Megachurch Asks for Nearly $1M in 48 Hours

[MathiasOfAthens]

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/church-ask...ory?id=9455589

The clock is ticking for members of pastor Rick Warren's California megachurch after the evangelical leader posted an "urgent" letter on his Web site Wednesday calling on congregants to donate a total of $900,000 before the New Year to make up for a massive holiday giving deficit.

"This is an urgent letter unlike any I've written in 30 years," the blog post said. "I have some thrilling news to share with you below but first some seriously bad news."

Warren said that despite the recession, Saddleback Church managed to stay on budget all year until last weekend when "the bottom dropped out."

"On the last weekend of 2009, our total offerings were less than half of what we normally receive -- leaving us $900,000 in the red for the year, unless you help make up the difference today and tomorrow," the post said.

The church's usual non-holiday Sunday offering is estimated at $600,000 coming from more than 80,000 members at five different church locations, according to a 2009 Reader's Digest profile on Warren.


The letter, signed "Pastor Rick," goes on to detail the church's accomplishments including its food pantry, homeless shelter and financial coaching, despite 10 percent of the congregation being jobless.

"It's basically having to do more with less," church spokesman A. Larry Ross told The Associated Press. "The seasonal Christmas offering was down significantly and, commensurately, the need for services the church is expected to provide is up."

Its a lot to ask for in the last weekend of 2009, but what the hell, and dont get me wrong Im sure there are a lot of churches out there that do contribute a lot to food pantry, homeless shelter, and finiancial coaching, but those churches are often Roman Catholic, Protestant, orthordox, or jewish, and almost always in the major cities downtown, not out in the suburbs. Preachers are not often dressed in 1000 dollar suits either. Roman Catholic churches may spend a lot on masonry but at least the money does not go toward dressing public speakers and fanciful lights like at this Mega (Give us your money) Churches. Its not even a church to tell you the truth, All they do is praise god and then ask for your donation so we can keep praising god, then 5 minutes later help us praise god again by offering another donation. ing money grabbers them all.

If they are in the red then its because of the all the money they spent on themselves and theres no reason they should be in the red, the recession hit and they should have planned accordingly but I guarantee they didnt and kept stuffing their wallets.

I like the second part that I bolded the most. Typical MegaChurches often spend 85 % on infrastructure with the remaining 15 going to helping the needy, social work, ect.

[Monarchist]

Well, what can I say other than "serves him right"? I've always found those suited pastors very suspect. Most of them seem rather slimy to me, to be perfectly honest. A church doesn't need nine hundred thousand dollars...

[Tiberius Tosi]

If they are in the red then its because of the all the money they spent on themselves and theres no reason they should be in the red, the recession hit and they should have planned accordingly but I guarantee they didnt and kept stuffing their wallets.

I agree with you except on this part. It is during a recession that the Church should start dishing out more money, as it is more needed than other times. The last thing a Church wants is to appear stingy and only interested in money (asking for 1 million dollars doesn't help Mr. Warren on this lol), which it shouldn't be and should not care if it is in debt up to its' eyeballs as long as it is doing good.

Now as for this church and spending 85% of infastructure...damn that is a lot. But I guess when you have 20,000 people packed into a church you have to have 100,000 dollar sound systems and 50,000 dollar projector screens. . Damn megachurches, once the numbers in a church get too high it doesn't even become church anymore.

[MathiasOfAthens]

To clarify I dont know how much Warren's Churches spend on infrastructure. The 85 % is from other mega churches numbers. But judging on the cost of running the join I can only imagine it to be roughly similar, anyone know otherwise let me know.

Some of the best (non Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant) churches I have seen were the Lords Gym in suburban neighborhoods that organized after school events for children and helped out the community. They did not spend 85 % on infrastructure and their place certainly didn't have expensive but the work they did for the community was greatly important.

[Fiyenyaa]

I never understood how these megachurches survived to any great degree.
I would have thought that even the most fervent believer would see past these smarmy ers with their $5,000-suits and their copious amounts of jewellery to see some con-merchant with dollar-signs in their eyes.
These are basically cults using the cache of already established religions.

[Exarch]

this is a ing disgrace and why i hate this aspect of christianity
the church should be demolished and the proceeds given to scientific research for stemc ells and the hungry
oh and also, this pastor should be made a subject for weapons testing

[cfmonkey45]

Its a lot to ask for in the last weekend of 2009, but what the hell, and dont get me wrong Im sure there are a lot of churches out there that do contribute a lot to food pantry, homeless shelter, and finiancial coaching, but those churches are often Roman Catholic, Protestant, orthordox, or jewish, and almost always in the major cities downtown, not out in the suburbs. Preachers are not often dressed in 1000 dollar suits either. Roman Catholic churches may spend a lot on masonry but at least the money does not go toward dressing public speakers and fanciful lights like at this Mega (Give us your money) Churches. Its not even a church to tell you the truth, All they do is praise god and then ask for your donation so we can keep praising god, then 5 minutes later help us praise god again by offering another donation. ing money grabbers them all.

