Joel Osteen's Lakewood church passes around collection plates to Hurricane evacuees

[DesertRat]

You can see the collection baskets being passed around toward the end of the video.

[packman]

1. All about $ and praying on emotions

Yes, praying---

God must have a very special place for these people

Dante's Inferno - The Eighth Circle of Hell



The Eight Circle of Hell is resided by the fraudulent. Dante and Virgil reach it on the back of Geryon, a flying monster with different natures, just like the fraudulent. This circle of Hell is divided into 10 Bolgias or stony ditches with bridges between them. In Bolgia 1, Dante sees panderers and seducer. In Bolgia 2 he finds flatterers. After crossing the bridge to Bolgia 3, he and Virgil see those who are guilty of simony. After crossing another bridge between the ditches to Bolgia 4, they find sorcerers and false prophets. In Bolgia 5 are housed corrupt politicians, in Bolgia 6 are hypocrites and in the remaining 4 ditches, Dante finds hypocrites (Bolgia 7), thieves (Bolgia 7), evil counselors and advisers (Bolgia 8), divisive individuals (Bolgia 9) and various falsifiers such as alchemists, perjurers and counterfeits (Bolgia

[tonyt53]

7. It think the word is "preying" instead of "praying". That is what people like him do.

[packman]

11. Meant for the double play on the word-

One must pay attention to the subtle points of posting sarcasm - We be a sophisticated crowd here at DU

[heaven05]

2. you are pointing

to one of the major reasons for religion in ameriKKKa. MONEY, MONEY and more MONEY. And control over peoples lives. Now I know many send church people to places overseas to establish ameriKKKan brand religion and they feed the hungry, sometimes. Osteen doesn't I guess. AmeriKKKan religion is a scam and basically was built on 'Manifest Destiny' and white supremacy over the COMPLETE world. Always has been a scam.

[not fooled]

3. Oh yecchhh

Thanks for the synopsis because no way could I watch more than a few seconds of that smarmy charlatan woman going through her pitch.

Oh, and what a despicable excuse for "christianity". Jesus my ass.

[flygal]

10. it reminded me of Michael Scott on the Office

when he was talking in circles and says "sometimes I just speak and hope I end up making a point".

[Scarsdale]

4. Ah, yes.

The fleecing of the flock never ends, no matter what happens. Is she Mrs. Joel, helping him pad their bank account?

[George II]

5. No shame. I remember back when Falwell had his show in the 1980s....

....it was between Christmas and New Year's Days. That was a big time for these charlatans to ask for money.

Anyway, Falwell said on his show (not an exact quote): "If you don't have the money because of Christmas, just put January 1 on your check and send it in"! Unbelievable.

As Madeleine Albright said, "there's a special place in hell" for those people.

[TubbersUK]

6. Where's the water/water damage they claimed? n/t

[turbinetree]

8. Well Joel, your still full of sh*t...........................How much have "YOU" given in cash?

"No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money" (Luke 16:13-31).

[efhmc]

9. The whole concept of that money laundering place is

disgusting. Not a church or anything resembling one. Their entire view of the NT and Christ's teachings is skewed.

[SkyDaddy7]

12. Even when I was a child...

Going to church has always made me feel uncomfortable. Thankfully my parents were not fundies & we did not go to church much as a family. However, I live in the deep south so many of my friends did go to church religiously & anytime I spent the night at their house I had to go to church with them the next morning. It all appeared so fake...And I'm not talking about the religion itself or text but the adults talking about the religion. To me, it just seems like everyone knew everything was fake but they played along for some unknown reason my budding Atheist brain could not figure out.

...Of course, now I know there are true believers & there are also people out there like Joel & Victoria Osteen that make tens of millions of dollars taking advantage of these true believers.

...I just don't understand how anyone could watch this video & come away with the idea she really cares about the people of Houston.

...So sad.

[SergeStorms]

13. Yeah....

and some of your parishioners were blessed by unprecedented rain and misery, instead of the "unprecedented favor" you say your "supply-side god" will shower you with.

Fucking charlatans.

[GreatInDayton]

14. to me, this is

sickening. Profiteering, WITH the added benefit of growing the flock. If Joel had realized this potential at the outset, he would have filled his seats before any of the shelters.

[raven mad]

15. Remember what xtians say the bible said?

About the money changers at the temple? I hope this goes viral.

Matthew 21:12-13New International Version (NIV)

12 Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13 “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’[a] but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’”

[mdbl]

16. All the Houston stuff aside,,,,,

I wish we would just tax these churches that are just fronts for businesses. Then they wouldn't be so sickening.

[DesertRat]

17. I agree

Osteen is a motivational speaker who pretends to be a church to avoid paying taxes.