you are on your own
journeys. But we just encourage you, if
you have stories to share, if you have suggestions or thoughts
or feelings that come up, pleasehelp us build a community.
The end goal that we're here foris to really build a community,
community where it's safe to talk about all of these things

(01:02):
and we can express our feelings and thoughts and experiences
without fear of judgment and send us your thoughts.
We'd love to hear from you. Also, we would ask you if you do
enjoy the podcast and you find value from it, the best thing
you can do for us is please like, share and subscribe.
As you all probably know, that helps let the algorithm know
that good things are happening on this channel and then the

(01:23):
show gets pushed to more folks and hopefully we can spread this
message of healing to a broader audience.
So thank you for being here. What are we talking about today,
T? Tonight or today or whatever
time it is where you're at, we are going to be talking about
faith healers and miracles. Now, Jay and I both grew up with

(01:43):
a prophet and a faith healer in our house, the same dude, if you
can imagine that, what great luck we had.
We were never sick, never had a cold.
It was just amazing. But we're going to be.
Right. Look at me now.
So we're going to be talking about how faith healing and
miracles, this sort of a gift, Iguess you would call it, is a

(02:06):
con. So let's get into it.
So let's talk about the history of it all.
What is faith healing? What does it claim to be, and
what actually is it? How does it function in the
modern evangelical experience? So historically, faith healing
is part of the larger basket, asit were, of spiritual gifts.

(02:26):
And particularly in the Pentecostal or evangelical
tradition, those gifts were seenas an expression of sorting,
having the full spiritual endorsement of God.
I will misquote the Scripture, but there's there's Scripture
that has the apostles operated in the New Testament that
believers who were fully endowedwith the Holy Spirit and the

(02:47):
gifts of the Spirit would be able to do those works and even
more. And those included things like
healing, raising from the dead, no?
Snake handling. That's where that came from.
Taking poison, anything like that.
The gifts of the Spirit, or as Ilike to call them, the Grifs of
the Spirit. This is a business and you know

(03:08):
you don't. You don't get meetings or you
don't get booked back unless youhave a gimmick.
Whereas the evangelists say it'sa, it's a ministry.
Like it's incredible. They'll say, oh, brother, so and
so he's got the ministry of laying on him hands or he's got
the ministry of prophecy, but that's a gimmick.
And the guys that have the gimmicks get the big meetings.
Yes, and where did you hear thatterm?

(03:28):
There is a great documentary about Marjo Gortner and he was,
believe it or not, a four year old preacher, an ordained 4 year
old preacher that would go around to camp meetings and it
is amazing. He has the same cadence and if
you've ever been to Pentecostal church, the.
Windows. They locked the doors but clear

(03:50):
their lives. But I see them as they got down
on their knees, and they began to play, and I see the Holy
Ghost as cold in tongues of fire, whereupon them?
Hallelujah. Hello my the holy knows to.
Finally found opponent resting place.
Cadence the the the hard breathing at the end and it's

(04:11):
all used to manipulate you. If you study speech making and
you study famous orders, especially, gosh, this is going
to be tricky, especially orders of political persuasions that
tend to be very dogmatic. You'll hear those same speech
patterns used in that context aswell.
And, and it was really interesting to me when I first

(04:32):
heard that. I was in college at the time and
was watching historical documentaries talking about
different orders and there's their speech giving process.
And I was like, wait a minute, I've heard that cadence before.
The language is irrelevant. You'll recognize the cadence and
it's also very it's what's the staccato?
That's kind of what I'm looking at.
It'll be like very directive, very sharp, very trying to get

(04:56):
you to do something. Call to action is the word.
All right, so Marjo. So what's Yeah.
And what's funny to me is a lot of these faith healers, I mean,
they were debunked back in the day.
Like I'm talking the 1800s. These people were debunked and
they're still still around. They're like herpes.
You can't get rid of them. Well, let's go back to the
origins and then the why. So we talked, we've talked

(05:18):
previous, if you've joined us before, you may have heard or
remember about how Pentecostalism as a specific
strain of evangelicism. Nowadays evangelicism is kind of
migrated out to mean non denominational, charismatic,
Catholic, to some extent more broader based Baptist.
It, it can incorporate a lot of things under that tent.

(05:40):
But the origins of what we're talking about when we talk about
the supernatural sort of realm of evangelicism really
originated in this country in Pentecostalism.
And that movement grew a great deal out of the 20s, out of the
time when people were very frustrated.
There was sharp demarcation lines between the have and the

(06:01):
have nots and remember. In the Deep South, that's it.
Out of the deep. South, Right, Right.
Well, in talking back in the 20s, it moved out of groups that
were largely disenfranchised. And when we talk about that, we
have to realize too, there wasn't a lot of higher education
available, number one. Number two, people didn't have a
lot of entertainment options. So revivals and faith healers

(06:24):
and things like that, Those wereevents in your city to go see.
But #3 we're talking about people who didn't necessarily
have access to medical care. If you're living on a farm in
the middle of Kansas and little Susie cuts off her toe, it's
going to work out a lot better for you to have access to divine
healer or prayer than, you know to do what?

(06:45):
Go get her on a horse and ride to the emergency.
But I feel like playing the I feel like playing the bump,
bump, bump, Bah Bah sound. Because if little Susie cut off
her toe, a faith healer wouldn'teven have her on stage.
They would vet those people out because they know that's not
going to happen. But let's go back to the true
currency at play here, right? It's sort of, it reminds me so

(07:08):
much if you ever study process addiction and talking about
gambling and you want to know, OK, why?
Why do people gamble when it's so well documented how often
they lose? And what we found in the study
of addiction and process addiction is the most effective
reinforcement, which the conceptof reinforcement is, you do a

(07:28):
thing and you get a reward for that thing.
And so that reinforces the behavior to continue happening,
right? So when we look at addiction
studies and we look at process addiction and gambling in
particular to find out why people keep doing something that
has such a high failure rate or such a low predictable rate of
return. What we found is, is
intermittent reinforcement, which what that means is every

(07:51):
time you do the activity, every time I brush my teeth, I don't
get a star on the chart. But sometimes I do, right?
Sometimes it works. So when I buy a scratch off
lottery ticket, I certainly don't win every time, but I do
sometimes. And when you space out the
reinforcement like that, it kindof keeps the brain in this state
of disequilibrium. So since the result is not

(08:14):
predictable, but it could have afavorable outcome, the brain is
more likely to repeat that behavior.
So back to little Susie with themissing toe.
We know that as Cowboy fans, too.
Right, right. So gosh, don't even talk about
the Cowboys. Jeez.
But back to that example. If you have this feeling that AI
don't need your fancy doctors, right, it's like I'm not

(08:38):
breaking up with you're not breaking up with me.
I'm breaking up with you. It's not that I don't have
access to the higher realms of society and medical care and
resources. I am.
Choosing. Not to, because I'm putting my
faith in God. Because guess what?
I can ask God myself. I don't have to go through the
doctor. I don't have to feel ashamed of
my poverty. I don't have to feel aware of my
lack of education. I don't have.

(08:59):
To be othered I can go to the divine creator and sometimes it
works right. Well then, why do I need a faith
healer? If I have this Direct Line to
God and I'm God's child, why do I need the faith healer?
Well, that's the good question. And a lot of folks believe that
you don't, you know, you pray over your own issues.
And I know certainly from myself, when I was active in the

(09:19):
religion, I certainly prayed over my children, prayed over
myself, prayed about all the things.
But it's that extra, that extra mojo, right?
Like if you can get to the prophet, if you can get to the
faith healer, it's like saying, you know, you've got dial up,
but they've got fiber optic connection, right?
So back to the history. Well, God has, God has given

(09:40):
them a gift and you know, and inthis case, the gift of faith
healing or the gift of prophesying.
Right. And so we really saw, you know,
especially in like the 30s and the days of where we were just
beginning to get, you know, filmand some television or not
television, but some some film documentation of things
happening. You know, you had Amy Simple

(10:02):
McPherson and some other folks like that back in the day that
they were holding what became these big crusades and drawing
big crowds. And guess what comes along with
big crowds? Big money, big money.
It really became this popular. Phenomenon and popular culture
that even lasted into, you know,the 70s.

