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From Essence

Beginning today, Oxygen Media will begin filming scenes for its newest reality show, Pastors of L.A.

The docu-series aims to give viewers a candid and revealing look at the personal and professional lives of the following six world renowned pastors: Deitrick Haddon, Bishop Noel Jones, Bishop Clarence McClendon, Pastor Wayne Chaney, Bishop Ron Gibson and Pastor Jay Haizlip.

“Pastors of L.A. documents these larger than life characters who are rock stars in their communities, with a fresh, unique perspective that will resonate with our young audience,” said Rod Aissa, Senior Vice President of Original Programming and Development, Oxygen Media.

The “business” of church seems to really be booming, doesn’t it? You can read the rest on Essence.com.

Would you watch this show?

Yesterday, I caught the very first episode of the new Lifetime series, Preachers’ Daughters and this show is why I canceled my cable.

But seriously, outside of the controversy the show has created among some, who object to these families-of-the-cloth parading their foolishness around on TV for a few bucks, the show itself is not bad. In fact, I believe it offers keen insight into the difficulties that are associated with growing up. For those who have yet to tune in, basically, the show revolves around three daughters of various Protestant church leaders, who each have their own crisis of faith happening, including Olivia Perry, the 18-year-old daughter of the pastor of the Everyday Church and single teenage mother, who – after years of drinking, drugs and basically wildin’ the hell out – questions the paternity of her child. You may commence with waving your church fan. Despite being a sound-stage away from an episode of Maury Povich, Olivia has nothing on 18-year-old Taylor Colemen, because, you know, nobody quite brings the TV shenanigans quite like black folks:

Eighteen-year-old Taylor is set on pushing boundaries established by her strict father, Ken, a pastor of City of Refuge Pentecostal Church, who, following the mistakes he made with his older children, wants nothing more than to keep Taylor as his little angel. Taylor craves freedom from all of the rules in the house and occasionally rebels by sneaking out, kissing boys and giving into temptation, all the while trying to maintain her relationship with her Lord. While her mother Marie tries to keep the peace between Taylor and Ken, she fears his stern rules will push Taylor to act out even more, especially when she gets to college. Conflicted and frustrated with her father’s demands, Taylor confides in her half-sister Kendra, who Ken kicked out of the house when she was pregnant at 20.

In the first episode, we see Taylor, gyrating in her bedroom mirror wearing only a gold-lament cut out one piece swim suit and some booty shorts. She sneaks out the house to see her ex-boyfriend, a foul-mouth weed-smoking, possible degenerate, at the beach, who promptly tongues her down and squeezes her a**. In the same scene, Taylor confides in her girlfriends that she is considering a career as a stripper or Adult Video actress, a la Montana Fishburne, because they have more freedom than what she has at home. Further along in the episode, Taylor’s half-sister Kendra dry-snitches to their parents about Taylor’s professional aspirations and in the next scene we see Pastor Coleman, kneeling in the family’s den, praying to the man upstairs to, “please God, don’t let my daughter turn into a p**n star.”

I don’t know why I found that scene hilarious. Oh wait, I do: I’ve actually known some preachers’ children and for the most part, what I see on television is pretty accurate. IN fact, I would argue that what we see on television is a bit sanitized. Like in college, I knew this one girl – let’s just call her Jezebel – whose mother ran a church inside the living room of their family’s home. Every day, she would come down stairs for a bowl of Cheerios and be greeted by a room full of devout evangelical worshipers, singing “There’s a Leak in this Old Building,” on folding chairs her preacher mom had set up between the sofa and the dining room table. Jezebel once described her preacher mother as very stern, restricting her from activities like dating and television, watching out of fear that the Devil would “get her.”

Now I know that some folks, who constantly complain about the lack of guidance and parental involvement within urban areas might find this situation ideal. Obviously, this is a parent who cares enough to have complete control over her children’s welfare. And they would be right as it surely helped Jezebel to stay on the straight and narrow, long enough to get accepted to college. However, once she stepped foot on campus, all that righteous and moral upbringing went out the window and Jezebel spread herself so far around campus that there wasn’t enough rebuking of Satan that could shut those legs closed again. And I mean that with sincere love because overall, Jezebel was pretty cool, she was just pretty damn promiscuous too. Like, I remember one such occasion where we were at a party at a friend’s apartment with some of the university’s new basketball players. Well, our girl excused herself under the guise of refreshing our drinks and came back fifteen minutes with a story to tell. “You see that guy over there,” she said whispering in my ear. I nodded, “Yeah what about ‘em?” She giggled, taking a sip from my cup, “I just slobbed the knob.” And then she handed me my drink back. I handed it back and said, “Naw, you can keep that.”

Of course, we can argue that Jezebel’s story is not indicative of the fate of all children of the ministry, however it is not unique either. Although I do wonder, are we holding preachers’ kids to a different moral standard than we do other kids in this society? I mean, the added pressure to be better examples for the other children in their respective congregations has to be burdensome. Or as Pastor Ken Coleman (father of wannabe stripper Taylor), said recently in an interview with OK magazine, “We wanted people to see what we deal with as parents being pastors and preachers and dealing with our daughters. We’re just like everyone else. Our children are just like everyone else. They sometimes put a higher expectation on them but we want to let them know our children are just like regular children.”

