Christian televangelist asks supporters to buy him a $54 million dollar jet

May 30, 2018 • 11:45 am

No wonder they call Christians congregations “a flock”, since they’re so easily led and so easily fleeced. Meet preacher Jesse Duplantis of New Orleans, who, in this video, is asking his sheeple to ante up $54 million to buy him his fourth private jet, a Falcon 7X. He’s fleeced ’em thrice before, and here he’s doing it again.

The Washington Post has an article about Duplantis and other “prosperity gospel” ministers who get planes by squeezing their followers like lemons, but the five-minute video below speaks for itself. How can people watch this and not be horrified by the obvious lies and dissimulation? As Christopher Hitchens said about Jerry Falwell, “you can get away with the most extraordinary offenses to morality and truth in this country if you’ll just get yourself called ‘Reverend’.”

The best part of this video is at 1:20, where Duplantis says God told him to ask for this jet to “come up where I’m at”. He also emphasizes that it’s the ministry, not himself, who owns the plane. (That avoids taxes, of course!) And, of course, Jesus himself would be flying around in a jet if he were here today (3:10)! And, as Duplantis maintains, “I can’t live long enough to travel by car.”

The next time you hear a Christian reminding us that religion is good because it promotes charitable acts, remind them about the many preachers like Duplantis who direct that charity into their own pockets.

h/t: Olen

72 thoughts on “Christian televangelist asks supporters to buy him a $54 million dollar jet”

    1. Yecch! I am happy that Al Gore and Barack Obama are Trekkies, but became less sanguine when I discovered Ted Cruz was also a fan.

      But if you unpack Star Trek carefully, it solidly preaches humanist values.

        1. I don’t know if you could call those episodes atheistic; in fact, I always found them a bit too mired in the idea of spirituality for my taste (though DS9 is still tied with TNG for my favorite series). The wormhole aliens exist and, though they’re not gods, their existence and actions substantiate the claims of the Bajoran religion.

        2. To expand on my previous comment:

          All of Major Kira’s religious beliefs turn out to be true, and her faith is repeatedly rewarded and/or shown to be properly placed.

          1. I agree with you to an extent; but, do you remember the episode in series one where Kai Wynn interfered with the school? And Dax was also a voice of reason. I always thought of the prophecies coming through as coincidence. = )

          2. Yup, those are definitely fair points. There was a message of separating religion from education, but the show didn’t exactly come down against the Bajorans and what amounted to their theocratic government.

            Maybe part of me is still bitter that some portions of the final episodes were spent on Kai Winn and her silly pah-wraiths. Being bitter doesn’t make much sense for me, as I was too young to have watched it live at the time, but my reaction to that scene in the fire caves is second in disappointment to my reaction while watching TNG’s Shades of Gray.

          3. You’re right; thinking about it; it didn’t; rather, isolated episodes, or even conversations, leant towards atheism. When you consider the criteria for acceptance into the Federation, an entire planet which is a theocracy should be excluded because of that very thing.

            Yes whenever we watch the last episode’ we fast wind through the fire caves!

  4. I live across the street from Lakewood Church. America’s largest church, and home to none other than Joel Osteen.

    I have walked around his “church” on numerous occasions. Would y’all believe me if I told you that the manholes (sorry, ladies) covers which cover the sewers are custom designed? Yes, they have the Lakewood name and logo on them. A former client of mine estimated that each custom designed manhole cover cost approximately $1k ! I counted ten manhole covers, so that means that Joel spent $10k on custom designed manhole covers which the City of Houston would have graciously provided FOR FREE !!!

    Wish I could post pix here LOL

    2. Joel Osteen displayed the true colors of the “prosperity gospel” mentality in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey last year. “Mattress Mack” Jim McIngvale pretty much put him to shame by comparison.

  6. I just don’t know why, if he wants to go first class he is not stepping up to a Gulf Stream G650ER. I don’t think spending another 10 or 15 million is too much to ask. Go figure. And to even bring up fuel price? It’s like having a Rolls Royce and then complaining about fuel mileage. The only reason he would want to use only his fuel is if he stole it.

    1. Reminds of a song from some years back. I thought the song was about “cheese sticks.” Could have sworn that was what they were singing. I was later informed that they were singing “G6”, as in the airplane.

      1. Funny, I always sang “Are you reeling the cheese? Throwin’ Away the rind. Are you gathering up the cheese? Have you had enough of mine?” My sincerest apologies to Steely Dan, but as a kid I had no idea what they were saying, and as an adult, I can’t sing it any other way now. Not that it has anything to do with this dumbass, except perhaps that Babybel cheeses are of course known as the “baby Jesus”.

      1. I remember that guy. Why not – if you can trick them into the big private jet, why not go all the way. If you are going to be disgusting you should be really disgusting. Be like Trump.

    3. He’s probably been stockpiling fuel, perhaps at different locations, so he can escape to NZ when the End Times arrive. As a NZer I’m grateful that Armageddon is a myth. Also that there aren’t many of us and almost half are nones, so there’s no way he’ll come early because he’d never make any money here.

      1. May we fervently wish he miscalculates his fuel reserves and makes it no further than the middle of the Pacific?

        cr

  8. It just occurred to me that Trump and his base are a sort of “prosperity gospel”. The “preacher” is definitely in it for the money and his supporters look to him as a rich guy they want to emulate. Unfortunately we’re all donating to his cause whether we like it or not.

    1. I love the “prosperity gospel” in one way: it is a case study in the (formal) fallacy of affirming the consequent. Consider:

      If god blesses you, you’ll get rich.

      Plausible enough in a Christian context, at least.

