Lux Life Kenneth Copeland is in the business of saving
souls.
As his bank account statements would attest to, it's a very lucrative business.
This famous televangelist spends his time preaching into a TV camera, hooting and hollering
to his viewers about the merits of living a Godly life and the blessings provided to
those who donate to his church.
But what's the truth behind Kenneth Copeland's ministry?
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let’s get back to Kenneth Copeland’s millionaire lifestyle!
Copeland Empire Are Copeland's grand gestures of faith genuine
or just a front used to pry cash away from folks who believe every word he says?
While we may never know the true nature of Kenneth Copeland's heart, his extremely lavish
lifestyle and questionable business practices imply that the bug-eyed Bible thumper has
more interest in his bottom line than anything else.
The 84-year old Texan and his family are worth hundreds of millions of dollars thanks to
his massive empire, TV personality, and business ventures.
Although one might assume a devout believer would use their fortune to support charitable
and religious efforts, Copeland has his eyes fixed on worldly possessions above all else.
A large portion of his fortune funds his extravagant life—a life filled with unnecessary luxuries
that he claims to be gifts bestowed upon him by God.
Early Life Copeland wasn't always the world's most popular
televangelist.
Although Kenneth Copeland Ministries now reaches many thousands of people on a regular basis,
the man himself came from very humble beginnings.
Before turning to the church, Copeland led a life that had nothing to do with religion
at all.
He was a licensed pilot, something he had always wanted to be after growing up near
an Air Force airfield.
He briefly dabbled in music, releasing a Billboard Top 40 hit in 1957 called "Pledge of Love."
Alas, his singing career was short-lived, and he was ultimately a one-hit-wonder.
Oral Roberts University It was around this time that he decided to
devote his life to Christian ministry.
His gospel journey officially began in 1966 when he enrolled at Oral Roberts University
in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The university is named after the legendary Oral Roberts, who’s generally considered
the founding father of the Charismatic Christian movement.
Charismatic Christianity is an expression of the faith that focuses on outward examples
of God working in the lives of believers.
More specifically, those who subscribe to the charismatic movement emphasize the importance
of being "baptized in the Holy Spirit'' and are interested in developing spiritual gifts,
which are unnatural abilities handed down by the Holy Spirit to certain individuals
to help others.
Basically, they're praying for superpowers.
Copeland arrived at Oral Roberts University with his wife, Gloria, their two kids, and
not a penny to his name.
Although the sudden move from Texas made little sense at the time, he said he had been called
by God to make the journey.
How would he maintain his pilot gig while keeping up with his academics and taking care
of his family?
Copeland had no idea.
But he felt like it was the right move, and it paid off in a big way.
Personal Pilot Through a stroke of good fortune, Copeland
became the chauffeur and personal pilot for none other than Oral Roberts himself.
One of the most prominent televangelists of all time—the godfather of the movement Copeland
would one day help lead himself—had taken young Copeland in and become something of
a mentor to him.
So it's easy to see how Copeland became the man he is today.
Kenneth Copeland Ministries Copeland took everything Roberts taught him
and, with his wife, took the biggest step of their lives.
In 1967, they started their own ministry, Kenneth Copeland Evangelistic Association,
which would eventually grow into Kenneth Copeland Ministries, the religious behemoth known around
the globe today.
The ministry saw steady growth during the 1970s.
They were initially spreading their message in a four-page newsletter read by about 3,000
people in 1973.
After moving to radio in 1975 and eventually adding a weekly television broadcast in 1979,
Copeland quickly became one of the loudest voices in Christian media.
Believer’s Voice of Victory In 1989, their top-rated daily TV show, Believer's
Voice of Victory, officially entered the picture, and the Copeland empire was off and running.
The Believer's Voice of Victory program still airs today, and it provides the basis for
the massive operation Copeland now spearheads.
According to the official Ministries website, the show reaches 2.3 billion potential viewers
- that's almost a third of the world's population that could be tuning in at any given time.
However, that's not to say that they're actually watching.
If it seems like Copeland's show is always on, that's because it is.
In 2015, the ministry launched the Believer's Voice of Victory Network.
Known today as the VICTORY Channel, it's an entire TV channel devoted to Copeland-related
programming.
That means Kenny around the clock, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
No wonder he's become such a recognizable face, even if most people know him as "that
crazy pastor guy on TV that tried to cure COVID."
