The senior pastor of America s largest congregation has come under fire for reportedly closing his doors to victims of the Houston floods. Plus, we ll have Pardis Selah and Kelly Campagna join the panel of deplorables to discuss Hillary Clinton, North Korea, and the health benefits of coffee and covfefe.
00:04:50.960He said, son, I thought you said your dog didn't bite.
00:04:53.220The little boy said, that's not my dog.
00:04:57.380Now, this clip reminded me of something that my priest that I talk about often, George Rutler, my priest in New York said, which is that those preachers who tell jokes like a ham actor in a dying vaudeville show should limit their repertoire to those jokes that St. John told the Blessed Virgin while her son bled on the cross.
00:05:14.600Which is a different preaching style, you might tell.
00:05:17.960Joel Osteen, a little bit lighter, a little lighter on theology in particular.
00:05:22.660And the message he's preaching is all about being positive.
00:05:43.880This is very different than my own liturgical experiences as a Catholic where we strike our breast and say, my fault, my fault, my grievous fault.
00:05:52.120It's all about building up self-esteem.
00:05:55.020He's written a lot of books to this idea, and this may be in part why he attracts 50,000 people a week to his church.
00:06:02.680Here is Osteen describing this to Chris Wallace.
00:06:05.280The voice inside yourself and making sure that your inner conversation is positive.
00:06:44.260I'm happy with what I'm doing in my career.
00:06:46.260And not always be beating ourselves down.
00:06:48.140I think that's just, you know, I see people, they won't be negative toward other people, but inside they're negative toward themselves, and I think that holds us back.
00:06:56.640Now, it's really hard not to like this guy.
00:06:58.720Some people describe him as Tony Robbins, who occasionally talks about God.
00:07:02.480He is just this very positive, nice, obviously very talented speaker, articulate.
00:07:08.600And so this is what he's preaching, is positivity.
00:07:13.220Whether or not it was a fair attack, it's unclear.
00:07:15.720There are some tweets said that, you know, he did close the doors to his neighbors.
00:07:20.700Some tweets said that he did not close the doors to his neighbors.
00:07:24.260I'm really not sure, nor does it really matter.
00:07:26.720They're doing a great job at the recovery efforts in Houston anyway.
00:07:30.060The more interesting thing is this theology, is this movement that is so, in many ways, American, this prosperity theology.
00:07:37.500And for a reference of this, Joel Osteen sent out one tweet that's gotten quite popular, which said, quote,
00:07:46.480Don't waste time with people who don't appreciate what you have to offer.
00:07:49.940The people around you should celebrate who you are.
00:07:52.880And this presents an obvious problem because the center of the religion that Joel Osteen is ostensibly preaching was a guy who spent a lot of time with people who didn't appreciate him.
00:08:02.940They so didn't appreciate him that they nailed him to a cross and killed him, and then three days later he came back from the dead.
00:08:07.920So there is a little bit of a problem in this theology, and some people are angrier at him than others.
00:08:17.820A lot of people call him a heretic and someone a false prophet, and you see these sort of things.
00:08:23.280I'm not sure that that's quite fair because I don't know that he's ever called himself a true prophet.
00:08:28.900The question is what does prosperity mean?
00:08:32.560This prosperity theology that he preaches has roots back in the 19th century, goes back to a guy named Oral Roberts, who is a minister.
00:08:40.060Joel Osteen attended Oral Roberts University, and he basically said expect material, expect a material prosperity, trusting God, and good things are going to happen to you.
00:08:51.820It comes from a mixture of Pentecostalism, the New Thought, which was a movement also in the 19th century.
00:08:58.920It comes from the unpublished writings of Phineas Quimby, and it's basically The Power of Positive Thinking, and The Gospel of Wealth, which is Andrew Carnegie's theory of philanthropy,
00:09:08.420that when wealth disparity became immense in the United States during that time, it was incumbent upon the rich to help the poor in a way that would actually benefit them
00:09:19.020and not encourage the promulgation of vice or something to that effect.
00:09:22.420Now, there is some biblical warrant to this point of view that if you trust in God and you have faith and, you know, you do your best and God will do the rest, that you'll have a good material life.
00:09:33.280We see this especially in Deuteronomy.
00:09:35.520If you follow God's commands, you will prosper.
00:15:39.720We have Kelly Campagna and Partis Sela, who has written for The Daily Wire before and now is writing for lots of other people.
00:15:48.080Kelly, you are no stranger to that old-time religion.
00:15:51.980Is there any room in this world for the prosperity gospel?
00:15:54.420Well, I'm going to step back for a minute and put the question aside.
00:16:03.060I think that the problem with Joel Osteen not opening his church is more so a liability question because my dad was actually a pastor for 10 years.
00:16:11.460And we had a school actually come to – and they had some problems with their boiler.
00:16:23.480But then he actually had to increase the insurance just on the building just so that they could use the church building for three weeks or whatever it was for the Christian school across the street.
00:16:36.100So I – shockingly enough, I'm defending Joel Osteen on this issue.
00:16:40.380There may be other liability reasons why he can't open the doors that are not being talked about because churches have to bend over backwards just to keep their own property.
00:16:49.580I went to a church in the San Francisco Bay Area that they were requiring all kinds of expensive changes just so that they could keep the building.
00:16:56.500And then they were told afterwards, oh, yeah, you're going to have to fix – revert the building back to its original status when you leave.
00:17:04.580So that's kind of beside the whole prosperity gospel thing.
00:17:11.140I agreed that I often judge a man by his critics.
00:17:15.220And the people who were pouncing on Osteen didn't seem to me people who thought he wasn't Christian enough.
00:17:20.760It was people who were pouncing on him because he purports to be a Christian.
00:17:24.600And there is this obvious liability issue.
00:17:26.840There are what seemed to be plenty of housing facilities for these victims already in Houston.
00:17:32.040So if they don't need to open up this space, which doesn't have adequate doctors and perhaps food and so on and so forth, then why do it?
00:17:41.680I felt it was a little bit of a disingenuous attack on him, though there are plenty other reasons to discuss the issues with his – what he does.
00:17:48.920Just on the point of the prosperity gospel, I noticed with Joel Osteen that there's never any biblical references.
00:17:56.000There's never any citations of verses.
00:17:58.560And that's kind of – for me, I can't take somebody seriously if they don't actually know the Bible and they're trying to tell me how to live my life and what I should and shouldn't be doing.
00:18:06.000I've grown up with these types of people all my life, and I'm repulsed by a lot of what they do.
00:18:13.060It's – I mean, he's – you know, you've got to think better about yourself.
00:19:10.800On a day like this, 105 degrees outside, I cannot wait for that camera to go off.
00:19:15.460I'm going to fill this up with some nice, icy, cold, always salty and delicious Leftist Tears and sit out by the pool.
00:19:21.420It is going to be absolutely fantastic.
00:19:23.160And if you can stick around and watch the rest of the panel of Deplorables, we will teach you the seven tricks to have a better life today, to be the best you.