If they are in the red then its because of the all the money they spent on themselves and theres no reason they should be in the red, the recession hit and they should have planned accordingly but I guarantee they didnt and kept stuffing their wallets.

I like the second part that I bolded the most. Typical MegaChurches often spend 85 % on infrastructure with the remaining 15 going to helping the needy, social work, ect.

What's the source for this, because I think this is grossly spun.

Also, relative to the size of this church, its stated that their weekly income from tithes is approximately $600,000, so this really isn't all that extravagant. Basically, they're asking for 1.5 Sundays' income to cover added costs. The Church boasts an average weekly attendance of about 20,000 people, so that would be $30 USD given to the church each week by each member. In reality, this whole 900K business would ultimately cost each church-goer about $45 USD. Which, even for the average American, is nothing.

[Fiyenyaa]

What's the source for this, because I think this is grossly spun.

Also, relative to the size of this church, its stated that their weekly income from tithes is approximately $600,000, so this really isn't all that extravagant. Basically, they're asking for 1.5 Sundays' income to cover added costs. The Church boasts an average weekly attendance of about 20,000 people, so that would be $30 USD given to the church each week by each member. In reality, this whole 900K business would ultimately cost each church-goer about $45 USD. Which, even for the average American, is nothing.

Do you not think that's pretty extravagant and unneccesary in and of itself?

[blackwatersix]

Do you not think that's pretty extravagant and unneccesary in and of itself?

I gagged when I saw USD30 by each member.

[Ariovistus Maximus]

Do you not think that's pretty extravagant and unneccesary in and of itself?

If people tithe like they're supposed to (which is 10% of your income), then $30 is nothing out of the ordinary.

Still, I don't trust a lot of these characters either. This guy isn't so bad though. The televangelists make me puke. They're so full of "Christianese" ways to soak you for your last dollar.

[cfmonkey45]

Do you not think that's pretty extravagant and unneccesary in and of itself?

No I don't. Because it makes perfect sense. They have to get it in before New Years in order to get tax write-offs as a charity. Otherwise, it could cost 10-25% more.

[Dayman]

I hope Rick Warren chokes on his greed, as do all the megachurch evangelical charlatans.

[Monarchist]

I hope Rick Warren chokes on his greed, as do all the megachurch evangelical charlatans.

While I wouldn't go that far , I do believe the Protestant Revivalist tradition has a lot of problems to deal with. It needs some serious restructuring before all credibility is lost. This is why I love Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy - the pastors aren't a bunch of individualists with money bags. Capitalism works in the civil society, but has no place when it comes to salvation of any sort.

[Dayman]

I have my problems with essentially every form of organized religion. One needs to merely look at the Vatican and tell me greed isn't a part of the RCC's SOP.

You know the libertarian in me tells me I need to get in on this racket, but then the humanist part starts whining about not deceiving people for profit...

[godol shmok]

What will happen if they do not collect enough donations? Chapter 11? What do federal or state laws provide for in case of a non-profitorganization runs out of cash?

[blackwatersix]

I have my problems with essentially every form of organized religion. One needs to merely look at the Vatican and tell me greed isn't a part of the RCC's SOP.

I don't know about others, but from collections alone all parishes I've seen the books of are always in the red. Anyway the point is in contrast with this pastor, priests aren't paid a wage, we don't charge fees for sacraments, etc.

[Dayman]

I don't know about others, but from collections alone all parishes I've seen the books of are always in the red. Anyway the point is in contrast with this pastor, priests aren't paid a wage, we don't charge fees for sacraments, etc.

Hence why I said the Vatican, not the local parish.

The local parish priest is not a megachuch fraud, and that is a good thing, at least.

[blackwatersix]

Hence why I said the Vatican, not the local parish.

The local parish priest is not a megachuch fraud, and that is a good thing, at least.

I expect the Vatican gets lots of donations as well.. I've never hear of Cardinals buying luxury cars hehehe... They keep us afloat at the least. We have the same problem, we need 5.5 Sundays to break even with all the utilities and there are only 4 Sundays in a month.. Good thing Salesians get lots of donations from alumni.

[Dayman]

Well one of the biggest frauds to ever play the megachurch racket, Oral Roberts (my heart warms at the fact of his death), broadcast that God told him he would "call him home" if he didn't raise $8mil.

He raised $9.1mil.

[Gromovnik]

Well one of the biggest frauds to ever play the megachurch racket, Oral Roberts...

lol, great name...