Holy High-Life Whatever you think of his brand, Copeland
and his family are certainly enjoying the fruits of his ministry's labor.
His over-the-top personality and message of prosperity rakes in donations on a daily basis.
Copelands estimated net-worth?
About $300 Million.
That's a lot of dough, and it's earned him his place as the richest pastor in the world.
But how exactly did preaching the gospel on TV earn Copeland that kind of outrageous cash?
It's important to know what Copeland says to his audience to understand why they're
willing to donate so much money to his ministry.
Kenneth Copeland is one of the biggest supporters of Prosperity Gospel.
Prosperity Gospel In case you haven’t been following our channel
lately, we’ll go over prosperity gospel briefly again.
It's the idea that God financially blesses those who give to the church and perform good
deeds.
While it's never explicitly described in the Bible, this belief system has become widely
popular thanks to televangelists like Copeland, Joel Osteen, and Creflo Dollar, who tell their
large viewerships to hand over their money and obey the rules laid out in the Bible faithfully.
If they do this, their wealth will multiply as a result, or so they say.
The message of prosperity gospel is criticized for preying on those who are struggling financially.
These folks hear a guy like Copeland and think God will turn their lives around if they just
send him some money.
What's a few dollars in donations when there's a million-dollar reward waiting for you?
Copeland has snared more than a few individuals in this prosperity trap, and his enormous
net worth speaks to its effectiveness.
The televangelism giant doesn't hold back from acknowledging his tremendous wealth,
either.
In an Inside Edition interview, Copeland not only admitted to being a wealthy man, he boasted
about it, claiming it was a sign of his devotion to God's work—devotion that's been rewarded
with a great flood of cash.
Copeland also says that his expansive property is home to copious oil reserves, which has
resulted in even more profits for the multi-millionaire.
Although the Bible describes a humble existence for God's followers, Kenneth Copeland certainly
doesn’t do that.
He lives in a sprawling $10.8 million dollar estate that sits directly adjacent to the
Kenneth Copeland Airport.
It's safe to say that his church-funded home looks more like the Playboy mansion.
Gulfstream Jet And you heard that right; his church has an
airport.
The church-sponsored hangar houses the ministry's private aircraft collection, which includes
a pricey Gulfstream V private jet that Copeland bought from actor Tyler Perry in 2018.
Copeland came under a considerable amount of fire for buying the luxury jet, with many
questioning its necessity.
Oh, and by the way, he already owned two other private planes at the time.
Copeland vehemently defended his decision to drop millions of dollars on the luxury
jet, stating it was a necessary purchase given the global scale of his work.
As he claimed in the ambush Inside Edition interview, his ministry doesn't have the resources
it needs to fulfill all of the many commitments it has lined up around the world.
Tyler Perry's Gulfstream jet would help with that, or so Copeland insists.
In 2010, for example, Copeland's ministry had promised to provide substantial aid to
the disaster relief efforts in Haiti after a devastating earthquake hit.
The relief assistance program was dubbed "Angel Flight 44".
Well, despite the lofty promises, Angel Flight 44 never took off.
A spokesperson for the Copeland brand would later explain that they simply didn't have
their planes in proper working order, denying that the ministry had ever officially committed
to any relief effort in the first place.
As a result, Copeland critics ripped Copeland apart for the debacle, and he used the incident
to justify buying Tyler Perry's jet.
He needed it to do God's work, you see.
The plane wasn't so he could fly between his various vacation homes...which he was ultimately
caught doing.
Tax Exemption As you've probably noticed, Ken Copeland has
his fair share of detractors, despite his immense popularity among viewers of his program.
Their anti-Copeland feelings come from his church's tax-exempt status.
In short, this multi-millionaire televangelist who convinces his followers to donate thousands
of dollars through prosperity preaching hardly pays any taxes.
Churches and other religious organizations are awarded generous tax credits by federal
law.
But the qualifications to receive tax-exempt status couldn't be any more vague.
Any organization that can be accurately described as a place of worship qualifies for these
special exemptions.
Even though his ministry operates like a secular business, Copeland can avoid taxes on his
beefy earnings.
Many question the legitimacy of Kenneth Copeland Ministries' status as an exclusively religious
organization, and Copeland's support of Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee in 2008
served as yet another red flag.