      But the prosperity gospel is:

      I’m (going to become) rich, therefore god (will) blesses me!

  9. I’m half seriously considering of becoming a reverend myself. I might not have the Charisma, but I guess that can be learned. I know of much better uses of 47 m U$D than to buy a fourth private jet.
    Just considering if I’d be up to it, it requires one to be fake about 24/7. No mean task.

    1. The other thing about this that bothers me. Such a poor use of the flock’s money. If he would trade in the old jet when he buys a new one he could save a bunch of money. A lot of people could make a good living, just off the old jets he hangs on to. Oh well, Jesus works in mysterious ways.

      1. Yes yhat’s another problem considering becoming a preacher, does one go with the Jesus thing, or do we go new alltogether?
        I fear I would have to go with Jeesus here.

      2. Probably have to go with the Jeesus thing. I hope all of you would support me. Getting dozens of atheists on board would give great kudos. (‘This preacher convinced dozens of atheists to renounce their erroneous and sinful ways’. I promise that after a few years and millions of U$D I will disclose 🙂

  10. Sure, religion promotes charitable acts, but what is the control mechanism that prevents parasites like this guy from feeding off of it?
    The answer partly lies in innate sense of morality that people are just born with independent of religious indoctrination.

  11. Hitchens also said of Falwell “If you gave [Jerry] Falwell an enema he could be buried in a matchbox.”, which applies to this xtian con artist as well.

  13. Sounds like a worthy cause; where do I donate?

    I’ve been jaded about this kinda crap since the first time I saw Billy Graham parading around in a $500 suit — back when 500 clams could get ya some bespoke threads on Fleet Street.

    Lookin’ like the good Reverend gonna squeeze his flock, to paraphrase the line Page & Plant copped from Robert Johnson, ’till the juice runs down its leg.

  14. The guy is the merest piker compared to the RCC. At least he’s more up front about it.

  15. The real question is how many of his people will fall for the scam. All too many I fear as they try to decide whether they have enough money to give both to the Reverend and Trump. I try to suppress the thought that these people vote.

    1. To hell with voting, I’m trying to suppress the thought that these people breed!

  16. There is a wonderful YouTube video of this con man having a conversation with fellow con man Kenneth Copeland on their absolute need for private jets. As mentioned, they are so important that they cannot waste time driving any where, but more importantly, commercial airliners are “demon-filled tubes” that directly interfere with their conversations with god. These men are sick but clearly understand that the flock can be fleeced.

  17. Hmm. I saw the video (earlier — it’s not working for me now)and immediately sent him a check (cashed in the retirement fund for it) and sent it along with the deed to my house. Then I read the comments here and … well, I’m starting to have second thoughts.

  19. Reminds me of the scene in the Steve Martin movie The Jerk in which he’s become rich and is hearing a man’s hard-luck request for new airplane seats — because the leather on the old ones is cracked.

    Search on “The Jerk Charities” to see the scene. (How do you link to a YouTube video anymore?)

    1. Ha! I forgot about that. Wonderful! By the way do you know the address of that guy with the cracked seat in his plane? I might send him a check.

    2. Like so:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg

      (You find the scene in Youtube, copy the URL from the address bar in your browser, paste it into the WEIT comment box, then remove the “https://” at the start so it doesn’t imbed the whole video and incur PCC’s wrath (WordPress automagically puts it back to create a clickable link)

      cr

  21. He’s only keeping up with the Joneses. (Do you have that saying in the US of A?) Maybe with luck he’ll keep up with the Jonestowns.

    (Ooh that was nasty, even for me 😎

    Here’s John Oliver on the topic of aviating televangelists.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7y1xJAVZxXg

    cr

  22. I got here too late. The video has been taken down “…due to a complaint claim by Jesse Duplantis Ministries.” So he’s complaining about his own video.

    Gee, I so much wanted to see it!

  23. So apparently, furiously stupid and false claims don’t necessarily prevent preachers from attracting thousands of converts.

    I see no reason to think Christianity’s popularity would have been hindered in the least, if the apostles in Acts were followed around by Jews displaying an open casket containing Jesus’ corpse for anybody to see.

    People simply aren’t truth-robots. They care more about joining and feeling wanted, than they care about whether their group’s claims are actually true.

    That’s what apologists would necessarily have to say about the many Christian “cults” of today and the false teachers spoken of in the NT, so they have to allow that the same excuse could just as easily hold for the apostles and their followers.

  25. I read these days a Yahoo!News report about some pastor sexually abusing a little girl, and now after he was arrested, his supporters harassed the victim. A commenter nicknamed “Facts Expert” wrote the following:

    “Religion is gross. It’s just a club for weak minded sexually dysfunctional people who like to waste a perfectly good Sunday patting themselves on the back and singing songs to a magical man in the sky instead of spending the day practicing what they preach. Could you imagine how great christians would actually be if millions of them spent a few hours on Sunday morning giving of their time and 10% of their income to their community instead of handing it over to tax evaders building luxury mega churches that sit empty 99% of the time? The mega church near me hires security guards to keep the homeless people from parking their rv’s on the property. The property used to be a beautiful farm. They purchased it with the promise to the owners who were getting too old to care for it and wanted it to be something great along with the surrounding community members that it would remain a farm and be turned into a camp for children. They lied, bulldozed the beautiful farmhouse, barns, and orchards, paved as much of it as they legally could and built another mega church that clogs the surrounding country roads every Sunday holding those in the community hostage to their schedule. 100% of their congregation is from outside the community. They are now suing the small town to pay for widening the road which will come with the demolition of several dozen homes. I don’t respect Christians because of my experiences with them.”

    I wish he had identified the town!

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