Posted on 12/30/2009 11:22:46 PM PST by FTJM
Evangelical pastor Rick Warren is begging parishioners at his Southern California megachurch to cough up $900,000 before Jan. 1 to keep the parish out of the red.
In an urgent letter posted on the Saddleback Church Web site on Wednesday, Warren says expenses are up because parishioners are out of work and "the bottom dropped out" when year-end donations dropped dramatically.
He asks parishioners to donate before the new year to keep the Orange County church out of debt, The Orange County Register reports.
A spokeswoman for Warren said the church does not release financial details, so it's difficult to put the $900,000 shortfall in context.
Warren delivered the invocation at the inauguration of President Barack Obama and is the author of numerous books, including the best-selling "The Purpose Driven Life."
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
Now THAT is a reminder of what’s important if I ever read one!
Now THAT is a reminder of what’s important if I ever read one!
Church to big to fail? Ask the Messiah for a stimulas bail-out. Why not Pray.
Goodbye and good riddance you fraud.
I don’t know about Warren’s bible, but mine says the Lord’s children will never be found begging for bread. Mine also instructs...neither a borrower nor a lender be.
I thought he was building an Arc. /s
Rick Warren’s Controversial Comments on Gay Marriage
The following is the controversial portion of the interview with Rick Warren focused on gay marriage, civil unions and divorce. In brackets are clarifications that Warren asked to include after reading a transcript of the original interview:
BELIEFNET: Which do you think is a greater threat to the American family - divorce or gay marriage?
WARREN: [laughs] That’s a no brainer. Divorce. There’s no doubt about it.
Here’s an interesting thing. The divorce statistics are quite bandied around. People say half the marriages end in divorce. That’s just not true. 40% of first time marriages end in divorce. About 61% of second time marriages end in divorce and 75% of third time marriages end in divorce. So the odds get worse and what’s balancing this out...when you hear 50% end in divorce, that’s just not true. The majority of marriages do last....
BELIEFNET: So why do we hear so much more - especially from religious conservatives - about gay marriage than about divorce?
Oh we always love to talk about other sins more than ours. Why do we hear more about drug use than about being overweight? Why do we hear more about anything else than about wasting time or gossip? We want to point that my sins are perfectly acceptable. Your sins are hideous and evil.
BELIEFNET: One controversial moment for you in the last election was your support for proposition 8 in California. ... Just to clarify, do you support civil unions or domestic partnerships?
WARREN: I don’t know if I’d use the term there but I support full equal rights for everybody in America. I don’t believe we should have unequal rights depending on particular lifestyles so I fully support equal rights.
[Clarification from Pastor Warren 12/15: I now see you asked about civil UNIONS -and I responded by talking about civil RIGHTS. Sorry. They are two different issues. No American should ever be discriminated against because of their beliefs. Period. But a civil union is not a civil right. Nowhere in the constitution can you find the “right” to claim that any loving relationship identical to marriage. It’s just not there. ]
BELIEFNET: What about partnership benefits in terms of insurance or hospital visitation?
WARREN: You know, not a problem with me.
[Clarification from Pastor Warren 12/15: I favor anyone being able to make anyone else the beneficiary of their health or life insurance coverage. If I am willing to pay for it, I should be able to put a friend, partner, relative, or stranger on my coverage. No one should be turned away from seeing a friend in the hospital. But visiting rights are a non-issue in California! Since 1999, California has had a domestic partnership law that grants gay couples visiting rights and all the other rights. Prop 8 had no -zero -effect on those rights.]
The issue to me, I’m not opposed to that as much as I’m opposed to redefinition of a 5,000 year definition of marriage. I’m opposed to having a brother and sister being together and calling that marriage. I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that marriage. I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage.
BELIEFNET: Do you think those are equivalent to gays getting married?
Oh , I do. For 5,000 years, marriage has been defined by every single culture and every single religion - this is not a Christian issue. Buddhist, Muslims, Jews - historically, marriage is a man and a woman. And the reason I supported Proposition 8, is really a free speech issue. Because first the court overrode the will of the people, but second there were all kinds of threats that if that did not pass then any pastor could be considered doing hate speech if he shared his views that he didn’t think homosexuality was the most natural way for relationships, and that would be hate speech. We should have freedom of speech, ok? And you should be able to have freedom of speech to make your position and I should be able to have freedom of speech to make my position, and can’t we do this in a civil way.