I posed this question on my Facebook page and a friend of mine reminded me that sometimes, a religious leader will put his or her church before the family, thus dismissing the needs of their children, who end up rebelling as a way to show the world, but more specifically their parents, the hypocrisy in what they preach and how they actually live. I don’t know if this is totally true, but I think it holds weight. I mean, if the same teachings the pastor expound on on Sunday mornings are not digested at home then you have to wonder what good is the doctrine for the rest of flock? Likewise, if you want to keep the kid off the stripper pole, its probably best not to wh**e her and her problems – no matter how common they are – out on national television. I’m just saying.

Source: LipstickAlley.com

Do you know where your tithe dollars are going?

If you were a faithful member of Bethel Institutional Missionary Baptist Church in Houston Texas, then they may have been going right into the pocket of your pastor and his wife…then to a Louisiana slot machine.

KHOU-11 news in Houston reports:

A Houston pastor and his wife are in the Harris County jail charged with bilking their former congregation out of more than $400,000 and using that money for gambling trips to Louisiana.

Charles Gilford, 58, and Adriane Gilford, 53, were indicted Wednesday by a Harris County grand jury and charged with aggregate theft and “misapplication of fiduciary property.”

Prosecutors allege the Gilfords used at least $430,000 in church funds to gamble at the Coushatta Casino near Lake Charles between 2004 and 2007. They were pastor and first lady of Bethel Institutional Missionary Baptist Church (BIMBC) on Selinsky Road in southeast Houston at the time.

“Over that three-year period of time as fiduciaries there, they were able to take that total of $430,000 from that little Baptist church,” said Amy McCauley with the white collar crimes section of the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.

At that little Baptist church, a fixture in this neighborhood for decades, the current leadership told us they didn’t want to comment on the case. The Gilford’s left BIMBC five years ago.

Not only did this pastor and his wife allegedly steal money from the church, but they are believed to have gambled it away too? Looks like one idiot move leads to another.

Of course, as we’ve seen in several high profile scandals in churches across the country, even when faced with damning evidence, congregants cannot wipe the smoke out of their eyes and see when they’ve been had. Unfortunately, some members of this church are no different. The article goes on to say:

Close friends say they have trouble believing the couple would steal from their congregation.

“And when I tell you impeccable people, outstanding people willing to help, I just, this is a little bit too much for me,” said friend Regina Davis when she learned about the arrests.

“It doesn’t make sense,” added her son Freddie Davis. “As far as I know, they are really genuine people, both pastor Gilford and sister Gilford. They have been courteous and amazing over the years.”

But after poring over boxes and boxes of financial records, prosecutors convinced a grand jury to indict the pair on charges that carry anywhere from 5 years to life in prison.

Ummmm of course they were “courteous and amazing” — the members were funding their gambling addiction. I know that no one wants to believe the worst about leaders in their church, but unfortunately you can’t put this kind of behavior past anyone. You also can’t be too shocked when it happens. You like to think people are honest, but when you do the math, even small churches bring in a ton of money and most don’t have any financial oversight. In addition, too many of these pastors have people around them willing to turn a blind eye to their egregious actions. Granted, it definitely takes a special kind of boldness to steal money from a church, especially if you’re the pastor or his wife. Unsurprisingly, Adriane’s thievery was not confined to the church building. The story also said she was  arrested in 2010 on a felony charge of writing bad checks in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana.

This couple is out of control. Fortunately, congregants who tithe out of obedience to the Bible know that they will be blessed regardless of any “misappropriation of funds”, but it does make you think twice before dropping your hard-earned money in the offering plate.

Alissa Henry is a freelance writer (and church girl) living in Columbus, OH. Follow her on Twitter @AlissaInPink

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Pastors at several evangelical churches throughout England and Scotland have been advising HIV-positive people to stop taking their medications, and now at least 6 patients have died.

The pastors told the individuals they were healed by God through an exorcism-like process. According to the NY Daily News, a pastor at the wealthy televangelist Synagogue Church of all Nations (SCOAN), told an undercover Sky News reporter (who is HIV positive) that they have a 100% success rate. He even tells people who continue to experience symptoms such as vomiting and diarrhea that these are signs of the virus leaving the body.

According to the Sky News investigation, as many as six individuals have died as a result of the churches’ guidance. Another man, Emmanuel, who stopped taking his medicine a year ago after being instructed by a pastor at his church in London, now believes he’s passed the infection on to his boyfriend.

“I feel guilty, if I’m the one who passed it onto him I’m feeling guilty. Yeah, very much guilty,” he told Sky News.

SCOAN, on the other hand, continues to defend and administer its treatment for the HIV virus, and other diseases.

I feel sorry for these victims. It’s easy to think they should have known better, but religion and religious leaders can have powerful control over people, especially when they’re desperate. It’s clear these churches are taking advantage of that desperation.

Check out the video of the exorcisms below. What do you think about what these churches are doing?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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By focusing on our blessings, we attract more joyous experiences to come into our lives, opening up channels of positive energy that allow our hopes and dreams to flow. Acknowledge that The Universe shows up in our lives daily in the form of dreams manifest, goals accomplished, hopes fulfilled and prayers answered. By giving thanks every day, we are telling The Universe that we appreciate the blessings we receive, and that we believe we are worthy of receiving all the good things in life we so desire.

Have an amazing week!

-Brooke Dean