(10:23):
You had Catherine Kuhlman and you had, you know, folks of that
type and then later on. Roberts.
Yeah, later in the 80s and 90s, right, you had Robert Tilton,
Oral Roberts, Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Baker.
We'll talk about them a little bit later.
But one thing I did want to point out, as we're kind of
talking a little bit about the history, just as an example

(10:43):
between, because let's look at who this really effects.
Between 1975 and 1995, almost 175 children, 172 to be exact in
the United States alone passed away after their parents
withheld medical care for diagnosed medical conditions,
instead seeking to pursue faith or religious based healing.

(11:05):
Of 140 of those were from preventable diseases such as
pneumonia or diabetes. OK.
So it's not all evangelicals. There's the Jehovah's Witnesses
who don't allow blood transfusion, transfusions I
believe, and Christian Scientist, Scientologist, even
though I guess they're considered a religion.

(11:28):
They're. They're a business.
Really. A cult and a business and yeah,
well, a whole other episode of religion and cults, and that's a
really fine. Line but back to talking about
how that became sort of ingrained into popular culture
and has gained more approval. Look at show again the
convergence and the irony of converging entertainment with

(11:51):
religious spectacles, so to speak.
Not only did you have the adventof televangelists through the
80s, nineties and present day, but you also had the rise of
things like the Duggars, right, 19 kids and counting or however
many kids they eventually got upto.
Now you have trad wives and making content on TikTok and
YouTube and all the things. And a big part of that is the

(12:14):
quiver fool movement, which saysyou should have as many children
as God gives you. And to really do it right, you
should have those children in a home birth with no medical
intervention. Many people even going to the
extent of no prenatal care for mother or baby and that those
children should not be vaccinated because ideally they
will be homeschooled. So all of that together in

(12:35):
popular culture has really kind of continued to push sort of
this element that a, you don't need doctors, you don't need
immunizations, you that's all kind of out there, but you
really don't need it. You know you can swallow some
beef tallow and rub some dirt init and you're good.
It's another way to for men to control women.

(12:56):
I've had this conversation with my wife and as you know, my
wife's a very strong independent, has her own mind,
bless her. But we both agree, we both
agreed that when she was pregnant, she was a lot more,
and I use this term in the nicest possible way, docile.
Right. Like she was much more.
Malleable. Yeah, well, I don't care what

(13:18):
you do. I'm just going to sit here.
Leave me alone. And my God, I can't imagine, you
know, if she was pregnant. You know, every, every what, 15
months or something. Well, let me just tell you.
Should be exhausted. My first two kids are 20 months
apart. My last two set of kids are 12
months and 23 days apart, and ifGod forbid, I had had even a

(13:43):
goldfish come along, at that point, I've been like, I don't
really care what you'll do, justleave me alone.
It's hard on the body, it's hardon the mind.
And yes, absolutely lots of manipulation.
But that's one of the ways it comes into popular culture, and
unfortunately, children get hurtin that, which we'll talk about
that more later. Well, let's talk about what we

(14:05):
grew up with. We were behind the curtain, so
to speak, and my first experience with miracles.
This is again one of the few memories I have but ingrained
into my mind. The phone rang at our house and
I was little enough that my mom could pick me up and put me on
the kitchen counter so she couldanswer the phone, which was for
you younger kids on the wall andshe.

(14:27):
Phones used to be attached to the wall.
Kiddos now granted and I'll never forget we were goofing
around my dad was out hunting inin Colorado at the time and me
and my mom were having fun like laughing and giggling and I
remember the color just drained out of her face and what had
happened was dad fell off the mountain and.
Yeah, I was alive. I was 4 at that time.

(14:50):
OK so my dad, my dad was huntingin Colorado and was on his horse
and was looking through his binoculars, fell down the
mountain 300 feet, broke his back in three places.
So wow, how do I tell this storywithout like just telling a
bunch of shit? There was, and we will get to

(15:10):
this later, there was AI guess for lack of a better term, our
dad's mentor who was a prophet and a healer.
He had all the gifts he had. He was A5 tool player.
Wait a minute, He. He use a baseball term.
He also had repossessed limousine that he had one of the
dudes in the church dress up in a full chauffeur outfit and

(15:32):
drive him around. So this dude was a.
He was like. Yes, he was.
Oh my God, He. Was any who back to the story.
So my dad had gotten taken by care of flight of the hospital
and he was in traction, you know, couldn't move, broke his
back in three places. He was in bad shape and my mom
had flown there with him and as the story goes, he talked to.

(15:56):
His mentor? Let's just call.
Yeah, Lester. Yeah, Lester.
Lester's better. Let's call him Lester.
He talked to Lester and Lester said Lord has spoken to me and
you need to come here, get in anairplane, come here.
And. And let.
Me clarify here was South Louisiana.
So we're talking about quite a journey for a person who had

(16:19):
their back broken. Go ahead.
Yeah, he in fact on the plane, had to be taken on the plane in
a stretcher. And I'm not sure, like we're
told these stories when when we're little.
And now thinking back on them, I'm like, what happened?
The logistics. The logistics just don't work,
man. There's so many holes in your
story. Like I wish I would have been
such a. Adult.

(16:39):
Like a little kid genius. Ask all these questions.
I wish I was like baby Howard Stern and ask what what about?
Oh, let me just tell you how that works out for you.
Not well, not well. Take it real quick.
And I'm not a genius or Howard Stern, but I ask all the
questions and have the scars to prove it.
Well, anyway, so he does, he goes there and there was

(17:02):
actually a videotape that they made 'cause I wasn't there, they
didn't take us. You know, obviously mom wouldn't
have grabbed us and taken us, sothere was a videotape 8mm
somebody made. Yeah, I was on a reel to reel.
I remember watching it. Yeah, yeah.
And he dad's on a stretcher in front of the church, you know,
Pentecostal church. Everybody's fucking going crazy.

(17:24):
He comes up, he lays hands on him.
Dad gets up, walks around, touches his toes.
It's a miracle. Game over and the church went.
I mean, the place went insane, like insane.
So that's been the story our whole life.
And the after effects. But that's not the end of the
story. Hold on, hold on.
Let me do my Paul Harvey. And now for the rest of the

(17:47):
story. Shall I do the rest of the story
or do you want to you go first? You go ahead.
Well, our whole life. Yeah, Bear.
In mind, at this point in time Iwas four and T was somewhere
between 8:00 and 9:00. So we're talking since we were
in like preschool to 4th grade level.
Go ahead. The rest of our life my dad's

(18:07):
had back. He was addicted to opiates.
Something was always wrong with his back or his neck.
It's hard to say like what's real and what's not real.
So we just kind of, in my opinion, when you can't really
decipher it, just lay out the facts and let's see what the
facts have to say for themselves.

(18:28):
And then where the facts don't cover it, then you have to kind
of leave room for what else could it be?
And I just know from experience when I had my third baby, I'm
trying to think, I think it was my third.
They all run together, but I think it was the 3rd baby.
So I've got into labor and I had24 hours of induced labor with
so pain relief or anything like that.

(18:48):
And he had a very complicated situation.
My third child was born with Down syndrome.
He had a congenital heart defect, and that caused a lot of
issues that we didn't necessarily know we're going to
complicate the actual birth itself.
So I wound up having an emergency C-section.
And because I was shaking so badly after the C-section, I was

(19:08):
kind of in shock. I think I couldn't hold the
baby. And he had to be rushed straight
away to the NICU to make sure his heart and everything was
functioning and give him the support he needed.
So I had yet to see my baby. And I recovered to the point I
wasn't shaking. And they were Wheeling me on the
stretcher, the Gurney, whatever,to my room.
And I said, I'd like to go see my baby.

