Story Archive

False Profit

All Creflo Dollar of College Park, Ga., needs is “200,000 people committed to sow $300 or more [to] help achieve our goal,” he says. That will help “Project G650” get off the ground — literally: the televangelist, known for preaching “Prosperity Gospel” (the idea that tithing $1 for every $10 you earn to his “Creflo Dollar Ministries” will result in riches for yourself), needs a new private jet to fly him and his wife Taffi Dollar around the world “to spread the gospel.” And what he needs is the most expensive private jet made, the Gulfstream G650. His old jet is worn out, he says, and he “knew that it was time to begin to believe God for a new airplane.” (Dollar insists that’s his real name, and the reported “Michael Smith” that some say he was born with is an “urban legend.”) The new plane seats 14 passengers, sleeps six, and includes high-speed satellite Internet access. A local TV station notes that “after a huge social media backlash,” the video pleading for the money was taken down from the Creflo Dollar Ministries web site — but the donations page still lists it as an option for donations. (RC/CNN, WXIA Atlanta) ...Dollar knows: there’s a sucker recruited every minute.