Under the tax legislation enforced by the IRS, churches and religious organizations
are not allowed to "intervene in political campaigns," or else they'll be disqualified
from receiving the tax credits.
However, Huckabee, then-governor of Arkansas, made several guest appearances on Believer's
Voice of Victory leading up to the 2008 election.
The content of their discussions on the show primarily centered around Huckabee's new book.
Promoting guests' book releases was a common practice on Copeland's program, but usually,
the guests aren't running for President.
Things got even dicier after the Huckabee campaign used facilities owned by Kenneth
Copeland Ministries for fundraising events.
The 2006 Investigation Copeland's involvement with Huckabee's bid
for the presidency raised a lot of eyebrows.
As a result, Kenneth Copeland Ministries, along with five other televangelist organizations,
were investigated by a Senate committee led by Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley following the
situation with Huckabee.
The purpose of the investigation was to uncover any hole in the tax exemption laws that might
permit organizations such as Copeland's to cheat the system.
The Senate inquiry, which spanned four years, did not discover any concrete evidence of
wrongdoing on the part of Copeland's ministry.
However, financial analysts of all sorts agreed there was something fishy about the way they
ran things over at Kenneth Copeland Ministries.
Members of Copeland's family have benefited directly from the ministry's work and vice
versa.
This includes Ken's son, John Copeland, who started his very own ranching business on
33-acres of his father's church property.
The land has quadrupled in value, and the church received another tax benefit for using
their land for agricultural purposes.
In all, 15 members of the Copeland family were found to be on the ministry's payroll,
with a combined yearly salary coming out to more than a million bucks.
Furthermore, Gloria Copeland's brother-in-law is the President of a media company that buys
television time for Kenneth Copeland Ministries.
That company, ironically called "Integrity Media," charges an extremely discounted rate
for the TV time it acquires.
There's nothing technically illegal about any of this, but it calls into question the
real motivation behind some of Ken Copeland's work.
Is it really all for the glory of God?
Perhaps.
But there's plenty of evidence to the contrary.
Copeland Controversies As if all that wasn't enough, Copeland has
found himself in hot water several other times over the years.
In 2015, comedian John Oliver did an entire segment on his show, Last Week Tonight, centered
around Copeland and other televangelists.
Oliver started his own fake church playfully called "Our Lady of Perpetual Exemption" as
part of the show.
The point was to highlight the immense amount of untaxed donations ministries like Copeland's
get from viewers who buy into their prosperity gospel message.
Oliver succeeded in exposing the sketchy nature of these transactions, collecting many thousands
of dollars in donations in just one week, much of which would not be taxed.
Oliver ended up giving all the money he obtained to Doctors Without Borders rather than hoarding
it for himself, but the televangelists he satired are not so generous.
There's also the tragic story of Bonnie Parker, a cancer patient who chose to donate all of
her money to Ken Copeland's church rather than seek professional medical help for her
condition.
She believed Copeland when he said God would heal her if she "sowed" her money properly.
In 2004, Parker passed away, neglecting to receive the treatment she desperately needed.
Nevertheless, Copeland pocketed her money all the same.
Copeland showed off his total disregard for science once again just this past year during
his now-infamous COVID-19 rant.
In a completely unhinged segment, Copeland stared into the camera, offered out his hand,
and used the transcendent healing power he wields to end the global pandemic and heal
all those afflicted with the virus.
It was an absurd stunt that serves as the latest example of Copeland's outlandish behavior—behavior
clearly meant to entice donations from his audience.
COVID Beliefs Even though so many Americans, including many
who watch his program, lost their jobs as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak, Copeland
insisted that they should continue to offer up donations to his ministry and that doing
so would bless them financially in the long run.
The prosperity gospel at its most manipulative.
Despite his many glaring flaws and the multitude of controversies, Kenneth Copeland and his
ministry will continue to flourish as he approaches the twilight of his life.
Why is he so popular?
There's a certain irresistible hope in the message he spouts to his avid viewers.
People love to hear that they're going to be rich and God is going to bless them.
It's an uplifting thing to be told.
Unfortunately for those who resonate with the prosperity gospel's message, there are
leeches in the holy water that seek to profit from their vulnerability.
So is Copeland a true man of the cloth, or just another leaching preacher who's looking
to steal your money?
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