(19:30):
And they're like, well, it's kind of our policy that until
the epidural wears off and untilyou're able to walk, we can't
let you be in contact with the baby.
And I had just had AC section after 24 hours of Labor and I
pulled myself up off the Gurney and willed myself to walk.
And I turn around and looked at him and I said I can walk, take

(19:50):
me to my baby. And the nurse was looking at my
husband. And she's like, I've been doing
this for years and I've yet to have the mom get up off the
literal surgical Gurney and walkto the baby.
No, the brain. The brain is a powerful thing,
and belief is a powerful thing. And when you're in a situation
with a crowd like that and that whole group think and you got

(20:11):
the music playing, yeah, I couldsee you, you know?
Yeah, yeah, right. It literally amps you up.
And I mean, there are studies that talk about releases of
endorphins and adrenaline. And for that matter, look at
players. Like look at athletes who sit
there and they have trouble, traumatic injuries like
fractures or you know. Jack Youngblood plated with a

(20:33):
broken leg. Right.
And they literally play through the pain and you know, that
those endorphins and the adrenaline and the crowd
response, all the psychology of it, you know, all of those
things factor in. So after the miracle, as it
were, our Father's life became really centered around pain,
around back pain, neck pain, chronic headaches, the

(20:57):
subsequent leg, hip and knee replacements that had to take
place due to, you know, misaligned back issues.
I think he just completed his most recent surgery at almost 80
years of age. And I think, gosh, how many has
he had TI? Don't.
Over 10. I mean, I, I don't know.
I know that I spent a lot of time in the hospital and I they

(21:21):
give me the heebie jeebies. The same same.
It must have been at least 10 surgeries.
It's got to be more. There were neck fusions, back
fusions, just all kinds of things you can imagine.
I've been, I've been called to the hospital by the doctors
telling me that you better get here, your dad's about to die if
you want to see it. And then starting from when I
was 4, so at the same time, clearly the opioids became part

(21:44):
of our family. And I personally cannot remember
a single memory of my life or childhood without opioid
addiction playing a factor I don't have.
I don't have a lot of childhood memories because trauma is a
beast. But the ones that I do have,
they all function around either limitations due to back pain or

(22:05):
problems due to addiction and you know, just in full.
Well, and how much of that back pain was?
Chicken and. Egg.
I need the pills, so yeah. And so, you know, to that end,
and we're not telling tales out of school in this part on, you
know, our father, to his credit,he has admitted and accepted the
fact that he had and some might say has still an ongoing

(22:30):
addiction issue with opioids. And you know, look, let's call
it like it is when you have. We're just giving his testimony.
When you right, right when you have a real health issue
literally becomes a cycle. I mean, in the truest sense,
because now you have this pain, you want the pain to go away.
And look, if you've ever had chronic back pain, it can really

(22:51):
mess with you. I think, you know, we all have
our experience with chronic painand day after day, moment after
moment, it just gets to the point where you just want it to
stop. And so, you know, then the more
you take, the more you need and it becomes this real self
perpetuating cycle. So, you know, we're not trying
to throw shade or blame to anybody for that perspective,
but as an adult, especially as aparent, and more specifically as

(23:15):
someone working in ministry and trying to stand up before people
as an example of how to live life.
If you have an addiction or you're caught in that situation
and you're confronted with it and you have the intervention
moments, you go handle it. There's no shame in addiction,
but there's absolutely a responsibility to handle your
business. And, you know, here I sit at

(23:35):
this big age and again, it's still a moment of pain because
when I look back at moments in our life, the big red letter
moments, the times when you wanted to be able to reach out
and call to a dad or a parent tohelp you, the drugs are always a
factor. And you know, for those of you
that have lived with a parent ora loved one dealing with

(23:56):
addiction of any kind, you know,that's the case.
Like they become the silent partof the family.
And I think that for you and I, that was such an early point of
questioning healing was, you know, OK, so you got healed, but
it didn't quite take or you got healed, but you were left with
this pain because it's like, youknow, the Thorne and Paul side,

(24:17):
the besetting sin, to draw a biblical analogy.
Like there was lots of rationalizing around that and
trying to make it make sense. Another one, couple of stories
that that kind of whacked us between the eyes, back to Lester
for a minute. Later down the road when Lester
developed illnesses. I can't remember what he had, if

(24:37):
it was cancer or something. I think it was bladder cancer.
I wanted to. Say, could have been living in
that neck of the woods. Man, that's a terrible place to
live for health. Anyway, he passed away and his
church was very much a cult of personality, was very much built
around the bigness of the prophet and the prophet's gifts
and the prophet's calling. And you were just lucky to be

(24:59):
able to be in the presence of the prophet.
And I'm, I'm talking like if he could have gotten away with like
the Cape, like Elvis had, I think he would have done it.
But he wound up passing away andthe church just couldn't accept
it. First of all, why wasn't he
healed from his ailment and it wound up taking his life?
But then they really somehow convened around this idea that

(25:21):
he was going to be resurrected. But just imagine, you know,
we're little children. We're gathered around this
candles and music and praying intongues and all of the things
for days and days and days. The dude is the dude's free.
Green as Kermit. He's he's green as Kermit.
And you know, it just it didn't happen.
It just didn't happen. Of course, imagine and you know,

(25:43):
so there again, we're left with this, OK.
Hey, if that if it would have happened, we would have this
podcast right now. Facts.
But you know, then it's it's. And I want to make this point
when you're raised in this culture, it really, really kind
of. Shifts.
The development of your thinkingprocess and your ability to
rationalize and self advocate later in life.

(26:04):
And I firmly believe this is howso many of us wind up in abusive
situations. Is that when you're kind of
taught the axiom of well, what are you going to believe?
Or you're lying eyes, you know, I.
Have a couple of other examples.Our uncle was a.
Righteous one. I I don't really look at my

(26:25):
dad's like that, but I think my uncle really believed the little
bit of time that I knew him. He at a very young age got colon
cancer and died. Like in his early 30s.
Before it happened, No. 40s. He's 40 something.
Yeah, but I remember, you know, mom, Dad, grandma, Grandpa,

(26:45):
everybody was saying that he wasgoing to be healed.
God was going to heal him. It was going to be a big
miracle. Well.
And, and I remember like, think,thinking, OK, yeah, well, God's
going to heal him. He's going to heal him.
And I remember going to the hospital to see him.
And that was about about as that.
It was about as scary as the funeral.
We were just referencing if you've ever seen anybody dying

(27:07):
of cancer, especially. That one it's.
Yes, but my grandma. Wait, wait, Let me go back to
let me go back. Was a well, I was going to say
my grandma, she had faith everybody had faith that it was
going to happen and it didn't Sowhat did you do wrong?
Did you not have enough faith? Did you not give enough money to

(27:28):
the church? Why?
Why wouldn't God heal this very righteous man?
And then they always have the reverse Uno card of oh, God has
a plan or, you know, in. It's victim blaming.
Something that. It's victim blaming you.
Can't you can't win an argument.It's like, it's like arguing
with a stupid person. You.
Can't. But here's the rationale I use

(27:48):
for that. You can't logic someone out of
something they didn't logic their way into.
And, you know, I think we have to bear that in mind throughout.
And I do want to go back to our uncle for a second and make this
point. He was a pastor at a fairly
large church in a major metropolitan city.
And the church was doing very, very well.

(28:09):
It was a, you know, full fund open the list Pentecostal
church, but they were doing. Very well.
And that's that's why Satan attacked him.
There you go and he was just about to have a brand new baby.
You know, all of these things and and in full truth, if you
want to talk about somebody who purely lives what they believe,
he was 1. You know, of course we were

(28:29):
children. We didn't know everybody has
their their ghosts in the closet, so to speak, but.
You know, in the main. He truly was a good guy and he
had an entire church praying, holding prayer vigils.
And this is the reason I wanted to come back to this.
They were under the, you know, perspective of, hey, he's sick.
He can't have faith right now. We'll have faith for him, right?

(28:51):
And I mean, I'm talking 24 hour prayer chains, not just there,
but connecting with others in other States and other prayer
groups. He was one of the countries,
right? And they were praying for his
healing and he passed away. And, you know, I do think
something fundamentally shifted there in our Father.
But, you know, the irony is through the process of his death

(29:12):
and passing, our grandmother then became very ill and she
wound up having a fall or a stroke or something and wound up
paralyzed from the waist down. And so now she's going to our
church in a wheelchair. And she became the next miracle
focus. And I'm telling you, every
evangelist, every preacher, every special singer that came

(29:33):
through and saw that Lady in thewheelchair in the back of the
church had a special message. And that was that.
Tonight was the night she was going to receive her healing.
And so my grandmother didn't appreciate that.
I'm sure she, more than anyone hoped very much to be healed.
But I think she kind of made herpeace with what was happening
after a certain point and to be pointed out and made almost

(29:56):
fetishized in that sense as the object of the demonstration of
the power of healing. You could see it in her eyes.
She would just be like, again. And I mean to the point where?
And what do you do? Like what do you do after
believing it all that time and you've doubled down?
You've lost a child to it you. Can't now say I.
Mean, yeah. Yeah, and you know, to the

(30:17):
point. That people would go and grab
her arms and try to hold her up and force her to walk down the
aisle. Do you remember that?
And then they tell her, you know, have faith.
And they'd let go of her, and she'd fall.
And I mean, it was heart wrenching, it was horrible.
It was honestly, it was a form of elder abuse truly.
And you know, my heart goes out to her.

