Free Republic

A Nigerian prophet has come under intense scrutiny after his prediction that the rapture and the end of the world would coincide on April 25, 2024, failed to materialise. Despite proclaiming to have been shown the date through divine revelations during trances, the prophet’s claims have sparked a mixture of ridicule and criticism across social media platforms. The prophet, with the handle @Prophetmetu on X, claimed he experienced the visions on two separate occasions, expressed his own trepidation about the revelations. In his statement, he emphasised the clarity of his visions, where he saw two distinct mountains and felt a...

The Meeting House church in Oakville, ON, which disgraced pastor Bruxy Cavey once led, is shutting down for a month after being unable to find abuse insurance following nearly 40 different reports of sexual abuse against four pastors within the church. Bruxy Cavey is one of the country’s most recognizable religious leaders. Far from being orthodox, he is also a false teacher who denies penal substitutionary atonement, biblical inerrancy, the eternality of hell, has an unbiblical view of the sin of homosexuality, and displays an affinity for open-theism. In 2021, Cavey was released from his position at The Meeting House,...

Check out Gary Curtis’ related article, “Avoiding Sexual Sins and Scandals,” at this link. Some contend that God sees all sins as the same and that one sin is not more difficult for God to forgive than another. While they may think that sounds reasonable and righteous, it ignores the admonitions of revealed Scripture and how sexual impurity damages us personally, weakens our witness and can be destructive to the family of God. Pastor Jack Hayford, respected author, songwriter and church leader, once wrote, “I believe that sex sins are worse in that they are more damaging personally and socially...

The prosperity preacher who was robbed at gunpoint during a live-streamed service and relieved of reported $400,000 in watches, rings, and chains, and then subsequently was found guilty of wire fraud and extortion, has been sentenced to nine years in federal prison. According to reports: U.S. District Judge Lorna G. Schofield imposed the punishment on Monday, after Whitehead was found guilty of numerous fraud and attempted extortion charges, along with lying to the FBI. Prosecutors portrayed the 45-year-old church leader as a grifter, siphoning money from his followers — and demanding money for what he claimed was influence over New...

Several weeks ago we revealed that Saddleback Church has joined other large megachurches in the VR space, recently hosting its first Virtual Reality church service through the Metaverse. We’ve covered Saddleback Church on several occasions after Andy and Stacie Wood, the new ‘pastors’ of the 25,000-membe multisite, dressed up as Toy Story characters for a sermon series, after they ordained several pastrixes and were expelled from the SBC for it, after they hosted a “Blacks Only worship service” where no white members were allowed in, so the “black gold” could have a “safe space” to “heal,” and after they had...

Chuck Parry is the Director of Healing Ministries at Bethel Church in Redding, California, and one of the primary teacher of the schools. According to his bio, his life is “marked by both faith and the miraculous” and he’s “seen the dead raised, food multiplied, storms move out of the way, the supply of heaven released through supernatural finances, and countless people healed and their lives transformed.” Readers of Protestia will recognize him as overseeing Bethel Church’s healing schools which spent nearly two years shut down during COVID. In fact, in October of 2020, Bethel and their school had so...

Three leaders at televangelist Mark Barclay’s Michigan church face charges of sexual assault. Now, the latest leader to be involved is facing additional charges, according to Midland County Circuit Court records. Randy Saylor, associate pastor at Living Word International Church in Midland, Michigan, was charged with three new charges of second-degree criminal sexual conduct at a pre-exam conference on Tuesday. Two of the charges involve a minor while the other involves someone he was related to, according to court records. In May, Saylor, was charged with two other second-degree criminal sexual conduct charges, The Roys Report (TRR) previously reported. Saylor,...

For those of us who have raised children, you might remember the question. There was a commercial, as I recall, that used the question to emphasize one product or the other in a humorous way.Children in the back seat of the car in the commercial kept asking, “Are we there yet?”We who transported our young kids on those times – especially on longer trips to Grandmas or other destinations – have heard that question, often in whining tones as time went on. I certainly remember hearing it. And I’m sure my parents heard it on those long trips from Pekin,...

The International House of Prayer’s (IHOP) Kansas City church held its final service last week in Grandview, a conclusion and natural consequence of the sprawling sex abuse scandal brought on by founder and disgraced prophet Mike Bickle. Bickle was uncovered to be one of the most manipulative, creepy, and pervy “prophets’ of the past fifty years, causing his vaunted ministry to implode. Forerunner Church Senior pastor Isaac Bennett led the service, which was packed to the brim with members and ministry partners exchanging farewells and teary goodbyes to each other, mourning the loss. Mike Bickle was not present. “This morning...

On May 19, 2024, prosperity-gospel heretic Joel Osteen preached his 1000th sermon before a packed crowd at Lakewood church, giving a message of health and wealth in a sermon titled A Thousand Times More. Osteen was ordained through his father’s church in 1983 and preached his first sermon on January 17, 1999. He was a stand-in for his father, John Osteen, who was in a hospital bed at the time and passed later that day. Bristling with nervous energy and wearing a suit and jacket too large for him, a mulleted Osteen fumbled his way through 1 Corinthians while encouraging...

