Charlatan Pastor Joel Osteen Fails To Ask What Would Jesus Do

-by Noah

I'm not a religious guy; far from it. I was raised as a Christian (Episcopalian) but I got over it at an early age. It was more than the fact that my parents would jar me out of my blissful Sunday morning sleep without fail and drag me to church every damn Sunday. I've always been a late to bed and late to rise person. Hell, I even had to dress up in scratchy wool trousers, wrap a tie tightly around my neck, the whole bit, no beloved sneakers either. That sartorial style wasn't me then and it isn't me now.

Going to church in my privileged Republican town also gave me a first hand view of hypocrisy. It was a town of three card monty bankers, major corporate heads, alcoholism on a galactic scale, and wife-swapping, plenty of wife-swapping. Oh, and I should add the the very first true asshole that I met as a child was my grandfather, an ordained Anglican priest.

Soooo, it was with great interest that I read, on Monday night, that the mega-millionaire televangelist pastor of a Houston Christian mega church had apparently not offered his church as a refuge site for the victims of Houston's flood of biblical proportions. The pastor's name is Joel Osteen. Not throwing his doors open was worse than anything I saw as a child. It was also right in line with the Age of Trump that we are living in.

Osteen did make an effort, a really big and magnanimous effort. He grabbed one of his phones and tweeted out that he would pray for the flood victims from home (See below). Not only that but the victims wouldn't have to contribute the usual money for his prayers, this time. Think about what kind of person thinks so highly of himself that his praying for you is worth your money. It's very Trumpian of him. More importantly, how stupid or deranged do you have to be to want to send money to people like this? No doubt a lot, if not all, of Osteen's suckers thought Trump would cure their ills and problems, too. One thing I can tell you is that, if the classic Christian God exists, I sure wouldn't want the likes of Joel Osteen making my case.

An example of Osteen's Christian vow of poverty

Osteen now says that the doors of his church were always open. His church also claims that the immediate area around his church was flooded. No doubt there was water, water everywhere. Every building had more than pumps could handle. However, photos of the area show no floods. When confronted photographic proof of that fact, a spokesperson for the church said, well, it was flooded but the flood waters had receded. I see, receded during the time that up to 50 inches of rain was still falling. Tellingly, photos show no debris around the church. The grass is not even matted. God works in mysterious ways indeed.

Anyway, a massive social media shaming of Osteen has now led to a rectifying of the situation. Osteen has announced that the church is now open even though it always was. Buses of Houstonians are arriving. They can stay at the church. Air mattresses are at the ready. Supplies are now getting in place. People staying at the church, which is, by the way, a 16,000 seat converted basketball arena, will be staying on the mezzanine and upper tiers, just in case flooding arrives, again, I assume.

And another thing; all this time, the 21 Houston area Islamic centers and mosques were open to any and all people who had been flooded out of their homes. I bet that has a lot of people mightily confused. Numerous are stores did too, including Houston's Mattress Mack which opened the doors of both of his furniture stores.

But wait, there's more! On Wednesday morning, Osteen went on NBC's Today Show and changed his story yet again. It seems the reason he didn't open his church to homeless flood victims is that the city didn't ask him to! Not that that stopped Houston's real humanitarians.

"We were just being precautious, but the main thing is the city didn't ask us to become a shelter then."

Osteen also made excuses about "safety issues" and not having enough staff or volunteers. "Safety issues"? You bet. There are always "safety issues" when a hurricane hits. Hurricanes are all about "safety issues," but all those other churches, mosques, temples, and community centers that took in storm victims felt that, "safety issues" aside, the victims would have much bigger "safety issues" if they stayed on the roofs of what was left of their homes or waded around in cold, contaminated water for the next several days. It's also pretty strange that, with 30,000 members of his monument to fake christianity, Osteen just didn't have any staff or volunteers when everyone else did. Shame on NBC for even putting this slithering charlatan on the air.

Stay tuned. In a matter of hours, Osteen will probably be blaming Obama... not to mention "gay marriage."

Osteen's vow of poverty #2-- his home in Florida