Dear Pat Robertson – can you please shut up?
I know you intend well when you tell people the reason for tragedy in the world is their pact with the Devil, but please just shut up because you sir could not be more wrong.
Telling hopeless people the reason for their destruction, is that God won’t help them because of their sin, is contradictory to the message of the cross. People in darkness are not to blame for stumbling, they are in darkness and can’t see.
For the record, God doesn’t need you to tell broken people about the mess they have made by shining the golden light of your life on theirs. God has not appointed or anointed you and your club to be the benchmark of Godly living. Wearing fine clothes and driving fine cars and living in gated communities does not qualify you to measure the rest of the world by your standard. The thing hurting people need is compassion and love and when questions about why bad things happen to them come up, “I don’t know” works every time, so say more of that.
Here are a few other suggestions I would like you to consider:
Can you please stop thinking and telling people God is American? God loves the world, not just North America, and if you read his book you will notice He is really quite fond of the Middle East.
Can you please stop drawing distinctions that one religion is better than another? Jesus wasn’t even Christian, he was Jewish, so stop thinking Christianity is the end all be all when it comes to trying to please God. Religion is mans attempt to please God but He is already pleased so stop trying to make Him happy with religion. God made it clear He hates religion. What He really wants is relationship.
Can you please stop telling people that God is somehow punishing them for the actions of their ancestors and in the same breath, demand they serve that vengeful God you just painted for them? God settled all this a long time ago on a hill at Calvary.
Can you please stop selling the name of Jesus like it is a secret decoder ring that once put on makes you exempt from pain and suffering? Life is hard Pat. Earthquakes happen, planes fly into buildings, wars are started by selfish men, and being saved does not exempt you from having trouble. In fact, it all but guarantees you will, the good news is you won’t go it alone.
And finally, will you please stop reinforcing hurting peoples idea of an angry God by telling them He caused pain and suffering because you sir, are wrong. God isn’t angry at us – He loves us.
If you could work on those things for me I would really appreciate it because when you do the opposite, from behind your cameras in your multi-million dollar studio up the road, it makes it really difficult for me to talk to people about my God.
To be fair, there is much good that comes from CBN, so thank your for the good stuff Pat. Thank you for Operation Blessing, and your prayer ministry, and Regent University, and lots of other positive stuff. You might think about letting the good people that work for you talk about tragedy when it comes up. They seem less apt to get all “Old Testament” and you can avoid most of the problems of late.
Speaking of problems, there is one thing that truly breaks my heart about all of this. It is the thing that makes me want to disassociate myself from anything “Christian” when I hear it. It is the revelation from Christians that they somehow “know” the real reason behind tragedies in the world. This banter usually comes up right after tragedy strikes and if it is true, that they “knew”, a painful question burns in me.
If you knew Pat, really knew, why did you do NOTHING to stop it?
Let’s pretend for arguments sake the earthquake in Haiti was a result of pacts with the Devil. Take this a step further and why not associate all the pain and suffering of Haiti to this same revelation – pacts with the Devil. If that is the case, and you “knew” the reason for their destruction was an alliance with evil, why in hell didn’t you do something to stop it? Saying people deserve destruction because of something outside their own ability to control leads them to question the nature of God. The message you are sending is God made this happen but you sir, could not be more wrong.
You can’t blame the people of Haiti for this as they are in darkness, by your own admission, so aren’t you in fact guilty of murder by letting them stumble to their death? To come out after the fact and tell people you “know why” tragedy happened, and in the same breath offer to them the solution to what could have prevented it appears to be incredibly mean spirited! Especially when that solution was so simple, to turn from darkness.
If you need someone to blame for the pain and suffering in the world don’t blame the people in darkness, blame me and blame you because we know better. People in darkness are doing the best they can as they stumble through life but God has given us light hope and love, so we know better how to see in the dark.
And since we know better, and were content to let them stumble, their pain and suffering is our fault.
David, I couldn’t agree with you more! If I were a more brilliant writer I could have written it myself. I certainly feel the same way.
If we all pray for the Haitian people and contribute even a small amount to a charity we trust things can change for the better there. My heart goes out to the people who have lost their homes and family members and to the orphaned children.