Controversial televangelist Benny Hinn said his two “biggest regrets” in his decades-long ministry include promoting prophecies he now admits “were not accurate or from the Lord” and pushing “prosperity theology."“The two things I regret most in ministry: I was not too wise a number of times with prophecy,” the 71-year-old charismatic preacher told Stephen Strang, host of The Strang Report, in a recent interview. “I had guests come to the crusades that I think brought harm to not only people’s lives but also to my reputation because their prophecies were not really prophecy. They went outside the borders of redemption.”“And...

Arch-heretic Benny Hinn is deleting a raft of videos from his YouTube channel, willingly losing millions of views in the wake of a devastating exposé against him. Two weeks ago, we reported that a ministry associated with Benny Hinn was claiming copyright strikes against Mike Winger, unjustly targeting him on account of a video critical of the famed con man* After Winger released a four-hour-long blistering critique of Hinn, replete with multiple videos and commentary demonstrating that the money-grubbin’ heretic is a two-fold son of hell (Our description, not his), the video was struck by Jesus Image Ministries, an enterprise...

Currently in the Liturgies of daily Mass we have been reading the Book of Revelation. It is commonly read at the end of the liturgical year, for it bespeaks the end of, and passing qualities of all things of this world. It is also a book of glory, depicting the ultimate victory of our Lord Jesus Christ, after a great period of conflict between the doomed kingdom of this world, and the victorious Kingdom of Christ. In this context the Book of Revelation is not a mere tour guide to the last days, but is a book of glory reminding...

A server and her co-workers have been left shaking their heads after a series of interactions with a woman who was convinced the world was ending on April 8, 2024 — and who is now hoppin' mad and behaving in a most un-Christian fashion. Unlike most eclipses, the one on April 8 was special for Americans because the U.S. was in the "path of totality," a roughly 100-mile-wide swath from Texas to Maine in which the Moon completely obscures the Sun and ushers in a brief period of nighttime in the middle of the day. "A woman came to our...

A little girl told her mother 'I love you’ in an attempt to stop the woman torturing her to death in a day-long church ‘exorcism’, newly released court documents reveal. Three-year-old Arely Proctor pleaded for her life and struggled to escape as she was battered and strangled by her mother Claudia Hernandez, 27, and her pastor relatives. Two years after her body was found by police on the altar of a Pentecostal church in San Jose, California, authorities have still to decide whether her killers will stand trial. ‘Over the course of approximately twenty hours Arely Doe fought for her...

In Florida, a private Christian school's decision to cancel Autism Awareness Week after the school's pastor claimed such an event is "idolatry and demonic" has sparked backlash from parents vowing to pull their kids out. Trinity Christian Academy in the Lake Worth Beach area, affiliated with the Pentecostal Assemblies of God denomination, faced backlash after Pastor Matt Baker announced the cancellation of the week's activities in a March 30 email to families. Baker argued that these events led students to prioritize identities over their faith in Jesus Christ. The planned activities, similar to previous years, included themed dress-up days aimed...

In January 2023, Ministry Watch reported on the arrest of a worship leader and music teacher—Joseph “Kade” Abbott, 27—for sexual misconduct against a 14-year-old girl. Authorities charged him with three counts of sexual assault. According to his attorney, last week he agreed to plead guilty to all three counts. Apostolic Christian Academy in Maryville, Tennessee / Facebook Abbot taught at Apostolic Christian Academy, held on the property of First Apostolic Church in Maryville, Tenn. The victim was a student at the academy, and the two met weekly one-on-one during school hours. They also participated in the same group trip to...

Church of the Rock in Winnipeg, led by pastor Mark Hughes, is known for its unique Easter sermons, interpreting the death, burial, and resurrection of the Lord of Glory as Hollywood blockbusters, ranging from Monty Python and the Holy Grail to Toy Story, Star Wars, Tombstone, Indiana Jones, Robin Hood, Back to the Future, and Pirates of the Caribbean. We last covered them after they crucified Iron Man on stage, then crucified Buzz Lightyear, Simba. and then most recently Batman. A straightforward exegesis and the proclamation of the good news of the resurrection as told by the scriptures is seemingly...

he Ambassador Seed of Love Church, which is part of the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ (COOLJC), is a Philadelphia-based Oneness Pentecostal church led by Edward “Busta” Fields. COOLJC differs from many Pentecostal denominations and groups in that it doesn’t allow women to be pastors and has a stricter view of divorce and remarriage, though for teh most part it follows the same beats. During a recent church service, Seed of Love Church did not merely perform Miley Cyrus’ 2009 hit The Climb, as some sort of mid-service performance or musical interlude, as many churches do, but actually incorporated...

ermell Witherspoon and Royce Yeun are the impastors of Common Good Church in Bellevue, WA, one-two punch combination of Christ-hating heretics if there ever was one. Four years ago, Yeun preached a message titled “-Isms: Heterosexism,” which argued Christians need to “shift” their understanding of what the Bible says about queer affirmation. Their church swiftly did that very thing, coming to “fully affirm and celebrate our LGBTQIA+ siblings and believe that everyone— no matter their sexual orientation, gender identity, or marital status— belongs here and can share in the worship, rites, sacraments, membership, and leadership of this church.” Four months...