Exploiting the medium of television to commercialise religion
Commentary by Kit Nascimento
BENNY Hinn has come and gone, filling the National Park like no politician, priest or performer has ever done and you have to wonder why. Thousands poured into the Park regardless of the threatening weather and the soggy, muddy ground underfoot, mainly for one reason: they came to see, mostly out of curiosity, whether Benny Hinn would or could perform a miracle by healing someone truly and genuinely seriously afflicted. Of course, the promoters in Guyana of the Benny Hinn performance, I am unwilling to call it a crusade, were careful, in advance, to avoid any commitment that Mr. Hinn would in fact perform a miracle. Nevertheless, the television advertising focussed on hardly anything else but Hinn "miraculously" healing the sick on stage witnessed by thousands in other countries. Benny Hinn is one of many evangelists who have exploited the medium of television coupled with all of the technology, the hype and artistry which goes with a modern stage performance, to bring in the crowds and commercialise religion. To date, there is no reliable, documented medical evidence to support the miracle of faith healing practised by tele-evangelists like Benny Hinn, but with the skilled professional use of very carefully planned stage performances, artfully recorded by the electronic media, miracles can indeed appear to be performed. Watch any professional wrestling match or magician performance on TV and you know how easy it is to practise deception with a camera. This is not to say that faith healing is not a genuine and sincerely practised religious belief. In fact, the use of spiritual or supernatural means to cure disease is an ancient practice and has long been associated with even the most conservative of Christian beliefs. The Greek temples of Aesculapius were legend as places of healing and it was not long before the early Christian churches introduced faith healing to match their counterparts in the ancient pagan temples in order to attract their flock. The New Testament Bible is replete with tales of Jesus healing the sick. Healing and exorcism were an important part of the Ministry of Jesus especially among the poor and dispossessed. Sickness and affliction were frequently associated with works of the devil and were often dealt with by faith healers as a result of demonic possession, as was the case with Jesus: "If it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the Kingdom of God has come upon you" (Luke 11:20, Matthew 12:28). The whole idea of the belief in the devil having taken possession of the body resulting in sickness is everywhere in the Old and New Testaments and in the Jewish apocalyptic writings. Prophets of God, as Jesus was, would drive out the evil spirits and banish the devil and heal the sick. But a condition always for the Prophet being able to perform his work in the name of God was a demand that the sufferer have faith. Once faith in God is manifest, then God's sovereignty over man is restored and established over the possessed, the devil would be exorcised and the afflicted would be healed. But any psychologist will tell you that many a physical ailment is a condition of the mind that does not need medicine to cure. It is essential that the Preacher/Prophet imprint his authority and power on the congregation by being the one through whom the miracle of healing is performed. This is exactly why the modern tele-evangelists have, with few exceptions, associated themselves with the miracle of healing to attract the thousands to their crusades and the millions of dollars that flow in from the sale of the television performances which follow. Witness a Benny Hinn stage performance and it exploits all of the ancient superstitions of the past and uses exactly the same approach as the Prophets of the past, the demand for faith, the laying on of hands, an assurance of pardon and forgiveness of sins and the driving out of disease as an aspect of satanic possession. The difference is the electronic media and satellite communication facilitating its absolute international commercialism for profit. When Benny Hinn came to Guyana, it was nothing more and nothing less than a commercial investment in a stage performance presented in the name of religious evangelism. He did not have to charge an entrance fee. His ushers made a collection instead which avoided paying an entertainment tax. He did not need to be paid to come here. The thousands who flocked to his performance were the unpaid actors of his television production where the real profits of the Benny Hinn ministries are realised. So, are the Benny Hinn's of our modern world so different from the more established and older Christian churches in practising the belief in faith healing? Not really. Faith healing has always been a tenant of the established church. In recent prayer book revisions of the Anglican Church, services designed for the purpose of healing disease have been recognised and actually set down as part of the established philosophy of the church. In a report of the Lambeth Conference of 1930, the assemblies of Bishops of the Anglican Communion held every decade, which pronounces on matters of faith and morals, but not doctrine, it says: "Disease is an evil to be combated ... this means that health or an orderly condition of body, mind and spirit is God's primary will for all his children". But it goes on to caution that "whilst religious methods are applicable to all cases of sickness, they would seem to be most appropriate where moral or intellectual difficulties have contributed to the disorder". It is this latter caution that the Benny Hinn evangelists choose to ignore in their mass television performances. But Benny Hinn only needs, at each performance, one psychological or dramatised cure out of thousands left disappointed and disillusioned, to market his brand of religion all the way to the bank. What a pity it had to come to Guyana.
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