The Pantagraph from Bloomington, Illinois • Page 28

Sfl THE PANTAGRAPH, Thursday, Nov. 25, 1993 Professor: Televangelism will flourish despite scandals ORLEANS (AP) At first gfpqce, scandals that hit the television empires of evangelists Jim Jimmy Swaggart, Oral RfCerts and Robert Tilton appeared to have taken their toll on a business that blossomed throughout much of the 1980s. jC. Nielsen the overseer of tyision ratings, says not only hye the number of religious shows dropped sharply since 1988, but Of course, not all religious pro-i grams can be painted with the! same brush, Schultze said. He points to "Day of Discovery," a top 10-rated religious show that alter- nates hosts.

"They have never asked forj money on a single program," Schultze said. "That defies the lo-J gic of these people who assume; you have to use hucksterism and' have a personality cult to raise money." Schultze puts evangelist Billy Graham in a class by himself. Graham's television through the years has been limited to broadcasts of his crusades. his television shows off the air amid allegations that, among other things, requests for prayers were tossed in the trash can after the checks were deposited. "The fact that Tilton was so successful on the heels of the other scandals shows that people don't learn anything," Schultze said.

Schultze sees a "very bright future" for televangelism. For now, the scandals have hurt and an economic recession has further dried up the flow of checks. According to AC. Nielsen, the number of regularly scheduled religious programs shown on over-the-air television dropped from 55 to 39 between 1988 and early 1993. Those carried by at least 100 stations fell from nine to six.

But many televangelists are now buying cheaper time on cable television, where they can target a more-specific audience, Schultze said. Why is there still a market for televangelism? "There is a tremendous religious ignorance in the United States," Schultze said. "There are a lot of people who believe in God, but they have a poor understanding of doctrine and the Bible. We have a religious culture, but a high degree of religious ignorance. I'm not say- ing stupidity, but a high degree of just not knowing." Schultze also said Americans love personalities, whether they are entertainers, sports figures, news anchors or preachers.

"People are less interested in ideas than they are people," he said. "Telerrangelism tends to be personality oriented." Then there's a tendency to believe that the solution is in technology, Schultze said. "This is one of the principal appeals of televangelists," he said. "They say they are going to save the world by getting their message across the world." Ujnumber of homes reached by 'ngeusts oroaacasts nas gone I of history as well as we should." Evangelists have always carried their share of baggage in the minds of some. Aimee Semple McPherson was accused by critics of staging her own kidnapping in the 1920s.

Father (Charles) Coughlin's anti-Semitic and anti-New Deal broadcasts were squelched by the Catholic Church during the 1930s. The latest round of scandal went like this: Bakker went to federal prison for mishandling his followers' contributions. Swaggart was connected with prostitutes and sued for defamation by a rival Louisiana evangelist who claimed that Swaggart was afraid of his planned TV competition. Roberts turned off many with his claim that God would kill him if he didn't raise enough money. Just last month, Robert Tilton, fighting ABC-TV, the Texas attorney general and numerous unhappy contributors in court, pulled iown- uEut don't believe that tele FREE video expression kitl rd ANNUAL vangelists are a thing of the past, says a communications professor who" has extensively studied not only the recent video preachers, rbut -those who go back to the pio-'neer days of radio.

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