That's David Van Biema's characterization of some of the scholarship of Jonathan Walton, an academic who studies adherents of the "prosperity gospel" within Pentecostal Christianity. Here's how Van Biema's piece begins:
Has the so-called Prosperity gospel
turned its followers into some of the most willing participants — and
hence, victims — of the current financial crisis? That's what a scholar
of the fast-growing brand of Pentecostal Christianity believes. While
researching a book on black televangelism, says Jonathan Walton, a
religion professor at the University of California at Riverside, he
realized that Prosperity's central promise — that God will "make a way"
for poor people to enjoy the better things in life — had developed an
additional, dangerous expression during the subprime-lending boom.
Walton says that this encouraged congregants who got dicey mortgages to
believe "God caused the bank to ignore my credit score and blessed me
with my first house." The results, he says, "were disastrous, because
they pretty much turned parishioners into prey for greedy brokers."
Read the whole thing. (Thanks to the DMN Religion Blog.)
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