Most people know I have many gay friends. I’ve eaten dinner in gay homes. No church has probably done more for people with AIDS than Saddleback Church. Kay and I have given millions of dollars out of Purpose Driven Life helping people who got AIDS through gay relationships. So they can’t accuse me of homophobia. I just don’t believe in the redefinition of marriage.
[Clarification/addition from Pastor Warren 12:15:
BOTTOM LINE:
1. God, who always acts out of love and does what is best for us, thought up sex. Sex was God’s idea, not ours. Like fire, and many other things God gave us, sex can be used for good, or abused in ways that harm. The Designer of sex has clearly and repeatedly said that he created sex exclusively for husbands and wives in marriage. Whenever God’s parameters are violated, it causes broken hearts, broken families, emotional hurt and shame, painful memories, and many other destructive consequences. There would be so STDs in our world if we all played by the rules.
2. God gives me the free choice to follow his commands or willfully disobey them so I must allow others to have that same free choice. Loving, trusting, and obeying God cannot be forced. In America, people already have the civil right to live as they wish.
3. If anyone, whether unfaithful spouses, or unmarried couples, or homosexuals or anyone else think they are smarter than God and chooses to disobey God’s sexual instructions, it is not the US government’s role to take away their choice. But neither is it the government’s role to classify just any “loving” relationship as a marriage. A committed boyfriend-girlfriend relationship is not a marriage. Two lovers living together is a not a marriage. Incest is not marriage. A domestic partnership or even a civil union is still not marriage.
4. Much of this debate is not really about civil rights, but a desire for approval. The fact that 70% of blacks supported Prop 8 shows they don’t believe it is a civil rights issue. Gays in California already have their rights. What they desire is approval and validation from those who disagree with them, and they are willing to force it by law if necessary. Any disapproval is quickly labeled “hate speech. Imagine if we held that standard in every other disagreement Americans have? There would be no free speech. That’s why, on the traditional marriage side, many saw Prop 8 as a free speech issue: Don’t force me to validate a lifestyle I disagree with. It is not the same as marriage.” And many saw the Teacher’s Union contribution of $3 million against Prop 8, as a effort to insure that children would be taught to approve what most parents disapprove of.
http://blog.beliefnet.com/stevenwaldman/2008/12/rick-warrens-controversial-com.html
I would not give Rick Warren one cent. All he did was kiss up to Obama’s butt during the election. Hey, Rick, how’s your donation income decline going. Well, you got the hope and change you were looking for!!!! So, Rick, please no tears and being whimpish, please. Oh, maybe you can get an Obama bailout from Obama’s “stash” as so neatly put one one of Obama’s “something for nothing supporters!!!
Rick has made MILLIONS....why doesn’t HE cough up some!
Sorry Mr Warren, I know a little church in my old hometown that needs money. We don’t have friends in the White House and best selling authors to contribute, but we’ll be thinking of your struggle in the new year.
“Go sell what you have....”
Practice what you preach.
With the recent passing of Oral Roberts, somebody has to play the “contribute now or the Lord will call me home” card....
I don't think you can call his church a "parish".
And, the way he flip-flopped on the gay marriage issue, maybe this is a sign for him.
Hey Rick! Living above your means??
Better still Rick, ask your buddy, the Bam man for a stimulus, then the government will control your church as it does the auto mfrs. the banks etc.
Are you talking to the rich man with great possessions, or the guy with a knapsack and a sword?
You live by the media, you die by the media!!
Rick Warren has apologized to gays about his past support for banning gay marriage. Perhaps, Warren could ask the gay community for donations.
Hey Rick, trying to be a friend of the world AND a man of God at the same time?
(James 4:4)
I hope the 250,000 pastors that have gone to Rick’s “marketing” conferences are thinking twice about adopting this church model. This church is the Church of Laodicea leading their followers down the road to destruction.
If you want to see the playbook of Saddleback it is here:
http://www.sdadefend.com/MINDEX-U-Z/Saddleback.pdf
Our church adopted this model a few years ago and it has been disastrous. The church has half of the congregation it used to have and has been behind budget ever since. In fact, our church decided to buy 100 acres of land at the height of the real estate boom and it is big giant money pit. Sickening!
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