This series explores the credo behind the Seven Deadly Sins and the nearly comical manner that Christian based religion disobeys them. As a sober parallel to the Sin’s menace, all paintings are layered with the Eight Auspicious Symbols represented in teachings of the Buddha.
If religion is a stew pot, greed is like the broth, there’s just no way to make the soup without it. Greed for money, greed for power, greed for more, this is a sin that is perhaps the very reason religion still overwhelmingly relevant. Reading over the abhorrent leverage the church receives from the IRS while researching Gluttony, I had sort of a bubble around the whole problem. While, yes, a church as a whole entity can be corrupt- oh yeah, Hi sin of Lust- greed hammers down a much smaller phenomenon in the formula of religious efforts: Leaders.
There is a vast difference between an establishment and the people who run it. Enron could have gone down in history without infamy, if the collective leaders didn’t have as much handiwork with their accounting. Would anyone remember the People’s Temple if not for Jim Jones? Nazis suck, of course, but Hitler will stand as the face of hate for the rest of history.
This is when drawing the responsibility away from the establishment as a whole and focusing on the person at the head is most important. Churches are a blatant offender of this type of top-heavy wealth and fame.
Joel Osteen. There’s one. I bet anyone who lives with electricity and wifi will know that name. The famous Televangelist/pastor/millionaire is sitting pretty good on his Earthly rewards. His preaching of prosperity based on donation- contribute to the church and God will reward you- is hard to stomach when considering that his 2.9 million dollar estate wasn’t quite enough, so he added in a 10.5 million dollar mansion to his assets. The Lakewood Church he pastors is a former sports stadium in Houston, TX, holding 16,000 seats. Inherited from his father, he turned the congregation into a megachurch along with books and tours promoting his tune that God will repay those who invest in his preaching. Praise Twitter and persistent Osteen critics, who began interrogating his church after Hurricane Harvey plundered the people of Houston, and with emergency shelters filling up, the community noticed this massive church was closed and empty. Of course he ducked and covered, claiming the church had been flooded, though pictures proved otherwise. Finally offering help after days of desperate need, his gesture seemed anything but Christ-like, most likely from pressure on social media and local reporters collecting, knocking on his gates. Even though his wealth is an obvious result of swindling his followers to buy his brand, Christians seem to grasp his word and hold it as prophecy- which is the terrifying idea that just about anyone can claim to be a chosen voice of God, and people will believe them.
Take Prophet Mboro, a charismatic South African man, with thousands of worshipers in his Johannesburg megachurch. Though he wears designer suits and has a posse of Escalades, he is self proclaimed as a telephone to God. The heavily religious and superstitious society brings their sick, disabled, last hope and of course, money, to the prophet, for the chance of an individualized, custom prayer. Unsurprisingly, this comes with stories of fatalities from not seeking medical care. Again, Twitter, that sly broad, bit him in the ass hard, when he announced that being the elite, supreme prophet he is, he was granted a visit to Heaven. If that isn’t an insult of his follower’s intelligence, he also boasted that he had custom photos of his smiling face behind the Pearly Gates. These Heavenly selfies were sold on his Church’s website for hundreds of dollars, or Rand equivalent, each. Worse, was the absurdity of what they actually looked like: his face photo-shopped into a cloud with a sparkling rainbow filter surrounding him- reminiscent of those plate photos in authentic Mexican restaurants: bright, glimmering 90’s era graphics behind a photo of a beige burrito. Once he was called out for clearly lying, he had a digital meltdown, warning doubters on Twitter, that ‘The sky is watching’ then ultimately reducing the price of the portrait on his VIP trip to God.
I try to keep my obsession with John Oliver toned down in my posts, but sometimes, he does an investigation report so fantastically sharp that I want to put a poster of his pale British face above my bed. His exposure of Televangelism is hands-down my favorite account of a corrupt practice on his show. For visibility into the world of the Televangelist ilk, he made a small donation to Robert Tilton’s Church (The star of this painting by the way). From the very first letter Oliver got back from the Tilton Ministry, he was asked to donate a dollar as a “seed” to plant his faith, the first pitch. Dozens of letters later, the instructions to send more money than the time before prove what a slippery slope Tilton’s viewers can fall down. It’s the Christian form of gambling, betting more money for the hope of a miraculous outcome eventually. Oliver also featured the story of a deceased woman, who’s family found that she had been paying the Kenneth Copeland Ministry thousands of dollars, instead of getting full treatment for her cancer, with the hopes that her “seed money” would result in a cure. To make that story so much worse, Copeland’s wife, Gloria, preaches that their church’s products, books, Holy oils- whatever, are the answer to beating serious life-threatening diseases- at one point preaching:
“They tell you that you’ve got cancer and they don’t know what to do about it, except give you some poison that will make you sicker- now which do you want to do- that, or sit here on Saturday morning, hearing the word of God? Let faith come into your heart and be the cure”.
Astonishing to watch this plastic faced suit-dressed woman stand at a podium with nothing but smiling confidence in the voracity she is comfortable with while her power exploits people in the most hopeless points of their life.
The most slimy vermin of the Earth are those who prey upon the less fortunate for gain. There are many out there: Payday Lenders, drug dealers and, without a doubt, churches. For my contrast to the lovely Titlon, painted here using his best tongues-speaking face, is Buddha’s Dharma Wheel- with 8 spokes, symbolizing the Buddha’s Eightfold Noble Path. Here the wheel stands as token of joy in experiencing good and wholesome deeds. There seems to be no self-serving text in my research of Buddha’s teachings, which makes it that much more reliable. To harness the threats present in the Bible and fuel fear in the vulnerable or desperate is criminal. Millionaire preachers flying private jets, continuing to ask those with little, if any, extra money to give. The frightening reality of these predators, with a bright 1-800 number flashing at chest level, is that humanity is capable of such viciousness.
Pastors and megachurches thriving so shamelessly, is like watching a spider’s nest hatch. Shit! There are more of them and they will only be getting bigger and more disgusting as they grow over time. Perhaps it is a generational problem and the demographic of shopping channel style religion will soon die out- but- with ministries finding clever little ways to push their agenda online, and on social media- like selfies in Heaven, more will fall into the trap, pushing their meager amounts of money, into the un-taxed bank accounts of these suited charlatans. Maybe I’m wrong, perhaps these megachurch leaders are actually sent from God to spread His word and their riches are, indeed from their unique Holy access. I suppose that only makes it worse, for a God that shines on those with mansions and yachts by the hands of the poor, is no deity I want to believe in.