(30:38):
But watching that happen and then us just sitting there
going, OK, this is now 2 relatives that we've known that
truly do believe, they truly hold this faith in their heart
and they try to live it and walkit out.
But yet, when the rubber meets the road, you know the miracle
doesn't come through and so well.

(30:58):
Let's talk about that a little bit because if you look at those
3 examples, when these miracle workers, faith healers, they do
their bit, there's like a list, right?
There's there's a list of thingsthat they can heal and there's a
list of things they're not goingto touch, you know?
Speaking of your son, have you ever seen anybody healed?
If you want to call it healed, Ithink he has a great life.

(31:19):
He eats strawberries and watchesthings all day.
It's awesome. He goes to the park in the
library to not all day. You, you know what I mean?
Like he's not worried about shit.
But have you ever seen anybody healed of Down syndrome?
Have you ever seen anybody healed that was an amputee,
their arm grow out? Have you ever seen anybody
healed of cerebral palsy? Anybody that was really

(31:41):
crippled? No, you've never seen any of
that. They there's a lot of asthma
healers out there. Headaches.
Headaches get a lot of business.Headaches, yeah, a lot of
business heart condition people that quote UN quote can't walk,
but there's clips of there's so many clips of people facing.
People that have. Cancer and being caught doing.
They have cancer, but they're simultaneously, well, they're

(32:02):
simultaneously undergoing other forms of treatment as well, you
know? Well, also, but there's people
that believe that they were healed and then they go back six
months later and they're dead. People die because of this,
because they believe. They absolutely do.
I mean, I just read that statistic about children alone,
but absolutely, there are so many stories of elderly people

(32:22):
who? Well, not even elderly people.
Young people, right? Yeah, who just say no, I'm gonna
do it this way. And then they're gone.
And there's clips of people coming in that really truly
believe, coming into like Benny Hinns crusades.
But these people come there and they really, truly believe This

(32:44):
one example is this little girl comes in at a wheelchair and she
knows that if she goes to Benny Hinn, he's going to pray for and
she's going to walk. They won't even let her on stage
because obviously he can't do it.
So but she's heartbroken. And how #1 if you truly believe
that there's a God, there's no way in hell you'd be doing this
shit because you know you would burn in hell.

(33:06):
So you know, they don't believe.Well, but hold on. #2 just you,
how can you even be a good person?
How can you even be a good person and, and live the life he
does live in a $10 million housewhen people are starving, Any of
these preachers that live what are, what are they called, these
mega churches or whatever? And they live in a $10 million

(33:30):
house and they're flying all over the country in planes and
there's people starving in theircity.
They're not fucking Christians. And quit calling.
Them right? No.
But you're right, you're right on.
And you know, that goes back to a point I want to make and then
I want to branch off from what you just said.
But when you talk about belief and do they believe they're

(33:50):
actually able to, you know, access the supernatural in that
way? I have had people dead ass look
me in the eye and tell me that in foreign countries.
They've seen people turn into animals, right?
Or that they've seen noses grow.Go back on face.
No, I mean, I've had people, personally, people raise from
your head, tell me this and let me go back to the point of what

(34:13):
we believe about ourselves, right?
Does that not remind you of Yeah, I've got a girlfriend, but
she's. In Canada, his name's George
Glass. He doesn't go here.
Sorry for all you Jan Brady remembrances out there.
Anyway, boy, we are old. But you know, back to what we're
saying like it's there is. Something.
To the concept of think and become right as you think.

(34:37):
So you become and there's two sides of that, right.
Like if you tell yourself positive things and you do
positive affirmations, are you more likely to have positive
outcomes? Yes, you are right.
But by the corollary, I can sit there all day long and tell
myself that I'm rainbow bright and it's not going to happen.
You know, I can believe I'm a Unicorn.
I'm not going to sprout a horn and wings.

(34:58):
It's just or that's a Pegasus, but you get the point.
It's not going to happen. But these guys are getting so
much reinforcement. And again, let me draw the
parallel between the cult behaviors that we're pointing
out and some of the similar cultbehaviors that are being
exhibited right now on the worldand national stage, if you catch
my drift. Right when this guy who is

(35:21):
getting all this positive reinforcement and all this hype
and is getting their literal financial living off of being
able to sort of make this happen.
They start to. Believe.
Hey, you know, I did pray and this person was suddenly free of
a headache. They did suddenly feel better.
They were suddenly able to hear or whatever the case may be.

(35:42):
And you know. Is there room for that person
also to be experiencing some placebo effect and you know,
they're getting this like, yes, I do feel better.
I can't, my headache is gone. There's all kinds of of of and.
There's pure, perfect, you're upthere in front of what are you
going? To say, you know, didn't work,
you know, didn't fucking work. When you have somebody that's
being pulled from a wheelchair, it's a little harder to to walk

(36:06):
that blurry line. But you know, there are people
and I have to I always have to give the benefit of the doubt.
There are people who do legitimately believe that they
have been given a special gift to be able to connect with the
divine and be, as I've heard it said, a conduit to stand in the
gap for that person that they kind of go before God and and

(36:28):
help access this. They midwife in the miracle, so
to speak, right? But.
Yeah, just like just like peoplethat tell your.
Well, and. People, there's people that
legitimately believe that they can.
Well, there are people that legitimately have ways to kind
of read and ascertain a room, but sometimes we call that hyper
vigilance, which you develop after extreme PTSD because it's

(36:49):
a survival skill. So there's, again, there are the
facts, there are the purported facts, and then somewhere in
between is this Nexus of the real and the mystical.
And it's sometimes hard to make that line definitive, especially
when you're operating in the realms of like experimental or
quantum psychology where, you know, I won't go off on a

(37:09):
tangent, but that's something wecan explore another time.
There are elements at play that we have to acknowledge that we
don't know. What we don't know, I guess is
what I'm getting at. But what we do know is this,
there are people that believe and there are people, people
that absolutely exploit, right? And that's what's interesting is
how did this kind of like, you don't need no doctor, you got

(37:30):
Jesus on the main line situation, you know, have your
babies at home in the bathtub and just rub some olive oil on
their head and pray for them when they get sick.
How did that now morph into thismultibillion dollar global
industry involving private jets and multiple mansions and
prophets and preachers being treated like rock stars?

(37:51):
I mean, literally, Benny Hinn blows on people and they fall
out. I don't.
You've probably not seen that adaptation, but.
No, I've seen it. I've seen it used to sit there
and laugh and and make fun of it.
And what really like hurt me really.
Because it's one thing if your parents believe something and
you really think that they believe it and they're, they

(38:12):
have a conviction, just like we talked about in last episode.
But before this whole Trump thing, the one thing that really
hurt me was that they were hanging out with this guy.
They were going to his conferences and.
Stuff they they were called specifically to participate in
some many. Right.
And I'm like, you know, man, that's like, I just couldn't

(38:34):
believe it. I don't.
I don't even have the words to say.
It feels like a betrayal. Are you kidding me?
Well, but that's that's like themost obvious con in the world.
Jesus is still in the healing business.
There's one. Nobody gets the faithful out of
their wheelchairs these days anyfaster than Benny Hinn.

(38:55):
And when Pastor Benny comes to town, no Civic Center is big
enough. God.
Is just healed. Her healed her of what?
Pastor. Polio.
This woman who said she had polio and would never walk
again, she and her friends say she just climbed out of her
wheelchair and walked it's. A miracle.

(39:15):
Unbelievable. Pastor Benny knows it's great
TV, but does he know? Does he care if these feelings
are genuine? Anybody could make up anything.
Someday somebody's going to do that.
And what are you going to say then?
I don't know. I can't tell you now it hasn't
happened yet. Oh yes, it has.
Remember that woman supposedly cured of polio?
Pastor Benny knows it made for agreat episode of his TV show.

