Friday, February 25, 2005

Ya gotta have Faith

Benny Hinn is in town, and he's performing at the Toyota Center, which happens to be where I park for classes. This means that for the last 2 days I've had to maneuver my way through the Benny Hinnions to get out of the garage and head home. And I must say, there are a bunch of them. They were lined up around the corner waiting to get in, healthy looking people, people who looked ill, people in wheelchairs, on crutches, children, you name them, they were there.
Which leads me to my rant for the day. All these people are waiting for Benny Hinn to call them on stage, say a prayer, touch their head, and heal them of their affliction. Some of these people have been suffering for years, and some spent whatever meager savings they had for the opportunity to be near the great one. (He always enters the stage to "How Great Thou Art")
I don't begrudge Benny for making a living, and I don't really begrudge him for making a living by taking people's money. PT Barnum did it for years, as do most people who sell time wasting devices.
My issue stems from the way he does it. As I mentioned above, many of these people have little to give, and they give it all in hopes that Benny can cure them. I would be a little more apt to believe him, if there was some documented proof that what he said was true. His antics seem more along the lines of a carnie psychic, "There's someone over here in the fifth row who's suffering from cancer. God has given me the power to cure you, if you are faithful. I can feel your faith, and God has answered your prayer, you are cured."
I remember a show that 60 minutes, or some other show; they took a sample of 5 people Benny had "cured" and tracked them for a year. One of them, a woman suffering from emphysema until Benny cured her, stopped her medicine (Didn't need it, she was cured) and died within a year. The others all were either still suffering from their illness or had died, as well.
This gives me problems. While I don't object to taking people's money per se, I do object to profiting from people's false hopes of survival. For a lot of these people, Benny is their last hope, their last chance. And for him to profit off their desparate bid to not die, especially when he can't show that he can save them, really offends me.
No, I'm not on Benny Hinn's mailing list.

2 comments:

English Professor said...

He is despicable. I know that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God," but you've got to think that there's something special prepared for hucksters who prey on vulnerable people in the name of God.

Michelle said...

OMG...don't get me started on this vulgar piece of C***. He is loathed here in OZ. He was here a few years back and many tv stations were doing expose's on him. I could go on forever about him..ggrrrrrr.