Loan modification and debt cancellation are hot businesses right now. So hot that God himself apparently decided to get in on the action.

Here’s a story of how one man built himself a surging evangelistic ministry, complete with "God’s debt cancellation" program – yours for the unbelievably low payment of a mere few hundred bucks:

Emotional on-air pitches generate much of the money used to pay network salaries. In March, Morris Cerullo appeared on Inspiration’s “camp meeting” with a message to fire up prospective donors.

“Is anybody ready for the greatest financial breakthrough you’ve ever experienced in your life?” he asked.

The elder Cerullo, a Pentecostal minister, at times appeared to speak in tongues. His gravelly voice periodically rising to a shout, he urged members of the audience to fill envelopes with $900 donations.

“When you sow for your financial anointing, the windows of heaven are going to open for you,” he said. “ … In the next nine months, you are going to experience more financial blessings than you’ve ever experienced in your life! 100 fold! Debt cancellation!”

Soon, these words appeared on the screen: “Call now with your $900 offering and receive God’s debt cancellation.”

Ames Alexander and Tim Funk of Charlotte Observer have the investigative report: Link – via Raw Story

The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.

More than half of people who attend services at least once a week — 54 percent — said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according to the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.

Link

(Photo: sduffy [Flickr])