As part of his opening segment on Wednesday night’s show, Comedian Larry Wilmore, host of Comedy Central’s “The Nightly Show,” criticized “prosperity gospel” preachers in general and specifically made jokes about the actions of Pastor Creflo Dollar who recently asked his 200,000 Christian followers to buy his ministry a new G650 Jet costing a whooping $65 million by donating $300 each. Click here if you missed it! Following several public backlash, Creflo Dollar has shut down the campaign for the $65 Million Jet to focus on ‘Spreading the Gospel.’
Wilmore said Dollar and megachurch pastors who preach the prosperity gospel are “taking advantage of poor people.”
“When exactly did Jesus start a hip-hop label?” asked Wilmore, referencing Dollar’s recent effort to have people pay for a $65 million private jet.
“Have megachurches gone too far? Let me put it this way — when your place of worship sounds like the name of an evil Transformer, you’ve gone too far.”
Wilmore also spoke to Pastor Bullock, one of the men featured on the Oxygen Network’s show Preachers of Detroit during the panel segment.
“A lot of the ‘prosperity gospel’ exploits the notion that people are giving their money directly to God,” he said. “So my question to you is, why does Jesus need so much money? Is he cash poor right now? Does he need an addition in Heaven?”
“You know, he does say ‘In my Father’s house there are many rooms,’ so I think there’s plenty of good room already,” Bullock responded, before turning serious. “You shouldn’t feel that people are being exploited, you should know they’re being exploited by these congregations. There’s a big suction cup and in it’s in the sanctuary. It’s going from the people to the pastor.”
“If you look at these mega-ministries,” he continued, “the only one who seems to be getting mega-rich is the pastor and the pastor’s family.”
“Once you convince your flock that the son of God is a venture capitalist,” comedian Bradley Whitford chimed in, “the sky’s the limit.”
You can watch the Wilmore’s entire conversation on RawStory!
