After keeping his doors locked while Texas drowned, Joel Osteen invites flood survivors into his church and then tries to fleece them.

Courtesy of Newsweek:  

A televangelist whose church closed its doors during Hurricane Harvey claims that he is the victim of “misinformation” and told flood victims not to have a “poor me” attitude. 

In his Sunday sermon, multimillionaire pastor Joel Osteen addressed the criticism that has been directed at him after his 16,000 seat Houston megachurch initially closed its doors during the storm, in which thousands of people were left homeless and 40 were killed. 

Pictures and video posted on social media showed the church apparently undamaged by the storm, and Osteen initially claimed he had not opened its doors because he had not been asked to by the state. The church re-opened Tuesday, as floodwaters began to recede. 

“You know I really believe in these times of difficulty it's, for me, certainly not the time to question your faith but to turn to your faith because God is the one that gives you the strength to make it through the difficult times," he said in a video of Sunday's sermon posted on YouTube. 

“We are not going to understand everything that happens but, you know, having a 'poor old me' mentality or 'look what I lost' or 'why did this happen', that's just going to pull you down. Like we've been talking about all night, you just got to turn it over and say 'God you're still on the throne'.”

Yeah don't get a "poor old me" attitude just because your home was swept away by the flood and you lost everything. After all on the bright side Joel Osteen's church was completely untouched and he is still a very, very wealthy man.

However as bad as this completely out of touch sentiment was, it was not the worst of it.

On Saturday, the day before Osteen made his comments, his sister led a service.

Courtesy of Nova Magazine:  

In a video from a Saturday service at Lakewood Church, his sister Lisa Osteen Comes asks for the Hurricane Harvey survivors to stand up so that people could “touch” and “lay hands” on them. Before she does that though, she sends the ushers into the auditorium to start passing around collection plates. As they do, she throws out false words of comfort and carefully avoids ever telling these poor people that the church would help them. Instead, she keeps saying that God will. 

“All these people who stood tonight, they have needs, and financial needs, and you know, I just feel like we should pray for them that God is going to bless them with unprecedented favor in the next coming days and the next coming weeks and the next coming months because you know they have a lot of calls to make, they have a lot of work to get done, and their lives were so interrupted, but you know what we can trust God that it will go smoother than anyone could ever imagine.” 

Comes then called for the congregation to “touch them, hold hands with them…let’s touch them, let’s just let them know we’re praying for them and let’s believe right now that God is going to move supernaturally in their favor.”

So yes this woman actually sent out ushers to ask for donations from the people who had just lost EVERYTHING.

Comes actually went a little further than that and suggested that the flooding might turn out to be a good thing as God will likely reward them with better homes and more prosperity.

That is the trick that these people use to convince morons to give them their last nickle in the belief that God will reward their generosity with great wealth, health, and happiness.

It's really too bad that I don't believe in Hell, because if ever there were people who deserved a standing reservation in that place it is these slimy pieces of shit.

Joel Osteen claims he did not open his megachurch to flood victims until he was shamed on social media because the city did not ask him to.

Not even Jesus would buy into this and he's the forgiving sort pic.twitter.com/LBnnHIKRAh

— Michele (@inthefade) August 30, 2017

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

Pastor Joel Osteen can’t seem to get his story straight about why he didn’t offer his 16,800-seat megachurch in Houston as a shelter sooner for those displaced by Hurricane Harvey. 

During an appearance on NBC’s “TODAY” show Wednesday, the head of Lakewood Church said its doors have “always been open.” Minutes later, he appeared to reverse course and admit that the church hadn’t initially encouraged victims to seek shelter there.

WATCH: “We were just being precautious, but the main thing is the city didn’t ask us to become a shelter then.” -Pastor @JoelOsteen pic.twitter.com/Qdn5vgm09H

— TODAY (@TODAYshow) August 30, 2017

“If people were here, they’d realize there were safety issues,” Osteen said during the TV appearance. “We were just being precautious, but the main thing is the city didn’t ask us to become a shelter then.”

Dozens of Houston-area churches, schools and community centers opened their doors to offer temporary shelter to survivors as Hurricane Harvey pummeled the city earlier this week.

First off "precautious" is not a word.

And secondly what a load of bullshit.

For several days this Lakewood Church and its pastor were shamed on social media to open their doors and help those who desperately needed a warm dry place to stay.

Only THEN did they do anything to help.

Did Jesus refuse to multiply the loaves and fishes until somebody called him out on Twitter?

Did Moses only part the Red Sea after being shamed for sitting on his ass on Instagram?

Actually neither of those things actually happened, but you get my point.

If you are going to call yourself a Christian, and preach to people that they should love and care for each other, while accepting millions of dollars in donations, then shouldn't you at least PRETEND that you embrace the teachings of Jesus Christ?

The real cancer in this country is fairly easy to detect.

The idea that seemingly rational people can say, or accept, this kind of thing absolutely boggles my freaking mind.

Religious scholar Reza Aslan slams televangelist Joel Osteen and the Christian prosperity movement.

Courtesy of Raw Story: 

During a question and answer session, the University of California at Riverside professor was asked about the portrayal of Jesus in movies. 

“I love all fictional presentations of Jesus. I think they are fantastic, whether it is the Last Temptation of Christ or The Passion — both of which are fiction. But — sorry about that, did I break that to you? — but again for me what is fascinating about those is it is just a representation of what I have been talking about all along, which is the incredible malleability of the Christ story, the way that it can become whatever you want it to become.” 

Aslan said his favorite representation of Jesus was from the 1970 rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar, and then pivoted to the issue of the prosperity gospel. 

“The fastest growing Protestant movement in North America is this movement that is referred to as the prosperity gospel,” he said. “This is the gospel preached by people like Joel Osteen and T.D. Jakes — and when I say people, I mean charlatans. The argument of the prosperity gospel, if I can put it flippantly, is that Jesus wants you to drive a Bentley. That is basically what the argument is. That what Jesus wants for you is material prosperity, and that if you literally give, you will literally be given tenfold. That’s not a metaphor, as it is in most churches. It is literal. You give me $10 and Jesus will give you $100.” 

“This is as profoundly an unscriptural interpretation of Jesus that exists,” Aslan remarked. “I mean, if there is one thing that is just so clear cut and just not open to interpretation at all of any kind when it comes to Jesus’s message, it is his condemnation of wealth.” 

“And yet, not only does this version of Christianity exist, as I say, it is honestly the fastest growing version of Protestant evangelical Christianity in North America. That’s because Jesus can be whatever you want him to be, and the Christian message can be whatever you want it to be.”

I have been saying this for years.

I actually find many of the things attributed to Jesus to be quite admirable, but modern Christianity has drifted so far from what he supposedly taught that it bears virtually no resemblance to anything that could have possibly been inspired by his words.

So today, like Aslan says, the Christian message can be whatever those who claim to represent his teachings want it to be.

And sadly they so much more often focused on what using his name can do for them, than in what sharing his teaching can do for others. 

This is not to suggest that he was a demigod, or that he even existed, but there are things of value in the words that they claim he spoke. And the value should not be minimized by reducing it to mere dollars and cents.

Especially when the Gospels specifically condemn that kind of thinking out of hand. 

I'm just saying.