(39:38):
He knows it probably helped squeeze even bigger donations
from his flock, but there's something he doesn't know That
woman works for us. Woman doesn't have polio, Never
did. Then why?
Did you say she had? We put her up there to see if he
could tell her story was not true, to see if it would matter,
to see if he would ever check. So, Benny, is it Faith or is it

(39:59):
fraud? You should be disgusted by that.
We were so raised and I think, you know, there's different
niche kind of experiences. There's some groups that fall
under the umbrella of Pentecostalism that are a little
more socially and culturally aware.
There are others that, you know,they believe in miracles, but
they also absolutely want their people to go get medical care

(40:21):
and, you know, do all those things.
There's different branches of the tree, but I think in our
specific experience, right, likethe 80's, the 90s, I'm sure
probably the 70s too before, before I was here, but in that
time frame, whatever. Yeah, keep, keep pushing.
Not all the 70s, but whatever. Anyway, in the deep kind of

(40:41):
hexes, South Louisiana, Alabama,Mississippi, Georgia, of it all
right, like that specific experience was really, really
very much focused on not being of the world and not only not
watching TV. We're in the world.
Right, right. And not only not watching TV or

(41:02):
listening to secular music, but first of all, any pastor.
That used television. The devil's third eye.
Oh, my God. You know, that would have been
unthinkable. But second of all, for them to
be in, like, my mother didn't even have a wedding ring.
OK. My parents didn't have wedding
rings because they believed you shouldn't wear jewelry.

(41:22):
There were people who teach, whotaught it so stringent that a
woman couldn't wear a red dress to church.
You know, that you couldn't evenwear shiny hairpins in your
hair. You had to wear Bobby pins that
match the color of your hair. Like there were people you
couldn't braid. Your hair, because there's a
scripture against braiding your hair with gold and silver like
there was. So what a tradition that really

(41:43):
saw sort of austerity as a type of separation from the world and
a statement about not needing, you know, don't you don't lay
your treasures up on this. Earth, but you lay them up on
the other side, right? And it's so much of that, that
folklore and mythology and ideology and identity.
So when we're talking about people who really brought us up

(42:04):
in that way, that there was an honor in sort of humility,
meaning living a humble life, not necessarily being a humble
person. And then to have that flipped on
its head with take away, whetherit's fake or real.
And let's just look at the spectacle of it and the ego of
it and the gold jewelry. The whole prosperity gospel
thing. Yeah, no, exactly.

(42:24):
That would have been such a hardstop for people like our
parents, from the way that they demonstrated it to us.
And then it was just suddenly like, OK, no, you know, you
couldn't go to your friend's birthday party because her
parents let her wear pants. But we're going to go now, be on
ATV show where we're getting makeup put on us.
And you know, which, by the way,not out to or shout out to drag

(42:48):
Queens because they got nothing on the amount of makeup the male
televangelist pile on. So yeah, that one.
Yeah, I see some of my dad's pictures.
That one always just makes me giggle when they want to talk
about the whatever. It's another subject for another
another. But but back to that idea.
Seeing them, it feels like selling out.
That's what it is. That's what it is.

(43:09):
Yeah, it is. It is totally it's.
Seeing your favorite band that only plays on principle, you
know, the dive bar. It's it's Nirvana originally
saying like, no, we don't want our tickets to be more than $10
a show. And then, you know, signing with
Ticketmaster or something like it's, it feels like a sellout in
in the biggest degree, would yousay?

(43:31):
Exactly. That's what it is.
But also, it's not just a sellout for the money, but it's
a sellout with somebody who I don't even have an analogy to
put it he it, it's so fake and so obviously fake.
Why would you want to tie your wagon to that if what you're
purporting to uphold is real andtrue?
This is a business. He's been busted on several TV

(43:53):
shows and it's calling out his fake prophecies, his fake well.
If you believe. In the value.
Even even if. Yeah, if you believe in the
value of what you're supposedly bringing to the table, I guess
an analogy would kind of be in like, you're opening A5 Star
restaurant in the lobby of a McDonald's, you know, And it's
like, why are you conflating this?
What you say is is more rare than pure gold and, you know, is

(44:17):
better than diamonds and rubies and all of these things about
what profiteth a man if he, you know, has the whole world but
loses its soul. I mean, there's just so much in
there. There's this story of the rich
young ruler, you know, that camebefore Jesus and said, what must
I do to be saved? And he's like, we'll sell
everything you have and leave your family and follow me.
And he's like, well, hang on, isthere another way?
And he's literally was like, Nope, that's the way.

(44:39):
And I've heard that taught from such a position of morality that
to see that morality go, it'd belike your parents getting a
divorce so your mom could marry a gold dig or, you know, a rich
man. Like it really does feel like
that. And you know, seeing the extent
to which prosperity gospel has so conflated the whole element

(45:02):
of evangelicism and Pentecostalism specifically in
this country, because it's fed hand in hand together with
capitalism and having the most money makes you the better
person. It doesn't matter if you lie,
cheat, or steal. It doesn't matter how many
scandals you get busted in. If you are, if you are the
person with the most money, thenclearly you're the best person,

(45:24):
right? And we still see that playing
out. Well, that's what happened a lot
with these these pastors is theyactually, instead of being
ashamed of the, the wealth and the money that they were
hoarding, they took that and held it up and said this is a
sign of God's favor, right? I have this much money because I

(45:44):
am favored of God, because I am so clearly doing God's will and
just acing the test. Well, I do, you know, last
episode you said fight fire withfire and quoting the Bible.
And so I'm going to quote the Bible in this case and Matthew 6
and 2624 says you cannot serve both God and money.

(46:04):
And I don't know where else theycould go.
From right, well, but but this is the workaround because
remember, truth is whatever fitsthe narrative at the moment.
And the narrative that's createdis that money is a sign that God
is blessing you. It's a sign you are highly
blessed and favored of the Lord and I attended churches, you
know, well up until 2014. So I mean, I was heavily

(46:28):
involved in this to the extent that my former husband it's
tithe to the point that we were in financial duress.
He gave to the point that I didn't have money for my own
children because of what we're about to get into, which became
this thing of not only does the money and the wealth and The
Jets and everything mean that this prophet is highly favored
by God. But if you, you want your voice

(46:51):
to be heard, if you want to be highly favored by God, ergo have
the main line to get your needs met, then you have to prove
yourself. And the way you prove yourself
is through having faith. And how you show your faith is
by sowing a seed of faith. And that seed is all.
But let me tell you something. If you ever hear a preacher talk

(47:12):
about seed, run because they're coming for your money every
single time. Are you women?
That's a different episode, but no that that's.
The idea is that if you sow a seed of faith, God and good
Lord, I've had been in so many services where they're literally
say who will sow a seed of $100 right now?
Raise your hand. Stand up.
Well, it's either it's either that Sermon or Revelations.

(47:35):
You're going to hell in the End Times, which is another episode.
And hey, if you're out there worried about the End Times,
I've been worried about it since19.
But we'll get to that one. But no, seriously.
So. So what happens is, is, you
know, not only that, but you'll have this very emotional,
honestly manipulative sermon that the whole sermon is really
talking about people. You have a need, you're broken

(47:58):
down, your marriage is falling apart, your children aren't
speaking to you, You've lost your job, and you don't know
what you're going to do. No, seriously.
Jesus, it's country. Music, song.
But the fact is, is there are people who are desperate and
they are in those situations andthey've tried everything else.
You know, churches are often times very full of people who

(48:19):
have have tried everything else.Either they're born into it and
that's all they know, or they'rein a point of desperation or
pain in their life. And you know.
These people are legitimately seeking something because
they're in pain. And what's held up as the
panacea is this whole build up in the sermon.
You know, only God can help you.This is what you need.

(48:40):
Here's examples of where God hashelped other people in these
situations. And it's all of this kind of
pitch to pull you into this, this moment of purchase where
the statement is made. We're not only going to pray
right now. I, I want you to step out in
faith. And if you have a need that
we've talked about here tonight and you're going to come to the
altar and give prayer for that, I just, I want you to take a

(49:00):
seat. I don't care how big or small,
it's between you and the Lord. And you just come up here and
you put this in the offering boxand let me join together with
you in prayer because I know your meed will be met, right?
I mean, I can quote it off the top of my head.
Like for those of you wondering if I really did go to church
every time, right? And I've sat through.

