Memories of Televangelists Past

The Wall Street Journal had a piece entitled TV's Healing Power which discussed the heady days of the 80's in the televangelist business, and wonders where they've gone. My favorite part of the piece was a couple of paragraphs that reminded us of the silliness of the 80's televangelists (h/t Blogotional):

Twenty years ago televangelism had its greatest year on record. With their own slick productions that looked less like church than variety shows, evangelicals tuned in by the millions. Those heady days ended suddenly. Beginning in 1987, a series of scandals broke the faith of some, the wallets of others, and confirmed the fears of millions that such religious showmanship was all a sham.

It seems like a dream now: Oral Roberts sequestered himself in his Tower of Prayer, telling audiences that he would certainly die unless someone bailed him out from the financial ruin caused by his building an unneeded medical center. He said that he was commanded to undertake that construction project by a 900-feet-tall Jesus he saw in a vision. (The fact that Mr. Roberts had to flee the tower, which was hit by lightning during his vigil, never struck him as an ironic answer to his prayers.)

Jim Bakker was led away in handcuffs from his mansion while Tammy Faye, makeup sliding from spidery eyes, sang for the cameras. Jerry Falwell, who loathed Mr. Bakker nearly as much as he did feminists, took over Mr. Bakker's PTL (Praise the Lord) ministries, including its theme park, and enjoyed a widely photographed plunge down the water slide in his dark suit. Finally, Jimmy Swaggart offered one of the greatest public, teary, lip-quivering confessions ever recorded about his relationship with a prostitute and his addiction to pornography.

I'd forgotten some of that nonsense. Read the WSJ piece to see why the author thinks we no longer need that type of televangelism these days. We don't need to see teary confessions from TV preachers, we can now see them from reality show contestants. It's an interesting piece.