(49:22):
When did we not go to church that was worth?
Forever and ever. And that's the point is that you
have these people who've perpetuated to some level a con.
They tried to make the fruits ofthat con, instead of being
shameful, to be a badge of honor.
And then they prey on the poor, the sick, the disabled, the, you

(49:43):
know, people who are going through mental health issues,
people who are going through divorces and, you know,
relationship breakups. Again, if you read the Bible,
and you believe it, as you do unto the least of my little
ones, you do unto me. How can you do that if you
truly. Believe that you would be
selling as Jesus said in his words.

(50:04):
Sell all that you have. Give it to the poor and follow
me. You know, I don't think Jesus
ever once said when someone cameto him and said how should we be
saved? I don't recall a section where
he said buy a Gulfstream, have some gold interior design put
in, let your wife go and get 3 or 4 Armani suits.

(50:24):
Take your family on a vacation to a quote UN quote Parsonage
that you bought on the coast. And that's how you be saved
while you exploit people who arebarely making ends meet and who
are coming to you with tears in their eyes over custody hearings
and, you know, addiction struggles and having family
members that they're separated from having all kinds of pain in

(50:48):
their life. That's what you should do is you
go out and live it up and take their $5 a week and tell them
that if they keep playing that lottery, eventually one day it's
going to hit. Because that intermittent
reinforcement, remember? Yep, Yep, I heard, I heard Benny
Hinn say a proper if if you havesomebody that's died in your

(51:08):
family, prop them up in front ofthe TV in 24 hours.
And if you have faith and if yousend a seed in, God will send
his power through the TV and raise them from the dead,
because he's seen over 20 peopleraised from the dead in Brazil
and. And, and let's go back to this
one point really, really quicklybecause for those of you

(51:29):
listening who've lived this experience, I do want to focus
on something quickly. You notice there's two parts to
the equation, right? Because ultimately this becomes
a very transactional experience.Anything to do with prosperity
gospel really revolves around the idea that God operates on an
algorithm that's a mix of your faith and your money.

(51:50):
And I've even heard that very direct message.
Preach your faith and your money.
And The thing is, money's measurable, right?
It's a tangible, quantifiable entity.
Faith, however, is not. And so if for some reason the
equation fails or falters, and if for some reason you don't get
the the outcome from this transaction that you were hoping

(52:12):
and praying for, you know, you put the money in, you know, you
said the prayer. So what's got to be lacking?
It's got to be your faith and. And that that kind of ties into
religious advice because I remember our grandmother, I was
like thinking to myself, did I do something wrong?
Was it because I had a thought that this maybe couldn't happen

(52:33):
or this maybe wasn't wasn't real?
Which by the way, really can't control your thoughts.
And to have the thought police well, thinking that the thought
police are in your head all. The time look where we are right
now as a nation, right. I firmly believe that these
behavior patterns have become sonormalized through the process

(52:54):
of evangelicism, Pentecostalism and non denominationalism.
The idea of a thought police, the idea that wealth is a sign
of being favored by God. Those ideas have really heavily
affected our national stage right now.
You know, when we talk about behaviors, remember they don't
stay in in a specific dish, right?

(53:14):
If you program, if you're programmed to not use your
logic, your thinking, etcetera, and you're programmed to see
wealth as a sign of God's favoritism, that's going to
extrapolate outside of the church as well.
So just something to consider. I feel, I feel like I'm in the
like I'm in the freaking Twilight Zone.
Maybe. Maybe I'm in the Godfather and
that line where he goes when I get out, they suck me right back

(53:38):
in. I mean, I got out of the church
and then the whole. World.
World turns into the church. You know, I'm like, man, I can't
escape. This No, I know.
I was scrolling Shorts on YouTube the other day and one of
the popular songs happens to be a Christian song.
And whether the content creatorsknow that it is or isn't, it's
very triggering to me just to stumble across it over and over

(54:00):
again. And it makes you want to scream
at these teenagers on the videosand be like you're kids.
Put on some pop music, like go put on some good grunge from
back in the day. Put on some hip hop something.
But like it's a weird place whenit comes into the popular world.
But I do want to say if this hasever happened to you.
Let us just affirm it's not, it's not your fault if anybody's

(54:21):
ever told you that a miracle didn't happen in your life or
that something didn't happen because of a lack of belief,
right? Or that you weren't praying hard
enough. That's abuse and manipulation.
And I just encourage you, you know, find therapy.
We will always advocate for therapy.
You know, find some some other good resources, find somebody
you can talk to and really process that out of your system

(54:44):
because there's a lot of shame that we carry coming up from
this tradition. You know, I had a my famous
quote of every episode. I had a therapist once tell me
shame and guilt are not productive emotions beyond the
point of recognizing if you've harmed someone else.
There's no benefit in ruminatingin shame and guilt.
It won't get you anywhere. So.
And religious abuse. Abuse is a thing.

(55:05):
I found this out several years ago.
I'm not going to say how I don'twant to.
It's embarrassing. Anyway.
Anyway, I found out several years ago that religious abuse
is actually a thing. There's a few places out there,
The Reclamation of Collective and Tears of Eden.

(55:27):
But don't feel like you're alone.
And like you, I've always kind of wondered what was wrong with
me. Like I was born in the 70s.
I think we all got spanked back then.
I don't at the time I didn't really think that, you know, it
was child abuse. I thought it was just spare the
rod, spoil the child. That's what you did.

(55:47):
Not looking back on it. It's child abuse.
But there was also the religiousabuse.
For example, you wouldn't think to take your kid and sit him in
front of American Psycho at three years old and just have
him watch that over and over andthink that's how the world is.
But people take their three-yearold kids instead of want a
church Pew and get told the story of Revelations, which is

(56:09):
not. Only that for me it was somebody
had to die because you were so bad.
Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I always looked at
that story and I was like, but like, it was only three days,
man. I mean.
You know. What I mean like stop sorry.
No, but you're right and. Moving from that point forward,

(56:31):
I did want to touch really quickly if we have time on some
of the we'll, we'll take it up alighter notch and talk about
maybe some of the charlatans that have been exposed, shall
we? Yeah, there's there's quite a
laundry. List.
There are and there continues tobe.
Here's one too, just before we go into this, when we talked
about our SEANCE experience withLester.

(56:56):
There was actually a situation and this is this is tragic.
It is at Bethel Church in Redding, CA.
There was a 2 year old girl who passed away, just stopped
breathing in her sleep. And this was in 2019.
And if I remember correctly, thehusband and the wife were
definitely members, but I think it served in some capacity of
leadership at this church. Bethel Church, which is a large

(57:17):
evangelical church in Redding, CA.
We'll have to do an episode on that because it's a lot.
So she asked the church to come together and pray and they, they
began praying the power of physical resurrection.
So this became a huge deal. They actually had like online,
you know, streaming of it. There was multiple Christian
influencers that were joining in.

(57:39):
They were having 24 hour round the clock prayer and praying for
this little girl to be resurrected from being passed
away. You know, her, her parents.
I mean, just imagine that situation.
I can't even think about it. It's absolutely tragic.
Of course, ultimately she she didn't they even had a hashtag.
It was hashtag wake up, Olive. I mean, like we're talking days.

(58:01):
This wasn't just, you know, a moment in time.
And eventually they wound up. I hope, I hope she didn't have
siblings. I'm not sure, but eventually
they did wind up laying her to rest and had a memorial for her.
But just I'd make that point to say like, sometimes it's easy to
think, you know, oh, well, that happened in the 70s or the 80s.
And like, you know, we've evolved so much past that.

(58:24):
But remember, fanaticism does not evolve right?
It just. We have devolved.
We have devolved, we have and and unfortunately that type of
that type of religious abuse that you were talking about.
And this type of extremism stillhappens.
You know, exorcisms are happening to children.
There's we'll have to do anotherepisode on that, on children

(58:44):
that have actually been gravely harmed, fatally harmed by their
parents in the name of exorcisms.
But back to this let's. Lighten up, we said.
We're going to lighten up for a minute.
Yeah. So, Peter Popoff.
We have a hot one for you, Robert K Wood.

(59:04):
Faith healer Peter Popoff claimsmiracle powers to cure, but in
reality his source of inspiration is a hidden receiver
in his ear in which his wife transmits names and ailments of
audience members, making him appear to have psychic powers.
Jodie Dean Jodie. Jodie Dean Jodie.

(59:25):
Dean no should be right there onyour right side, right side.
Glory to God, come on up here. No, that's not her.
Hallelujah. No, that's not her.
Jodie. In the blue.
Dean Glory. To.
God. That that might see her.
Here it comes. OK, she lives at 4267 Masterson.

(59:47):
4267 Masterson I can see the angels of God all around your
house and. She's praying for her daughter,
Joy, who's allergic. To her, I tell you, God is going
to give Joy complete deliverance, but you've been
praying for she's not going to have any more eating disorders
before 86 is over. She's going to gain about 15 lbs
and you're going to rejoice. You're going to know.

(01:00:10):
I'll tell you she got shocked. She got shocked.
Hallelujah. I come here to be healed.
Come. Here to be healed.
I see you have a cane. What is arthritis?
Arthritis. How much money have you sent
Peter, do you think? I don't know, I don't know.
I've signed $100 at a time. I think what you're doing is

(01:00:32):
you're, you're exploiting this market.
You're taking lonely people using the television medium for.
Financial gain? It's hard to answer a question
like that. I mean, are cigarette
advertisers exploiting their audience?
Are the beer Brewers exploiting their audience?
You know, you could say, well, they are, yes.

(01:00:54):
They didn't know that what had happened is this guy who was a
skeptic, his name was James Randy, and he had.
James, Randy. Is awesome yeah he's great guys
look him up if you are interested in some interesting
stuff there but he had bugged this radio frequency or whatever
they. Yeah, they picked up some radio.
Frequency yes and so Peter Popoff you know this huge faith

(01:01:14):
healer was having this big convention or revival or
whatever it was come get healed thing and he had.
Just had this remarkable successrate and everybody thought he
was just. You know it on a stick.
And this guy, James Randi was like, I don't think so.
So he had this whole sting operation and set it up and they
figured out that what was happening is Peter Popoff was

(01:01:36):
actually wearing an earpiece in his ear and his wife had, you
know, the other half of it and would basically get the.
People's cards. So everybody would fill out this
card when they came in with liketheir name, their address, what
they were hoping for healing from, you know, etcetera.
I mean data thievery has been happening for decades people.
Nothing is private but. And she would feed him the

(01:01:59):
information, right? So she'd be like, you know, hey,
and you heard on the on the clip, Hey, PD, the next one's
name is Anna. She's got arthritis.
And he'd be like like Cornac themagnificent, you know, is there
Anna here? You know, so it I mean, and
here's what happens to the more people see that, the more
reinforcing it is of whatever itis within humans that kind of.

(01:02:24):
Of has the power of suggestion well, right?
Even after that guy got busted, he a few years later came back
and is doing the same thing right.
And and isn't he now like promoting this like Miracle
Water? I think he's selling Miracle
Water. Yeah.
It's. By the way, James Randy by the
way, is pretty interesting dude.He was an ex magician or a

(01:02:46):
magician. I don't know if you could ever
be an ex magician. Anyway, he started a $1 million
right and he offered to pay $1,000,000 to anyone who could
demonstrate supernatural or paranormal abilities, and nobody
ever won that $1,000,000. I know dude.
Like I hope he had good interestrate on it.
Where? I don't know, I do.

(01:03:07):
Think I am a little bit psychic.But we'll get into that another
time, so. Here's another one really
quickly. So Robert Tilton had the whole
Word of Faith. See Bob, I can't send $100 if
you can just worship gone through $5 or $10.
Every Apostle Paul said the 1st of each week lay aside as God
hath prospered you. That's why I believe God

(01:03:29):
prospers people. Satan gave me this message.
I mean it's a lie of the devil. I shouldn't have said that God
gave me this message. Well, I guess he really actually
had a Freudian slip there. But you know, his whole stick
was that it's the, it's the wordlike as you speak it.

(01:03:51):
So it will be. And this, this has done so much
damage to people that he kind ofcame about with it in the mid 8
or early 80s, I think was when he really got big on TV.
And you had that big church in Dallas.
I believe so. Well, almost.
Somewhere in that area. And let me just tell you how
this played out over the years, the whole idea of speak it and

(01:04:13):
receive it, you know, name it and claim it.
Of course, it comes with a financial requirement, right?
So name it and claim it. And pay the price to ride the
ride and and good luck maybe. You know, it's, it reminds me of
like you see something on TV late at night and they're like,
it's free and it, you know, if you don't want, you get it for
90 days and then you have to payfor it or it's free and just.

(01:04:34):
Pay for it. No, it's the Columbia House CDs
then. You go and yeah, but then you go
and it turns out to be a lot more than exactly.
And you're like, shit. Well, that's.
Not weird. Well, remember they used to get
you. We'll send you 10 CDs for a
penny or whatever and then you get the right, you get your 10
music items of whatever it is and you're like, woo Hoo, I've

(01:04:54):
rigged the system. And then you get that bill for
like 40 bucks and you're like, what?
I don't. Understand.
So yeah, no, I mean, but that's that's the concept.
And with him, let me just touch on this for a second.
The way that whole of course youknow.
He he got busted. ABC News, I think this is like
9091, something like that. They did this whole.
Expose and they found people used to write these prayer

(01:05:16):
letters and they'd enclosed donations and money inside the
prayer letters, of course, as a sign of their faith and sowing
their seed. And what they found was a video
of them just ripping the money out and then throwing the prayer
letters away. And what he had said was, is
that we are, we put these in a special place and we pray over
them. And there's always people
praying over your request. And myself, I touch every

(01:05:38):
envelope and they just absolutely debunked that.
And so I'm just, you know, ripping off and pretty much the
way you would, you know, open bills at home.
And that was exactly what happened.
So but really quickly what happened with that whole name it
and claim it idea is that reallydrew from a couple of scriptures
that touch on the idea that in the tongue, in the power of the
tongue is life and death. And there's some wisdom there.

(01:06:02):
If you speak positive words to your children, they're more.
Likely to have positive. Outcomes than if you sit there
and tell them a piece of crap every day, right?
But again, I can't look in the mirror and suddenly say to
myself, I'm 5 foot 11. I'm not, I'm 5 foot one if I
stretch and that's not going to change no matter how much I say
that with the power of the tongue.

(01:06:23):
And so that mindset really drifted into a whole nother
subset of abuse and victim blaming because.
It factors in with the faith discussion from earlier it.
It created this idea that if you're living in hard times, if
you're living in a bad circumstance or a dangerous
marriage. And I think I referenced this

(01:06:43):
and when I shared my story that you can't really speak out about
how how bad it is or else you'rebasically giving the devil
ammunition. And you're what you're supposed
to do is say things like it's a struggle right now, but God's
got me, you know, it's not, it'snot a stumbling block.
It's a stepping stone. Like you learn to speak in these
axioms and it almost becomes like spell casting in a way.

(01:07:06):
It's like, I have to say the right words or I'm going to get
the wrong output from the algorithm.
Does that make sense? And a lot of that ties back to
that prosperity gospel basis of name it and claim so.
And it also it's, you know, God has a plan.
It's the will of God. It's the will of God that I stay
with this man. That's.
Beating me? Yeah.

(01:07:27):
I could write a book about that.That's the Old Testament God.
Though Yep, long. Lots of lots.
To talk about there, but you're,you're right.
And you know, again, we talked about Benny Hinn, you know, he
is very theatrical. We see a lot of the Elvis
complex in him and reports have uncovered that he had
multimillion dollar homes and cars and all these other things

(01:07:51):
and tied them all through his non profit to avoid any taxation
and he didn't have to be transparent about to his donors
as well about how much he was taking in.
Yeah, there's a Canadian show, Ithink because he's originally
from Canada. I believe it's called the 5th.
Space and. Yeah, they did an expose on him

(01:08:12):
and they followed him and he went to Switzerland for one of
his conferences. And in the books, the church
books said he had a layover in London.
He stayed there for a day. He had a $4000 hotel.
He had over $6000 in expenses, just room expenses.
Then they went to Italy, and this is him and his old
entourage on a private plane. Talk about your carbon.

(01:08:34):
Right. Well, that's why global warming
isn't real. See.
But all of this was on the church's dime.
They're non taxable income. Church's dime.
Somehow they got some of their, somehow I left this out, the 5th
State had gotten some of their financial records and had a
financial forensic accountant gothrough it.
And he's like, man, this guy's living a lavish lifestyle.

(01:08:57):
And they interviewed a guy that that worked.
That's his nephew. And, well, they had him, you
know, His face was all wiped outand his voice changed.
Because Christians are going to come kill me anyway.
But he was just saying how when he goes somewhere, it's no
expense spared. You know, he's not going out and
doing and preaching the word of God.

(01:09:18):
Every time he's traveling, he's going out and living the high
life. And there was an example to
which I thought was real tellingof how he gave the bellman at
the hotel in London like $1000 tip and there was a pregnant
woman on the street and he graciously gave her $20.
It's just disgusting. You know what?
It doesn't matter if you're a preacher or Jeff Bezos or you

(01:09:39):
know, whomever, if you have a lot of money and you don't treat
people with dignity and respect and you don't give back to
people. And when you do, you make a big
show of it that you're giving back.
You're just not a good person and I don't.
And you're not a Christian. I don't understand how you can
be that kind of person. It's just so foreign, yeah.

(01:09:59):
No, I know. And then, but then go to church
every Sunday and clap yourself on the back for being.
Well, how can you do that? I mean, church is so cringy and
the music is so bad anyway, likeI was thinking about that today.
Like even if I was into this grift and had followed down that
path and I was doing that now, Icouldn't do it, man.
I couldn't go to fucking church.I just hated it so much.

(01:10:21):
I hated music. I hated the the worship and that
word. I could do a whole episode on
the word worship. That's just a fucked up word.
But all of that, to me, it's just, I don't like it.
Well, hold on the music. You could not.
I don't. Well, I mean, I liked, I liked
playing music. It's got a.
Lot better the words and the lyrics and the the worship that

(01:10:45):
that's just, it's, it's like to me, I can't do something like
that. It doesn't matter how much money
I was making, I can't do it unless I'm 100% into it for
something like that. And I don't understand how you
could be such a hypocrite and such a slave to money that you
would could fake that could do that.

(01:11:07):
I don't get it. Well, that's that's where the
the pain point is, right? Because there's this book you
see that supposedly has a lot ofstories about how to do the
right thing and none of them arethat right.
So, you know, don't worry. The book, the The grand book
that you know, what if in like 500 years somebody finds Harry

(01:11:29):
Potter and. Right.
Harry Potter becomes the new Bible.
Here's what I do know. If miracles happen, I would hope
and believe that they would happen in children's hospitals.
I would hope that they happen inrefugee camps, to burn victims
to victims of violent crime, to people suffering and struggling

(01:11:50):
with intractable mental illness,to people dealing with chronic
pain, for people who want to have babies and can't.
That's that's where I'm all for the miracles where I'm not.
Well, yeah, if they. Were real, right and and hey,
again, we don't know what we don't know if they ever happen.
If you know who knows? Maybe octopuses are the people

(01:12:12):
and they we don't know, right? They seem to happen a lot more
when there weren't as many cameras and social media and
everybody has a cell phone. Like if miracles happened, look,
look at all the shit you get on YouTube and TikTok and all that.
You would see that all the people that go to church, how
many people go to? Food the whole world knows when

(01:12:33):
Haley do were changes or nail Polish.
We would know if somebody grew aleg, right?
Do you see anything that's not, you know, like I said, asthma or
something like that, a healing? Do you see it?
No. I've heard of it.
It's not true. And it's, I've, yeah, I've heard
of it in Canada and in Brazil. But yeah, no, come on.
Well, I've heard of it, but I'vealso seen a lot of people who

(01:12:55):
left a church service feeling healed, and then the pain or the
illness wound up creeping back the day or two after, you know,
so again. We don't know what we don't
know, and we don't know the effect of a placebo effect.
We don't know how many times there's spontaneous remission.
Well, maybe your headache could have quit hurting anyway.

(01:13:17):
Maybe you got excited in in church and you were singing and
using less oxygen and got more blood flow to your brain.
Who knows? Maybe you stimulated your vagus
nerve? Which is a huge.
Issue in feeling better and releasing endorphins and mental
health and all those kinds of things.
Who knows? There's even some research that
shows that raising your hands and clapping your hands.

(01:13:38):
Make you feel better. And the reason the science
behind that is because it actually helps stimulate the
vagus nerve. Same thing with singing.
Singing and humming. If you're sick and you have
chronic illness or if you have mental health issues, anxiety
and depression specifically, if you can hum, it doesn't even
matter if it's a tune. It's just the physical act of
humming or singing. It.
Stimulates the vagus nerve, which is kind of right at the

(01:14:01):
Crest of your breastbone in thatarea.
And that particular nerve has a lot to do with our mental health
and. Immune system and well-being.
So that's for free. You know, who knows?
Maybe it's the things like that that happened in church services
where there's a lot of emotionalbuild up and singing and you
know, all that that goes into it.
Maybe that contributes to something that happens in the

(01:14:24):
body. We don't know.
But what we do know is there's alot of sick people out there and
a lot of hurting people out there who shouldn't be conned
into believing that if they justput $100 in the bank account of
some shiny preacher that they'regoing to get their miracle.
And that if they didn't, it's because their faith was a

(01:14:45):
problem and they were deemed lacking.
Because that's just victim blaming and shaming and there's
nothing good in that. And the fact that in like this
all powerful big God who createdthe universe, who is all knowing
and all that would put so much emphasis on money.
Right. And it, it's makes no sense at

(01:15:08):
all. And I'm I understand why people
believe it because I grew up in it.
But man, I just, I wish people would, would just think a little
bit. And that's the other thing where
they get you is in these religions, you're not allowed to
think, you're not allowed to question, because if you do
start doing that, it's a lack offaith.
Then you have a podcast. Well, and I'll say this too, you

(01:15:30):
know, as we wrap up our thoughts, my boy is about to
face a pretty serious surgery. And I would be lying if I didn't
say I'm going to be saying all the prayers and doing anything I
can because it brings me peace, because it brings me a sense of
some measure of control over an absolute insane situation.

(01:15:53):
Well, yeah, and that's why people want to pray, because
when there is nothing. Else you can do.
At least you have some sort of thing.
And you know, there's nothing wrong with putting good thoughts
out there and meditating and thinking about things.
But praying to some God and hoping that he will answer you
and hoping that you're standing on the right foot and holding

(01:16:14):
your mouth right and have the right amount of faith and you
didn't like think any dirty thoughts about anybody today.
It does. It does turn to magical
thinking, and to that end as well, there's nothing.
Hope is a powerful thing. And visualization.
Is a powerful thing. And all of those things are

(01:16:35):
positive for your mental health,they're positive for your
physical well-being. And let's face it, the world is
nuts. And anything that we can do
within reason, that helps us maintain some sort of semblance
of peace and control and stability, go for it, right?
But what's not OK is to be in a position of any type of
authority and to hold this most fragile Crucible.

(01:16:59):
A moment in time when people truly are at the when they don't
have anywhere else they can go. When prayer and a miracle is
their only option. And for someone to take that
vulnerable point and exploit it for financial gain to me.
Fucking disgusting. As bad low as it gets.

(01:17:19):
And you made a good point. Truth doesn't need smoke and
mirrors, right? It speaks.
Well, would you like to know my quote?
I'm gonna put it on a T-shirt for one day.
You ready? Authenticity speaks for itself.
Bullshit needs a bullhorn, right?
That's feel free to you're. Going to need a big.
T-shirt but no. And I mean.
You know, to that end, we just again, seriously, you guys have

(01:17:42):
heard us talk. We want to hear from you.
If you've ever been in a servicethat had a lot of times I'll
have it's miracle night, bring somebody expecting a miracle on
Tuesday, right? And if you've ever been in that
situation, or if you've ever had, you know, a moment of
hoping for a miracle or being ina healing service, or if you've
ever felt like you received a miracle or a healing, share that

(01:18:04):
experience with us. Let's talk about it.
Also, we want to hear your deconstruction stories and, and
know where you are in your journey.
And yeah, tell us your thoughts.Yeah, and like, subscribe and
share please. T What are we going to talk
about next time? Well, another fun topic.
Abuse. Spiritual, religious abuse,

(01:18:25):
emotional abuse, and yeah, sexual abuse because it even
happens in the church. Believe it.
Or. Not and also financial abuse,
which is a big one. We kind of touched on it today,
kind of touched on it today, butthat'll definitely be in the in
the pantheon of topics for next week.

(01:18:45):
So if you feel like having a good time next week, join us
again as we light up your life with merriment and lore, the
good old days. All right, we'll see you next.
Time. Later.